Bella Camhi - November 18, 1999
Salonika During the Depression
What was in 1933?
The Depression.
Oh.
Like we need it, on top of everything.
So you were eight years old then.
Eight.
You remember what, what was it like then?
Like, uh, you see, I was always, I always believe, no matter how dark is the day for me, I'm going to make it to, to survive. I want to see the end of it. I'm a believer of that. And uh, I says, well, we'll see what's going to be. The kids behind me you know, like the barracks, their stack, you know. You know on that Myers here, they got all those uh, housing.
Mm-hm.
Uh, they're run by the welfare. Here, the Myers. And uh, they were dying like anything. I, I still remember, their stomach was blown, you know. When I see something here, they show it to me, it's nothing new. I live it. I lived through it.
And your family too?
Uh...
Did they suffer in that way?
Somehow we survived that. I don't know how, because I remember my daddy you know, would make a, a big pot of that uh, corn uh, meal, or cream of wheat, or cream of rice. And we would all four of us sit in there who was going to get the most.
So you survived the Depression.
Yeah. And I survive concentration camp. And uh, I lived to be and I'm going to be seventy-five.
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