This is a photo taken in front of our house in Sofia. The windows you see are of the room in which we lived. The photo was taken in 1972. Standing on the left is Jana Geron, nee Kohen, in the middle is Sami Polikar and a nephew of my sister - Nichko Komfort. Sami graduated Russian philology and is a journalist. They are relatives of my sister's husband whose name is Rahamim Komfort. The girl below is Rina and now lives in the Netherlands.
My grandfather's house was on 12 Slivnitsa Street. Later the street was renamed to 7 Gyueshevo Street. Our house was made of adobe and at first it had only one room and an entrance hall. Later another room was added as well as another extension, which was the house of my uncle Rafael Kohen. My father's elder brother Eliya Kohen also lived in that yard. His house was the most solid one. My father Mihael Kohen took a half of one of my grandfather's rooms and enlarged it. He also built another room with a small entrance hall where he lived with his family. There were some inconveniences. The toilets were outside and we had no running water inside. There was a tap on the street which we used. We had electricity. Later we had running water in the yard, but not in the house. The street, on which we lived became all muddy when it rained. And so did most of the streets in the Jewish neighborhood.
I have two daughters - Rina Kohen and Jana Geron. Rina graduated the secondary polytechnical school in Sofia. She works in accounting. My other daughter Jana has a degree in statistics from the Economy Institute and works in the Statistics Institute. She is married to Mishel Geron and has two sons - Emil and Mihael.
In 1962-63 as employees of design organizations my wife and I were able to get a flat. We lived there until 1985 when blocks of flats were built on the site of the house where we were born and we received a flat in one of them. When my daughter Jana married, my wife and I went to live there.
