But, despite these two tragedies, Dora was to tell me years later, after the remaining four siblings had died from unnatural causes, that her childhood years in Edirne where the best of her life. Many tales I heard of a big white house filled with heavy carved furniture, fragrance of freshly baked savories and cakes, and the sounds of Boulissou's prayers and blessing. For it is said in the family that she was a saint; not a negative word was ever uttered from her mouth. She was the daughter of the Farhi's, wealthy tobacco growers - 'toutoungis' - in Haskovo, Bulgaria. Dora told me of holidays spent in the house of her uncles with tea served in a winter garden under a wrought iron atrium filled with exotic birds and plants and of outings in an open Bugati. She associated Bulgaria with the fragrance of leather, tobacco and roses.
In Edirne the neighbors of Haim and Boulissou Behmoiras where the Farhi's ' not related, but the editor of the Jewish newspaper, 'La Voz de la Verdad'. When I was in my teens (in Israel) I discovered that my art teacher was the grandson of those editors. He arranged a meeting with his mother and his aunt, two charming ladies in their seventies who lived in Jaffa. These two sisters confirmed what my mother had told me about her family. Yes, indeed it was true that Boulissou was a doer of good deeds, sending my mother to the hospitals with parcels of Michloah Manot on the holidays of Purim, and inviting the poor and waifs to her home for the Sedder Pessah, sitting them around the family table which was topped with refined embroidered linen tablecloths, fine china and silver. The Farhi sisters remembered Boulissou Behmoiras, as a highly respected woman among the Jewish community of Edirne, loved by all.
Haim Behmoiras, her husband and my grandfather, whom I never met (nor did I meet Boulissou who died a year before my birth) was a grain merchant, as far as my mother's stories went. She had very little to say about him, bar that he had rosy cheeks and that he never raised his voice in the house; one look of him was enough to tame each one of the children. Only recently my cousin Maggie (who lives in Connecticut) shared an anecdote about Haim, who was her grandfather too. He used to come to visit her parents' home with a big bag of lollies which he gave ceremoniously to her brother Jacques (two years her junior). She recalls one occasion when she protested 'and what about me? I want lollies too!' Haim answered: 'you are only a girl, no lollies for you!' This could explain why my mother had no significant recollections of her father, maybe for lack of interaction with him, being 'only' a girl in his eyes. She had heard two stories - one amusing and one alarming - which she told to me when I was a child. In the first story, Haim had a herd of sheep stolen from his yard, and when somebody found the thief and brought back the sheep, the animals apparently came all running and baaa'ing to him, as in a happy reunion. (Did those sheep belong to his household, or maybe they were part of a cheese manufacturing business - I do not know). In the second story, Haim had decided to leave Edirne and take his family to Paris, where his two sons, Sammy and Joseph, were already living and raving about the city of lights. It was said that he left his old and ailing mother alone in the family home (with some maid to care for her) and that she cursed him and his lineage for eternity. It is a disturbing thought, considering my mother's long life of hardship and heartbreak, and my life, which hasn't been exactly a garden of fragrant Bulgarian roses.
By the time I was born, in 1953, my mother had only one sibling left out of the eight other members of her family - My uncle Sammy Behmoiras. Haim died (19??) and, later, Boulissou was run over by a car and died (1952). Rebecca died (from illness) in her twenties, Joseph died in Auschwitz in 1942, Esterina (Maggie's and Jacques' mother) died with cancer.
My mother had me out of wedlock and raised me by herself, battling all the elements (literally, at times when we were homeless). She couldn't offer me much in the way of stability and material comfort but her love to me was boundless, she had the most wonderful mothering instincts, and she raised me with the courage of a lioness. Unfortunately, her life was marred by her mental illness ' she was paranoid and consequently very dysfunctional. While her brother Sammy was still alive, we had a roof over our heads. I remember him coming around to our place with a bag full of boxes : these were from one of his many variety shops he owned around Paris. Out of the boxes he would take pairs of new shoes and try them on my feet, until he was satisfied with the correct fit. He died in 1958 from heart attack. Soon after his death, my mother decided to leave Paris, and from there on we were nomads and destitute for most of our two years in the southern town of Montpellier. My mother moved through many jobs, taking whatever was available to keep us alive, and finding shelter for us at The Salvation Army, whenever there were beds available. In one of our arrests on account of vagrancy (this particular time on a night spent in a train station's waiting room), the French police, looking for an instant solution to our homelessness, 'shipped' us to Israel, via Marseilles.
Moving from France to Israel in 1961 was akin to falling from the frying pan into the fire. I will not elaborate on this chapter of my mother's life, as I am in the process of writing an entire book about her, hoping to present a balanced and honest account on human foibles. I hope to finish this project by the end of this year - si el dio lo kere, como disia mi mama. It's a literary non-fiction work, were I explore many themes, among others, enmity and fellowship, mothering with mental illness, old age and courage in face of adversity.
Dora Behmoiras left this world to find at last some peace at the age of eighty-eight on the 5th of November 2002, among strangers in a nursing home in Naharia, just three weeks after my visit with my daughter. As all my friends told me, she was waiting for us before she left us. She died on the first night she was hospitalised, and I was grateful she didn't suffer too much or too long. I flew back from Melbourne to Tel-Aviv for the funeral, which, in line with the rest of her life, was poignant and absurd. She is now resting in the Yarkon cemetery, goush 17, ezor 5. shoura 5, makom 14. If anybody from the Behmoiras clan even passes by and is willing to put some flowers on her grave, I would be most grateful. There is no telling if she is watching from above, saddened by her bare grave.
p.s.
Raphael Ventura from Israel, who read the draft of the above account, immediately organised a visit to my mother's grave, and I have received yesterday his e-mail with photos : it's my first sighting of the tombstone since I could linger in Israel until the gilouy matzeva. The stone is ornamented with beautiful fresh red flowers and flanked by eight members of his family, and somehow they are my family too! I find much consolation for my grief in this beautiful gesture. I send many thanks and good wishes to Raphael and family.
Josiane Smith (Behmoiras)
Melbourne, 23 June 2003
