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My mother was a member of the Amicale Society. Later, she applied to do the accounting for the Or-ahayim Hospital, a function which my father had been performing. She met my father as he transferred the books to her. My mother fell immediately in love with him, and courtship - in the form of going out together - followed.
As I mentioned earlier, tradition constrained my father from marrying, because he had an unmarried elder sister at home. Nevertheless, with my grandparents' explicit permission, my mother moved to my father's house, and they lived there as husband and wife for five years, at the end of which my aunt decided to get married - so that my father could at last get married, too - and they had a double wedding. I strongly suspect the double event was somewhat precipitated by my mother's pregnancy with me.
When my mother moved to my father's house in Findikli, my grandfather Izak Nassi and my aunt Viktorya lived there, too. My aunt used to do all the housework. When my mother joined the family, the two women started sharing the housework. They used to do the laundry by hand, then climb up to the terrace on the roof to hang it out to dry. All this manual work was difficult for my mother, who had always worked as an accountant and was not accustomed to do such housework.
Every evening, when the men came home from work, the four of them used to go to a pastry shop in Beyoglu to treat themselves to cakes. The cost came to 25 kurush. My mother would say, 'The daily wage of a cleaning woman was 25 kurush. Yet I could never convince them to give up eating those cakes in Beyoglu twice a week, and engage a cleaning lady with that money.' It is about this matter that they first fell out with my aunt.
Mother got married late, at age 36. Before getting married, she converted to Islam, together with my father. According to what she told me, they needed to go to the Mufti together to get the necessary permission. The Mufti asked them why they chose to convert to Islam. They candidly said that it was in order to get Turkish citizenship for my father, who was Romanian. The Mufti signed the necessary permission promptly without giving them a sermon or making the least difficulty. My mother was very impressed with that Mufti's maturity.
As I mentioned earlier, tradition constrained my father from marrying, because he had an unmarried elder sister at home. Nevertheless, with my grandparents' explicit permission, my mother moved to my father's house, and they lived there as husband and wife for five years, at the end of which my aunt decided to get married - so that my father could at last get married, too - and they had a double wedding. I strongly suspect the double event was somewhat precipitated by my mother's pregnancy with me.
When my mother moved to my father's house in Findikli, my grandfather Izak Nassi and my aunt Viktorya lived there, too. My aunt used to do all the housework. When my mother joined the family, the two women started sharing the housework. They used to do the laundry by hand, then climb up to the terrace on the roof to hang it out to dry. All this manual work was difficult for my mother, who had always worked as an accountant and was not accustomed to do such housework.
Every evening, when the men came home from work, the four of them used to go to a pastry shop in Beyoglu to treat themselves to cakes. The cost came to 25 kurush. My mother would say, 'The daily wage of a cleaning woman was 25 kurush. Yet I could never convince them to give up eating those cakes in Beyoglu twice a week, and engage a cleaning lady with that money.' It is about this matter that they first fell out with my aunt.
Mother got married late, at age 36. Before getting married, she converted to Islam, together with my father. According to what she told me, they needed to go to the Mufti together to get the necessary permission. The Mufti asked them why they chose to convert to Islam. They candidly said that it was in order to get Turkish citizenship for my father, who was Romanian. The Mufti signed the necessary permission promptly without giving them a sermon or making the least difficulty. My mother was very impressed with that Mufti's maturity.
Period
Location
Findikli/Rize
Türkiye
Interview
güler orgun