Wedding picture

My wedding is March 15th, 1953. We wake up with a snowstorm in the morning. My mother takes me to the hamam to take a ritual bath, because we are getting married. Later on we came home, the hairdresser came, fixed my hair. While we were worried that no one would show up because of the morning snowstorm, the sun came out in the afternoon and the weather cleared. The wedding took place in the Zülfaris synagogue. Afterwards we came home and in the evening, there was the Universal Hotel close to the 6th public office, we went there and stayed there one night. The next morning we went to my sister-in-law’s house, the post-wedding event took place there. The next evening we went to our home. At the time we married in poverty. We found our house a month before our wedding. My mother had given 1,000 Turkish liras as dowry then. We furnished our house with that money. The house had 2 rooms. We used one as a sitting and bedroom, the other as the livingroom. We had a large divan and a table in the livingroom. We also had a big radio, it was very valuable at that time. We had a bathroom but no kitchen, I had converted the hallway into a kitchen. At first, when we just got married, we were friends with his older brother. His brother had 2 apartments, when I gave birth to my older son, we moved to one, they moved to the other. We had a very close relationship with them and the neighbors. In the meantime my husband bought a car, we had such wonderful days with that car. Our days passed with wonderful, sweet conversations, with songs, with strolls. My sister and brother-in-law were talented in vaudeville. Those laughters were life-affirming. Our husbands worked on Sundays too. We women had a great time, we would prepare tea, cakes, everything for our husbands when they came home. There was no financial discord among us. The in-laws were rich, we were so-so but we got along well. We lived in their apartment. Much later on, there appeared a lack of harmony among siblings. Things like I want to go to this place, I don't want to go to that place. My husband suggested taking a break and not socializing as friends so that the brotherhood would not be affected. After these events we had another circle of friends. We had lovely days and evenings with them also. We always went to the movies, theatre, and concerts. We spent our summers in Büyükada [the largest one of the Princess Islands]. We had a house there, we went every year.