Sonia Grigorova with her father Aron Ishakh


This is my older daughter Sonia Grigorova, nee Ishakh, together with her father, Aron Ishakh. The photo was taken in Ruse in 2003. 

I have two daughters: Sonia, born in 1946, and Roza, born in 1953. My elder daughter graduated from the mechanical technical school ‘Yuriy Gagarin’ in Ruse and now works for ‘Shalom,’ being also the chairwoman of the economy commission at ‘Shalom.’ She is in charge of the collecting of rents from the organization’s estates that were let. These funds go for support to the local Jewish organization.

My elder daughter’s family name is Grigorova. Her son, Aron, lives in Ramat Gan and in 2004 he became father of a son, whose name is Ben. I am very sad I am not around him in Israel now, so that I can at least get a glimpse of my great-grandson.

Aron graduated from a commercial and industrial management college and is a certified engineer. He works for a company and they are very satisfied with him. Before that his name was Roman, because there was a regulation in socialist times that children from mixed marriages were Bulgarians and they could not have foreign names.

Before 1989, everybody had a job, the society was calm, everybody could build his own home. My family was even in the possession of a plot of land where we grew okra and grapes for making wine. This unemployment has affected the other part of my family: my grandson, Sonia’s son, is jobless, so is my daughter-in-law. It is paradoxical how we reached to a situation when my husband and I have to help them out with money from our pensions; to help them with our advice and to take care of them.