A wedding

A wedding

This is a photo of the wedding of my cousin Ceni. Ceni is the bride standing at the back, in the center of the photo. On the very left you can see my mother’s sister, my aunt Rasel Beraha. Beside her is her husband whose first name I can’t remember. They are marrying their daughter Ceni that day. Behind my aunt Rasel, stands her son, Ceni’s brother, and the lady sitting in the fron row on the right is his wife. The little girl Mr. Beraha is holding is the daughter of this latter couple.

Ceni married Ruben. We still see each other with this cousin of mine. We take care of each other. Ruben became the owner of a textile shop called Rubo in Osmanbey [a district in the European side of Istanbul]. Two years ago when the underground constructions started in that particular district, his business started to suffer so they closed it and he retired.

My mother Fortune Adevah, was born in Istanbul, in 1882. My mother had 10 sisters, and one brother. I remember some of their names: Luiza (f), Roza (f), Recina (f), Ester (f), Rasel (f). My mother was the most beautiful one amongst the 10 sisters. All of these sisters except for Rasel, and their brother Bension emigrated to the States and got married there, when I was only about 10 years old. I remember them vaguely. The only memory I have left from them is that sometimes they used to send 10 dollars in an envelope as a present to my mother. I used to exchange these dollars into Turkish liras. At that time, one dollar was 180 kurus. [one lira = 100 kurus]

From my aunts, Esther, went to Cuba from the States. She married someone named Baruh. They had two daughters. (I don't know the name of her husband, nor her daughters' names.)

My aunt Luiza married someone whose surname was Biton in the US, and had a son named Rafael. Rafael Biton was a taxi driver. He came to Istanbul during 1935. He found us and stayed over at our house for a week. We were the same age, and had a very nice time together. Later on we lost each other again.

Their brother Bensiyon got married in the USA and came to Istanbul for his honeymoon. He and his wife stayed with us and we had a few days together. The after they went back, we lost each other again.

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