Tag #128280 - Interview #96751 (Klara Kohen)

Jews lived in a community. The richer ones brought to the poorer ones hens during holidays; people used to help each other. There was a synagogue, a chazzan and a shochet, but no rabbi. Kosher meat was eaten. Lambs were also slaughtered and the internal organs were provided for the chazzan. That was before 9th September 1944; after that these rituals weren’t performed. Bar mitzvah and brit milah were celebrated. There wasn’t a separate Jewish neighborhood in Stara Zagora and the typical Jewish professions were various: there was a bank director and an accountant, there were also a lot of craftsmen such as tinsmiths, leather-workers, butchers ... My father had his own workshop for the production of beds. There was a Jew who was a car-mechanic, and there were traders. But it is not true that the Jews were rich – most of them were poor. Maybe there were around ten people who were well off; the rest were quite poor.