Tag #122937 - Interview #78508 (Mayer Rafael Alhalel)

The idea was for the truck to drive us from Lovech to Pleven. But it so happened that the truck transported us to Pleven on 8th September 1944, right in front of the prison, just when the political prisoners were being freed. Then our Vidin group decided that we all should go to Vidin and only I should stay in Cherven Bryag. My sister Lea was married in Cherven Bryag. Her husband’s name was Yosef Helfon. I had to stay at their place, because the military command was in Pleven and I could go there if we needed some documents legalizing the release of those of us who had escaped. Marko Primov returned to Vidin with the group. Also in that group were my friends Haim Paparo, Isak Benaroy and some of my other classmates. We all studied in the same class in the only high school in Vidin at that time: ‘Tsar Simeon Veliki’ [Tsar Simeon the Great]. So, we had been together since childhood. We had also been sent to the same labor camps, so we had always been friends. We equally shared all the food and clothes we had received from our relatives.