Menahem Josifov

This is a picture of my husband and some colleagues of his at a celebration. He was a chief executive of the Svoboda Association then. The photo was taken in 1971 in Sofia. Young Jews couldn't study at university between 1939-1944. My future husband had to interrupt his education in law at Sofia University. He continued studying after 9th September 1944 but he didn't graduate. It was his own decision not to. He started to work in the choir of the Ministry of Internal Affairs as an announcer. After we married our family financially relied entirely on me. I was very good at my profession as a dressmaker, and I worked with two other girls. Later my husband found prestigious work as deputy general manager of the trade and industry association called Co-operative Union. Even so we were short of money and I continued working. I was very happy and enthusiastic in the first years after 9th September 1944. We had survived the hard times and were safe. Gradually I started to understand what was happening in the country. Many people without any education were privileged and allowed to work in leading positions. My husband's director, for instance, was an illiterate man. My husband was the one who wrote the reports all night long and did all the work for him. I suppose that his Jewish origin was the main reason for that. He also got disappointed with the communist rule, especially after a visit to the Soviet Union. He met a Georgian Jew there who was afraid to tell that he was a Jew. My husband was an extremely honest person, and he truly believed in communism, but he got quickly disappointed with it because of the great injustice of the totalitarian system that stimulated privileges and theft.