My son moved to Israel in 1990. He studied the language in the town of Akko for six months. Then he started work in the village of my brother Lazar near Akko. He started work in a chemical laboratory in Beer Sheva. He had an accident there. One night he went to check something in the lab. Just at that moment something started hissing and there was an explosion. In order to save himself, Rami jumped out of the fourth floor and injured his foot badly. There are Jews all over the world living in that town. My son, however, didn't manage to become close with them, because they had a different lifestyle.
- Traditions 11756
- Language spoken 3019
- Identity 7808
- Description of town 2440
- Education, school 8506
- Economics 8772
- Work 11672
- Love & romance 4929
- Leisure/Social life 4159
- Antisemitism 4822
-
Major events (political and historical)
4256
- Armenian genocide 2
- Doctor's Plot (1953) 178
- Soviet invasion of Poland 31
- Siege of Leningrad 86
- The Six Day War 4
- Yom Kippur War 2
- Ataturk's death 5
- Balkan Wars (1912-1913) 35
- First Soviet-Finnish War 37
- Occupation of Czechoslovakia 1938 83
- Invasion of France 9
- Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact 65
- Varlik Vergisi (Wealth Tax) 36
- First World War (1914-1918) 216
- Spanish flu (1918-1920) 14
- Latvian War of Independence (1918-1920) 4
- The Great Depression (1929-1933) 20
- Hitler comes to power (1933) 127
- 151 Hospital 1
- Fire of Thessaloniki (1917) 9
- Greek Civil War (1946-49) 12
- Thessaloniki International Trade Fair 5
- Annexation of Bukovina to Romania (1918) 7
- Annexation of Northern Bukovina to the Soviet Union (1940) 19
- The German invasion of Poland (1939) 94
- Kishinev Pogrom (1903) 7
- Romanian Annexation of Bessarabia (1918) 25
- Returning of the Hungarian rule in Transylvania (1940-1944) 43
- Soviet Occupation of Bessarabia (1940) 59
- Second Vienna Dictate 27
- Estonian war of independence 3
- Warsaw Uprising 2
- Soviet occupation of the Balitc states (1940) 147
- Austrian Civil War (1934) 9
- Anschluss (1938) 71
- Collapse of Habsburg empire 3
- Dollfuß Regime 3
- Emigration to Vienna before WWII 36
- Kolkhoz 131
- KuK - Königlich und Kaiserlich 40
- Mineriade 1
- Post War Allied occupation 7
- Waldheim affair 5
- Trianon Peace Treaty 12
- NEP 56
- Russian Revolution 351
- Ukrainian Famine 199
- The Great Terror 283
- Perestroika 233
- 22nd June 1941 468
- Molotov's radio speech 115
- Victory Day 147
- Stalin's death 365
- Khrushchev's speech at 20th Congress 148
- KGB 62
- NKVD 153
- German occupation of Hungary (18-19 March 1944) 45
- Józef Pilsudski (until 1935) 33
- 1956 revolution 84
- Prague Spring (1968) 73
- 1989 change of regime 174
- Gomulka campaign (1968) 81
-
Holocaust
9685
- Holocaust (in general) 2789
- Concentration camp / Work camp 1235
- Mass shooting operations 337
- Ghetto 1183
- Death / extermination camp 647
- Deportation 1063
- Forced labor 791
- Flight 1410
- Hiding 594
- Resistance 121
- 1941 evacuations 866
- Novemberpogrom / Kristallnacht 34
- Eleftherias Square 10
- Kasztner group 1
- Pogrom in Iasi and the Death Train 21
- Sammelwohnungen 9
- Strohmann system 11
- Struma ship 17
- Life under occupation 803
- Yellow star house 72
- Protected house 15
- Arrow Cross ("nyilasok") 42
- Danube bank shots 6
- Kindertransport 26
- Schutzpass / false papers 95
- Warsaw Ghetto Uprising (1943) 24
- Warsaw Uprising (1944) 23
- Helpers 521
- Righteous Gentiles 269
- Returning home 1090
- Holocaust compensation 112
- Restitution 109
- Property (loss of property) 595
- Loss of loved ones 1724
- Trauma 1029
- Talking about what happened 1807
- Liberation 558
- Military 3322
- Politics 2640
-
Communism
4468
- Life in the Soviet Union/under Communism (in general) 2592
- Anti-communist resistance in general 63
- Nationalization under Communism 221
- Illegal communist movements 98
- Systematic demolitions under communism 45
- Communist holidays 311
- Sentiments about the communist rule 930
- Collectivization 94
- Experiences with state police 349
- Prison/Forced labor under communist/socialist rule 449
- Lack or violation of human and citizen rights 483
- Life after the change of the regime (1989) 493
- Israel / Palestine 2190
- Zionism 847
- Jewish Organizations 1200
Displaying 8671 - 8700 of 50826 results
Bina Dekalo
After that my son started working in a laboratory testing nuclear energy. There he was assigned the task to develop a plan for the utilization of prescribed doses of nuclear energy in some machine. Many teams had tried before, but unsuccessfully. My son, however, managed to do it. Everybody congratulated him and he was told that he would receive an award of 800 levs, which wasn't a small sum at that time. But the board of directors decided to spend the money on a banquet. My son was very hurt, because he had devoted a lot of months to this project. So, he decided to leave the job and move to Israel.
