Edna Peres of We Love Killarney and Alexandra Leisegang of New Killarney Riviera Residents’ Association writes:
Earlier this week, We Love Killarney and the New Killarney Riviera Residents’ Association had the pleasure of wishing our neighbour Sarah Copelowitz a happy 101st birthday.
In conversation with her, we heard how she has lived in our neighbourhood since the 70s. She was born in West Street and raised in Johannesburg in a suburb that no longer exists. It was demolished to make way for industrial buildings following which her family moved to Kensington where she went to Athlone Girls High School. After she married, she continued to live in Kensington before building a home in Saxonwold in 1955 on the corner of Oxford and Elfinwold streets.
It is amazing to image that this lovely lady was born soon after the Unification of South Africa and close to the start of WWI. She’s lived through the great depression and the great recession. She’s experienced the socio-political changes this country has gone through over 100 years, and has seen how technology has changed the way we live in the world. She grew up in a time when people grew their own organic fruits and vegetables in their backyards, and now we don’t know where our food comes from.
Through all these changes she has found books to be her greatest delight. She shared stories about borrowing books from the municipal library on the fifth floor of a department store in the CBD and ‘stealing’ them from her siblings to satiate her need to read. This self-made woman taught herself to type and worked as a bookkeeper for most of her life. When she speaks about her children and grandchildren she does so with great tenderness.
Happy birthday Mrs Copelowitz! May you enjoy many more books in your lifetime.
