Rosa Kaiserman as a school-girl

This is me, Rosa Kaiserman, in the first grade in primary school, with a black uniform – it was made of some black satin, like a frock, which was buttoned at the back and had pockets and an embroidered collar.

My mother used to embroider my collars. I wanted the collar to be perfect, so when I went to school I didn’t put it on, but put in a copy-book in my schoolbag, and only when got to school I took it out and buttoned it on my neck.

The uniforms were made by dressmakers, you couldn’t buy them ready-made, like nowadays.

There was a model, and they made all the others after it. Not all schools in Iasi had this kind of uniforms, but almost all of them.

Everybody wore this uniform in primary school. Afterwards, in high school, the elite schools begun to have their own uniforms and differentiate in that way from other schools.

For example The Notre Dame high school was run by French Catholic nuns.

In that building, which you can see from my window, there on the other side of the Independence Boulevard to the Cuza Voda street and to the front of the National Theater, where the State Philharmonic is located, all that large building was once the Notre Dame high school.

They had a different uniform.