My son Rami studied in a Bulgarian school in Sofia. After that he graduated from the Chemical and Technological Institute. He had to do some training and was appointed in a tire-producing factory, which was a Jewish one and was called Bakish. He was an ordinary worker there.
I worked in Zemlyane until 1972. After that I gave private lessons in Ivrit to children and students of Bulgarian and Jewish origin and wrote for the Evreiski Vesti newspaper [a monthly newspaper, published by the Jewish community in Bulgaria Shalom]. The editors there liked my style very much. They published some of my short stories and feature articles.
During the communist rule we observed the Jewish traditions to a lesser extent. I always observed Rosh Hashanah, Pesach and some of the other holidays. When I wanted to celebrate some of our holidays at home, I let my management know and they even gave me a day off. On the whole, when I lived with my parents we observed the Jewish rituals and traditions. When my husband and I went to live on our own, we weren't often able to do that, because I was devoted to my work in the district committee of the Communist Party.
I'm very grateful to my husband for helping me with the household work. He did the shopping and sometimes cooked. When I wasn't at home, he took care of everything. We found enough free time for some cultural activities. We didn't miss a new performance by the Ivan Vasov state theatre and by the youth theatre. I liked very much the repertoire of the youth theatre, because it was more modern. At that time theatre tickets were very cheap, much cheaper than now. I went to the cinema very rarely.
During the communist rule I visited the best holiday resorts. Together with my husband and my son I loved spending holidays at the seaside, mostly in August. There were a lot of organized excursions by the district committee of the party. We visited historic and natural sights throughout the whole country - monasteries, resorts, and towns.
After 9th September 1944 I was very happy. Firstly, the Law for the Protection of the Nation was abolished. We became citizens with equal rights of the so-called 'people's republic' of Bulgaria. Party groups and district organizations were formed. I joined the party organization in my living estate - at that time I lived on Veslets Street, which is in the center of Sofia. I was wholly devoted to my work in the Lenin District Committee of the Communist Party. The main task of the district committees of the Communist Party was to strengthen the new model of government, which was expressed in the dominance of the Communist Party. My work was a social one. We organized lectures in Marxism and Leninism; we introduced people to the statute of the Bolshevik Party in Russia. They liked me and wanted to transfer me to the city committee of the party. But there wasn't enough staff in my district committee so I stayed there.
In 1950 I started working in the Lenin District Committee of the Communist Party, firstly in the business department, later in the department for campaigns and propaganda. But I was overloaded with work there and my husband and I decided that I should quit that job, because I couldn't bear the stress. We went for a long holiday at the seaside. After I recovered, I started work as a clerk in a workshop producing metals named Vaptsarov. Then I went to the Zemlyane construction plant. I was appointed party secretary there. I worked there with a colonel, who was about to retire and all the time passed most of the work to me. I found all that very hard, because I had household work to do, too.
My husband wasn't very pleased with his work, because he preferred social sciences and art to trade. The leadership of the Communist Party, however, thought that since he was a Jew, he understood more about trade and didn't make him head of a department. My husband was a great idealist, for example, he didn't want us to buy an apartment, because he thought that he didn't fight for that. But I saw what life really was and what the others were doing and I bought the apartment in the Mousagenitsa living estate in which I live today.
My second husband was born in Bourgas. He joined the Union of Young Workers [UYW] [14] at an early age. His whole family was very poor and they were all communists. My husband was in prison because of his anti-fascist activities in the 1940s. After 9th September 1944 he was released. Afterwards he returned for a short time to Bourgas and then came to Sofia. We met in Sofia and we married. We rented a small apartment on Ekzarh Yosif Street in the center of the town.
In 1948 I married Mois Dekalo. We met in Sofia in the Lenin regional committee of the Bulgarian Communist Party. We had a civic marriage. He regarded the Jewish rituals as old-fashioned. He was a wise man, but he wasn't religious. On the issue of the establishment of a Jewish state, he thought that the Jewish people must have their own state. Only I was interested in Judaic issues.
