Eli and Vilma Finanser

These are my aunt and uncle, Eli and Vilma Finanser, while they were engaged, in Kalpazankaya, Burgaz. The photo was taken in 1947. My mother had eight siblings. As she was the third child, she saw her mother pregnant most of the time and helped raise many of her siblings. She took so much care of her brother Eli, who was 18 years younger, that she loved him more like a son than a brother. She would tell me, 'He is not your uncle, he is your brother.' As I was an only child, this is how I came to have an uncle/brother. Eli Finanser attended the St. Benoit French School. He had a wholesale business of pharmacy equipment. He was married to Vilma Bubic and had two daughters, Etel and Rozi, both of whom attended the Ste. Pulchérie French School. Rozi then went on to the St. Michel Lycée and the Academy of Fine Arts, where she studied Textile Designing. Eli died in Istanbul in 1997. His wife and daughters still live here.

Photos from this interviewee