Klara Perahya after her daughter Elsa's birth

Klara Perahya after her daughter Elsa's birth

This is my second wife, Klara, in her puerperal bed, ?Kama de Parida" at the Pakize Hospital in Sisli, looking with ?maternal? affection at our new born daughter Elsa. Klara's mother, my mother-in-law , Fortune Mazaltov Angel can be seen on her left and my sister Anna Abaruh and Anna's daughter Liliane are sitting to her right. The photo was taken in Istanbul in 1951. My first wife Elsa and I had such wonderful days; however, very unfortunately, Elsa died of cancer in 1949, in spite of all the efforts by the renowned physician Dr. Barbut. I was a widower with two children. Although we lived together as a family I was feeling the absence of a wife very dearly. In 1951, my then-sister-in-law, Klara, and I decided to get married. Our wedding ceremony was very plain and simple. After kissing our mothers' hands I went out with Klara to get married in the City Marriage Office with two witnesses we found there. After the wedding took place, we took the rabbi of the Kal de los Frankos Synagogue on Sahsuvar Street, who was also on duty at the Hemdat le Avram Synagogue in the summer months, and we went to Buyukada by boat. He performed our wedding ceremony under the hupa, only in front of a minyan. We had our honeymoon for one week on Buyukada. The same year Klara had a daughter whom we named Elsa, in memory of my late wife. Klara being a generous and selfless person raised all three kids together treating them completely equally. I'm so grateful to her.
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