Before 9th September 1944 the supporters of communist ideas were divided into two groups. One we called 'the real communists'. They distributed leaflets, carried out sabotages and attacks. I was a member of the sympathizing groups, which weren't given very hard and responsible tasks. I started to support these ideas when I was 13 years old. At that time we lived in Lom. There was a lawyer there whose name was Asher Levi. He had a remarkable appearance. He walked around with a black 'rubashka' [a coat without lapels with buttons from top to bottom] and a golden necklace with two tassels. He had wild hair, which he combed backwards. He was the 'flag' of the communists in Lom. He was a Jew and he organized meetings in the Jewish school in Lom. There he managed to form a group of sympathizers to the communists, which I also joined. When the Law for the Protection of the Nation was passed the whole country was flooded with leaflets against this law. The communists did this.
The first years after 9th September 1944 were, on the whole, poor. We didn't have much money then. The situation in Bulgaria was such that we all received rations for bread. The Joint organization helped the Jews a lot then. An American representative of the organization arrived in Sofia and brought us many new and second-hand clothes, powder milk and canned food. Then gradually the country stabilized. After the Central Committee of the Communist Party was founded and established itself as leader of the nation, the Joint organization was banished from the country, because they thought that their representative was a foreign agent. All property of the organization was given away to senior homes and other places. Joint had brought to Sofia knitting and sowing machines to give the Jews employment.
After 9th September 1944 Eli Ashkenazi, who was a lawyer, but was very interested in scholarly issues, founded the Balkan Studies Institute in Sofia. There was a project in the institute to teach all Balkan languages and Ivrit. I was appointed there to teach Ivrit.
Shortly after 9th September 1944 a Jewish cultural and educational organization was established in Sofia. I started working there. This organization solved various problems - accommodating people, who had been interned and returned to Sofia, distributing clothes and food received from the Joint [13] organization. I was very eager to continue my education in the conservatory, but everything I had experienced during the Holocaust, the hunger and deprivations, had affected my vocal capabilities and I could no longer sing in the high pitch range.
I remember that once a Soviet plane had made an emergency landing in Haskovo. The pilot was very surprised that people welcomed him with flowers. He was hidden away by the communist organization. After some time 9th September 1944 came, which was a joyous day for all. On that day we were told that we were free and we took the badges off. Everybody was very happy and we walked freely outside. After the internment to Haskovo, I went to live on Veslets Street in Sofia.
There was an illegal communist organization in Haskovo. I was in touch with this organization. I started meeting members of this organization, because I sympathized with the communist ideas. There were many Jews in the illegal communist organizations at that time. I remember that the police caught one member of our organization and after they beat him up, he told them the names of most members. He omitted only my name. There was a trial and sentences. There was one Jew from Plovdiv, who was killed without a trial and sentence. Others were sentenced to life imprisonment. But they were released the same year, because 9th September 1944 [12] came. Others saved themselves by escaping to the partisan squads. On 9th September 1944 they came down from the mountain and were welcomed with flowers.
In Haskovo the Jewish women were allowed to arrange fruits at the train station and the men dug hiding places for the army near the town's hills. There was a synagogue in Haskovo and a very rich Jewish family lived near it. They gave us delicious food - buns and chocolate. When I was in the school, a Turkish family brought us food for the child. A boy also brought us some food from home. I had sold everything I had at the black market - clothes, shoes, and cloths. But the money was spent very quickly. There were some good people, and if it hadn't been for them I don't know how I could have coped. My brother Jacques and his wife had some money saved, which helped them. In the school yard there was a cauldron, in which beans were cooked every evening.
In the spring of 1944 my mother and I were interned [see Internment of Jews in Bulgaria] [11] to the town of Haskovo [a town in Southeast Bulgaria]. My brother Sami was with us, too. At first we were accommodated in the school, and then an order came that we could rent an apartment in a specific living estate. So, I managed to find a small room where we settled. It was great poverty. We didn't have a bath and we had to go to the town's bath. And to reach it, we had to violate the ban to enter other living estates. We had no right to go out and walk around.
In the meantime, after the Law for the Protection of the Nation was passed in 1939, we were given badges and a signboard with a yellow star was put on the door of our house. The situation of the Jews grew worse. At first we were registered in the municipality. There the clerks treated us very badly. They created a commissariat for the Jewish issue and a plan for our deportation to Poland. When we heard that, my Jewish friends and I went to the Turkish mosque, because we planned to accept the Islam religion and save ourselves. This was a stupid decision and of course the imam dissuaded us. The authorities had issued an order that Jews shouldn't go out after 9pm, but the Bulgarians helped us and we could walk more freely. The commissariat decided to send the men to labor camps [see forced labor camps in Bulgaria] [10]. There was also one group who were sent to a prisoner's camp in Kaylaka near Pleven. The building of this camp was set on fire and some people burned to death, while others managed to save themselves.
