A postcard sent from Buko Lidgi to Elvira Lidgi (nee Beniesh)

This is a postcard sent from my dad Buko Lidgi while he was studying in Switzerland to my mother Elvira Beniesh. On the back of the card in ink and with tiny letters the following text had been written:

‘Elvira!
You shouldn't think that I have forgotten you! No, I will probably remember you for long years to come. You have done nothing bad to me but the good people have. And you are listening to them although what they say is not true but you were afraid to walk together with me on the road of life. You would have been happy because there had been mutual love. And where there is love, there is happiness. But let it be as you wish. Let God help you and always be with you. But you made me start writing these lines because yesterday I got three letters that had been sent three months ago. Why are you returning them? What has happened? On the envelope it is written "sender unknown". So, you don't live there anymore or you have just decided to return my letters. I realize that what I am doing is insolent but I always crave to hear something good from you. Excuse my intrusiveness, forgive me - B. Lidgi.
Don't be surprised if I drop a line or two every now and again but please at least don't deprive me of this pleasure.’

This is the small handwriting of my father - a bookkeeper. The postcard was probably written between 1920 and 1923 when he persistently wooed my mother.

My mother told me that in order to get separated from the heavy atmosphere in the family in the 1920s, she went to visit a distant relative from grandpa Itzhak's kin, whose name was Tiyasumha. She lived in Vidin. In the house next door lived my father's family. At that time he was in Switzerland but had come back to ask permission from his parents to propose to a Swiss girl. He saw my mother and some emotions arose in him. He felt attracted by her modesty, by her unostentatious presence. He went back to Switzerland but his desire to marry the Swiss girl had faded. He started writing letters to my mother all the time but she didn't respond because, at the beginning, she had a friendship with a Bulgarian man. His name was Stephan. At a certain moment there occurred some cooling in the relationship caused by the boy - a Bulgarian and only then did my mother write to my father that she was ready to accept his proposal. My father had proposed on several occasions in his letters but she rejected him, he even had a very valuable ring, which he wanted to give her. My mother didn't accept it because she was very proud and considered this as a kind of commitment. This ring used to be something really remarkable, but unfrotunately it was stolen from him in Romania. So they got engaged regardless of her difficult financial situation. She didn't even have a dowry - ashougar. They managed to get engaged - the engagement took place on 3rd September 1923.