PART OF THE MONOGRAPH "GOJKO JAKOVLEVSKI" BY SLAVE KATIN
His mother Rafka had long and straight black hair and very tender white skin. She had a stout figure, a tame, graceful but in insightful look that sometimes reflected her sad destiny. On the occasion of some celebration, Saints day or wedding, she went to Debreshe, and sometimes to the neighboring picturesque village of Zubovce, one of the few villages in the area where only the Christian Orthodox population lived, which was well known by many beautiful and modern girls and boys.
Like his mother Rafka, his father Delche, who was born in Zubovce, was ten years old when his father passed away. Until 1960, the surname of his father's ancestors was Manojloski, Manojlov, Manojlovic, but from that year they decided their surname to be Yakovleski.
The father of Goyko's father Delche, that is his grandfather Petko, went to work in Istanbul, Constantinople, where he died in 1920, and Delche's mother, grandmother Sir ma, whom they called "grandmother Bulja" when they were children, because she was always head-"covered"; she always wore a scarf on her head, and the children were scared of her.
Together with her mother-in-law – great-grandmother Manojlica (whose name was Yonka), they went to Istanbul to find out what happened with grandfather Petko (the son of great-grandmother Manojlica and husband of grandmother Sirma) on whom they had no information.
When they arrived in Istanbul, they learned that grandfather Petko had died in that city and was buried there. Grandmoth er Sirma who had three young children with grandfather Petko – Goyko's father – Delche (10 years old at that time), his uncle or "papa Yorde" (11 years old at that time) and his aunt Vaska (12 years old at that time), abandoned them because while she was with her mother-in-law in Istanbul she met a man named Duke from the neighboring village of Volkovia and married him leaving her three children to live with her great-grandmother Manojlica.
Zubovce
Great-grandmother Manoilica was so sad that she was ready to jump into the Sea of Marmara and drown. But she thought that if she did it, no one would look after the three golden little grandchildren – Delche, Yorde, and Vaska, so she gave up that idea and in intention. But she swore that she would nev er allow her daughter-in-law (grandmother Sirma), who left her three children to remarry, to see her children.
Goyko, on the other hand, had not heard this sad story for a long time and knew nothing about it. But many years later, while living with "papa Yorde" in Sofia, he told him that story, often saying, "She (his mother Sirma) is not a mother, she is a bitch."
According to Goyko's words, his mother Rafka grew up and she was frequently going to Zubovce. The girls from Zubovce used her as a courier and sent her to Delche, who was a handsome boy, a bachelor, to bring him a red apple, or a handkerchief, as a sign of affection and interest.
It happened very often, and his father spotted his mother who was a pretty girl, stout, smart and coming from the remote village of Kunovo. Even though at weddings and festive days he met many girls dressed in beautiful costumes, with aprons, mittens, belts, various decorations and golden coins, his father often looked at her and eventually he started talking to her and asking her where she was from and why she was coming to Zubovce.
Goyko's mother told him that she was an orphan since she was very young, that she lost her father, and that her mother remarried in Debreshe. His father Delche was surprised that both of them shared a similar destiny. He showed great interest in the girl from the distant village. One of the beautiful girls from Zubovce said, "It is useless, none of us will get to Delche's heart, Rafka will be the one." So it happened.
To be continued
By SLAVE KATIN
