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This is my wedding photo, taken on 1st March 1944. It was taken in the building where we all lived. As you can see on the photo everyone but me wears the humiliating yellow stars. I do not wear it by accident.
From left to right are my uncle Avram Farhi and his wife Mari Farhi, who were our witnesses at the ceremony. Next to them are I and my wife, Berta. They were our sponsors. At that time Berta and I lived at their place on Rakovski Street in the Jewish neighborhood in Shumen. We lived there temporarily because I was interned with my whole family in Shumen.
After the wedding in Shumen Berta and I packed our rucksacks in order to escape to another place, but the illegal organization of the Workers’ Party in Shumen insisted that we stay. The reason was that they did not have any people, whom they could trust to hide them. So, Berta and I took that risk and remained in Shumen until the end of the Holocaust.
The deputy commander of the Shumen partisan squad, Stoian Radoslavov, speaking about his memories of the events before 9th September 1944 still adds, ‘Only three secure Jewish apartments had remained: that of the Kalaora family, of Albert Basat and of Baruh Grimberg.’ And it was true that there were only three apartments that could be used as hiding places, because all the others had been arrested and sent to the labor camp in Enikioy, Xanthi region.
