Aleksandar Mosic as a boy

Photo of me as a boy. Photo was taken in Belgrade, 1923.

For my own reasons I will begin presenting myself from an unusual perspective. I have my own name, family name which appears in all my documents but I also have a nickname, Fredi, by which I am known to all my friends. You probably sensed that I pronounced that in the German manner, the Viennese pronunciation, that is because my mother was Viennese and my father a Belgradian. My mother was Ashkenazi and my father Sephardi. He was even a fifth generation Belgrade Sephard. When I was born I was given the name Avram. Later, during WWII, I was forced to change that name to Aleksandar. 

I remember best the period between the two world wars. We played in Dorcol among ourselves and we did not care at all who was of which religion or nationality, in general we knew each other by nicknames. In the school where I studied in close proximity to the Sabor church there were a lot of Jewish students. Around 30 students were in the grade, and if someone was called Adanja, and someone Mosic or Bararon they were Jews, but as was said earlier we knew each other by nicknames and no one paid attention who was of which religion and we did all this playing in Kalemegdan. There were also harmless children's fights between the students of Realka and the First Male Gymnasium, but there were no injuries. That was how territory was possessed and they were child's play that is played in every neighborhood in every city and in retrospect it is very cute. I knew all the kids from my generation in Dorcol.