In 1941 we had a son, Rami. We lived in our house with my mother who looked after the child. At that time I worked in a socks production factory. However, I didn't know that he was a member of an illegal communist group. In 1942 he disappeared with a group of Jews and until 1950 I knew nothing about him. Then I found out from my brothers in Israel that he had abandoned us and I was very hurt. I learned that he regretted leaving his family very much and that he didn't stay in Bulgaria where the Jews were saved. While running to Palestine, he passed through a lot of places where he saw horrible massacres of Jews. I heard that he had met a family and started seeing another woman. I don't know what happened to him after that.
In 1938 I married my first husband, Israel Vasser, who was a secretary of the spiritual council in the central synagogue. Our love was great, especially his. We married in the synagogue, where a chazzan read the wedding prayers and the rabbi was present as an honorary guest. Both my husband and his father were very devoted to our religion. They didn't eat food other than kosher. The ritual required that the dowry be presented first - usually this is money the bride's family gives to the groom's family. We didn't have a civil marriage.
In Sofia I worked as a shop assistant and tried to help with what I could, because the money was never enough. I enrolled to study singing in the conservatory. I was admitted to study dramatic soprano. The director of the conservatory advised me to take additional singing lessons and his wife Ruth Tsankova, who was German, became my tutor. I didn't graduate from the conservatory, because the Law for the Protection of the Nation was passed and I was expelled, because I was a Jew.
Around 1935 my parents and I moved to live in Sofia. My brother Marco who supported us decided to leave for Israel and we decided to leave Lom. In Sofia we rented a house at the corner of Hristo Botev Blvd. and St. Cyril and Methodius Street. [The western part of the center close to the Jewish neighborhood of the town.] It was a two-storied house with a ground floor. We had to climb some stairs with iron railings. The house was old, but beautiful. There was one more Jewish family on the upper floor. My father died in 1936 in this house and was buried in the Jewish cemetery.
We lived in Rousse for around two years. I studied in the high school there in my 1st and 2nd grade after the four elementary grades in the Jewish school in Yambol. And since there was no one to support us my brother Marco called us to live with him in the town of Lom [a small town in northern Bulgaria also on the Danube coast], where he had settled. I continued to study there in the local Bulgarian high school. There I had a music teacher, Motsev, who had formed a choir, in which I took part. He liked my singing and advised me to apply in the conservatory and study singing.
Life in Yambol was very nice. We all lived very happily. But at the end of the 1920s the country fell into a grave economic crisis [see crisis of the 1930s] [9]. As a result, my father's business declined and he went bankrupt. He had to support his big family by himself and that wasn't easy. So in 1929 my father had to sell the house and our whole family moved to live in Rousse [a town on the Danube in Northern Bulgaria]. My father decided to build a factory producing bedsprings with the money he had left. He took for a partner an Ashkenazi Jew named Berkovich. I remember that he came to our house, which we had rented and we were impressed by the fact that he ate lots of sausages and threw their peelings on the floor. My mother would ask him politely not to do that. My father, however, understood nothing of this business and went bankrupt very quickly. This was a hard blow for him and he went down with a very serious sclerosis. After the bankruptcy our brothers supported us and we sold some more valuable things. My mother had a very nice gold necklace and a watch, which she sold. In the meantime, my brothers from my father's first marriage married and found work.
My father was selected chairman of the General Zionists in Yambol. He was a gifted speaker and held speeches at the meetings, which took place in front of our house. He told the people about Theodor Herzl [8] and his book 'The Jewish State' and about the buying of lands from the Arabs in Palestine. For his successful social activities he was awarded a medal from the leadership of the General Zionists. I remember that we were very proud of this medal. My mother hid it in the wardrobe wrapped in a golden cloth and on Yom Ashekel she brought it out and my father put it on his lapel.
We also had a holiday called slichot. Then we didn't sleep all night and we went to the synagogue precisely at 12 o'clock at midnight. I remember people going to the synagogue during the night and the whole street leading to it turning black with them. We had a very good time. We loved slichot and my mother held us by the hand while going to the synagogue. 'Slichot' means evening prayers to God before a holiday. [Editor's note: the interviewee mixes up some information because slichot is special order of service consisting of non-statutory additional prayers which are recited on all fast days, on occasions of special intercession and during the Penitential season which begins before Rosh Hashanah and concludes with the Day of Atonement.] We went to evening prayers before Rosh Hashanah. I think on the occasion of slichot we went for a number of consecutive nights. At that time no Jew was sleeping and we all gathered in the synagogue.
Even today I still light candles on Chanukkah. It wasn't a practice to exchange presents on Chanukkah. On that occasion we would light one candle each day for seven days and an eighth candle was always burning for the shammash. The shammash was the servant in the synagogue who kept watch on the candle all the time.