Eveline Marcussohn with Gavril Marcuson

This photo was taken in Bucharest, on 22nd February 1919 and it pictures me, Gavril Marcuson, at the age of 6, together with my mother, Eveline Marcussohn [nee Weisselberg]. My name is Gavril Marcuson [the initial name, Marcussohn, was shortened to Marcuson in 1968]. I was born in Bucharest, on 28th October 1913, in the house of my maternal grandfather, an old house on Viilor Dr. Back then, the place was at the outskirts of the city. I used to go to the Golescu School, the School for Boys no.3. Back then, boys and girls went to separate schools - there were schools for boys and schools for girls, and high schools for boys and high schools for girls. I remember my first day of school [in september 1919]. Even more than 80 years later, it feels like yesterday. I remember the master, with the class register under his arm. He came in, got to his desk and told us: 'Children, I will now call out your names in order. When each of you hears his name, stand up and say : Here. Have you understood?' We all went 'Yes!' So he began to read out our names, and every boy stood up and said 'Here'; suddenly, I heard him say Marcussohn Gavril. I stood up and said 'Here! But, you know, my name is not Gavril!' 'What is it then', he asked me. 'My name is Gutu [diminutive form of Gavril], this is how they call me at home!' To which the master replied: 'They may call you Gutu at home, but, in the official records, your name is Gavril. And we shall call you Marcussohn Gavril. Now sit down!' My parents had sent me to school following the German system. I was the youngest in my class. My mother was born in Husi, in 1892. Her education consisted of some years of high school. She wasn't a religious person. She was a rather simple woman, and she spoke some French. My grandfather only sent the boys to college. One of them became a chemist, another one became a lawyer, and another one became an accountant; but the girls never got to college. Girls were despised. Men are the ones who lead. Even at the synagogue, women have to stay separated from the men. My mother was a housewife. She loved us as much as she could, looked after us, and fed us - we weren't picky when it came to food. She was a gentle woman. She got upset once in a while, but didn't beat us. Neither my brother nor I ever got beat by our parents. My mother made aliyah in the 1960's. My brother and other relatives were already living in Israel. She stayed in an old age home in Tel Aviv. I visited her there and, when I returned, I got the news of her death. She died after I had visited her. She was 89 when she passed away [in 1981].