Josif Sadikario

This is my father Josif Sadikario. This picture was taken for fake papers. All the Jews had their pictures taken for passports, fake papers. Fake passports were to be issued as if we were Serbs, even though we were not. This was not Serbia, it was Bulgaria. So that they could expell us, as though we were foreigners. [Editor's Note: This photo was more likely taken by the Bulgarian authorities in the first half of 1942 for identification purposes. Source: www.ushmm.org]. My father sold leather in Bitola before the war. He was a very good man. While we were little he spent a lot of time with us. He knew the Torah and Talmud very well. Imagine, he read Aramaic and Talmudic books and translated them into Ladino. He had a lot of Talmudic books. He did not speak Hebrew, but he could translate it He wore regular clothes, not Turkish ones. He wore a hat all the time; he only took it off when he slept. My father had a beard and never shaved it. The way it grew, that was it. Since he was religious he didn't shave, according to the Jewish law. He smoked a lot. On Sabbath when he could not smoke he was sleepy. I would ask 'What is the matter?' and he would answer, 'Sabbath, no smoking.' He was smoking one and before he finished he already had the next one ready. He rolled his own cigarettes. Almost everyone smoked back then. The younger you were the less you smoked. All the old people smoked and rolled the tutun, Turkish for tobacco, themselves. My father was killed in Treblinka.