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When we were living on Yazici Street, my sister was attending the Australian Elementary School located in the Kuledibi neighborhood. When I was five and a half years old, I also started attending pre-school at the Australian Elementary School. I have a memory from those years… We had Sisters in our classrooms as teachers. They would give us cardboards with holes in them, and we were supposed to create different shapes by way of passing thin ropes through those holes. I would sometimes create animal figures, sometimes flower shapes, etc…
I really liked the Austrian School, so I wanted to go there as well for elementary school. In 1936, right when I was about to begin elementary school, Mussolini passed a new law that affected me and my family members. According to this law, all males, who were Italian citizens, had to study at Italian schools worldwide. If not, they risked losing their citizenship when they became eighteen.
Italy was ruled by a Fashist regime in those days. At the boy scouts group, we had our own uniforms with black shirts. We had to wear dark blue khaki pants, black shirts, and triangle-shaped scarves. The scarves had Mussolini’s emblem carved onto them. On top of these, we had to wear black hats, which also had Mussolini’s emblem at the front. The hat had a pompom hanging down from its right side – just like the ones on the fez [old hats worn during the reign of the Ottoman Empire]. Every Wednesday and Saturday afternoon, the school would be out of session, and so we would go the Casa D’Italia Locale, wearing these uniforms.
I really liked the Austrian School, so I wanted to go there as well for elementary school. In 1936, right when I was about to begin elementary school, Mussolini passed a new law that affected me and my family members. According to this law, all males, who were Italian citizens, had to study at Italian schools worldwide. If not, they risked losing their citizenship when they became eighteen.
Italy was ruled by a Fashist regime in those days. At the boy scouts group, we had our own uniforms with black shirts. We had to wear dark blue khaki pants, black shirts, and triangle-shaped scarves. The scarves had Mussolini’s emblem carved onto them. On top of these, we had to wear black hats, which also had Mussolini’s emblem at the front. The hat had a pompom hanging down from its right side – just like the ones on the fez [old hats worn during the reign of the Ottoman Empire]. Every Wednesday and Saturday afternoon, the school would be out of session, and so we would go the Casa D’Italia Locale, wearing these uniforms.
Period
Location
/İstanbul
Türkiye
Interview
Enrico Modiano