Lenka Pinkas after the wedding

This photo of my mother Lenka Pinkas, nee Beraha, was taken in Skopje in 1921 during one of her visits to her parents. She sent it to her parents-in-law in Vidin as a remembrance in January 1921. My mother and her mother-in-law always got on very well. They were a very united family. All the other daughters-in-law who married the three brothers of my father lived together and loved each other very much. My mother was born in Pirot [today in Serbia], but she lived in Skopje [today in Macedonia] with her family. as a very beautiful and intelligent woman. Although she couldn't graduate from high school because of the war, she was clever and sociable. She loved reading books. She was subscribed to the 'Golden Seeds' book collection. We read mostly novels and my mother was the most avid reader of all. When we, the children, started reading, we read different books in Bulgarian - Western European and Bulgarian literature, for example Gorky, Zola or Dostoevsky. My mother was a WIZO activist [Jewish Zionist Women's Organization]; they were not very much involved in politics. They were more interested in cultural, social and charity activities. They organized parties, holiday celebrations, and fancy-dress balls and raised money for the poor. Meanwhile, my mother also kept the house in a perfect state. She was a very good cook and made very nice embroideries. Since my mother didn't work, she was the one who looked after us the most. She valued discipline and order very much. She insisted that we study, read, be honest and good and respect the elderly people. In this respect, I should say that she achieved a lot, because we all respected the elderly people around us.