See that disclaimer on the right? Well, I never have to worry about that again! Check out the new blog!
http://ryanlivergood.com/blog/
This is my last entry on this blog, but I hope you will keep up with what is going on in my life over at my new blog!
No, we’re not moving to Mexico…but we are moving back to the United States! While Meag and I are keeping the details somewhat secret right now, we have been presented with a great opportunity that we can’t pass up. Additionally, there are other reasons we are going back to the States, and Meag discusses some of those on her blog (Oh, she also has a great entry about our vacation, which I neglected to post about even though I said I would…the whole Bush visit got me off course and I never got a chance to go back and blog about the vacation). Leaving is bittersweet, as I really love Bulgaria, love the people, and love the friends I have made here. However, I have no doubts that this decision is the right one for me and I leave with no regrets. I have truly loved and cherished my time here in Bulgaria, and I look forward to sharing with people back home everything that is wonderful about Bulgaria.
Yes, that’s yours truly and several of my PCV friends with President Bush…how did we get to meet George Bush? Here’s the story:
If you follow the news, you probably know that the last stop for President Bush on his European visit was to Bulgaria. Last week, PCVs learned that we were being given the opportunity to attend an event at the US Embassy on Monday where President Bush would make an appearance. Expecting very little, I decided that I would attend. The decision turned out to be a good one, as the day would turn out to be one of the highlights of my Peace Corps experience.
The day didn’t start off so hot. First of all, I had to get up at 4:30 in order to catch the 5:30 bus to Sofia. Ugh. I hate getting up early in the morning! I met my sitemate Alex on the bus and we were off to Sofia. Despite our early morning fatigue, Alex and I were chatting as opposed to napping about an hour in to our three hour bus ride when our bus driver decided to pull over for some unknown reason. Apparently the low battery light came on and the driver decided to pull over and look at the battery. Now, I am no mechanic, nor do I know anything about buses, but if the low battery light comes on, isn’t it a good idea to keep your motor running and NOT turn it off? Well, the driver not only turned off the motor, but disconnected and reconnected the battery cables a few times. The bus actually started back up, and apparently this satisfied the driver, because we were off again…for ten minutes. The driver pulled over again and did the disconnect-reconnect thing…only this time, the bus didn’t start back up. What are the odds!? Thus, Alex and I lost an hour and a half waiting for a new bus to pick us up.
Fortunately, the meeting time for PCVs was scheduled for 10:15…despite the lengthy delay, Alex and I not only made it on time, but we made it with about 1o minutes to spare! The lesson here kids is that you should always plan on leaving really early when you are meeting the President and relying on public transportation, as you never know what might happen! Once we were all organized, we went over to the embassy as a group together, and, after a thorough security check, we waited in the embassy’s empty cafeteria (empty meaning it was closed and no food was in sight) for the event, which was scheduled to occur at around 2pm.
We were told that there would be food for us, but apparently embassy staff was too busy preparing for our CEO’s visit to put out some sandwiches for us (What are the odds!?). However, they did give us access to the commissary, which was much better than any sandwich they could have provided! There, I was able to buy some cheddar Chex Snack Mix, a Diet Dr. Pepper, a big Rice Krispies Treat Bar, and a box of cherry Pop Tarts! Yes! Jackpot! (if you are currently living in the United States and have never lived abroad, you might not understand how exciting having access to American food products can be!) There was so much good and delicious stuff I was tempted to buy, but stuff wasn’t exactly Wal-Mart cheap there, so I demonstrated some restraint. However, there was one PCV that allegedly spent the equivalent of $80 USD on groceries!
At around 12:30 or so, the PCVs along with embassy staff and family were led outside, where we were screened again before we were lead to the area where President Bush would come and address the crowd. Somehow, I managed to secure a position at the front of the stage with some fellow PCVs. We waited until about 2pm in the sun (and I have a red face to prove it), and then the President and his entourage finally arrived!
It was surreal for me when they made the announcement “Ladies and Gentleman, the President and First Lady of the United States of America”, followed by them entering and going up on the stage. I am sure that “Hail to the Chief” was playing, but the moment was so strange that I can’t be entirely sure. It was strange seeing Laura Bush, and, then, George Bush walk on stage. I felt almost as if I was seeing cartoon characters come to life, kind of the same feeling I had when I saw high definition television for the first time, but much stronger. The US Ambassador to Bulgaria introduced President Bush, and the President gave about a 5 to 10 minute speech which essentially thanked everyone in attendance for their service to America and outlined the issues that President Bush had discussed with Bulgaria’s President Georgi Parvanov. After the speech, President Bush took off his suit jacket and loosened his tie, making an expression to the crowd that said, “Okay, the formal speech is over, time for me to get comfortable!”. He then went over with Laura to the embassy kids that were in bleachers next to the stage and interacted with them. Then (and this is the cool part), he spent a half hour or so shaking hands with everybody and briefly chatting with all of us. My favorite quote of the day from the President (which he said to another volunteer) was probably, “Peace Corps Volunteer, huh? This is probably the first time you’ve worn a tie in two years!”
Here are some photos from the event:
President Bush was very engaging and charismatic in person, much more so than I think he comes across on television. I give him a lot of credit for spending so much time interacting with us, as this event was the very last stop on his European tour before going back to Air Force One and heading home! It would have been easy for him to head directly to the limo after his speech and cruise on out of there to the airport, but instead he spent his time saying hello to us and showing his appreciation for what we do.
God Bless America! -Ryan
As many of you may know, I just got back from our “Circle around Bulgaria” trip that took us to Romania, Serbia, Greece, and Turkey…all in two weeks! There is so much to tell you about and so many pictures to share from our trip! I alone took 798 photos! If you combine that with the photos Meag, Scott, and Anna have from our trip, we definitely have somewhere around 1500 photos! Man, what did we do before digital cameras and 2 gig memory cards? (Probably saved ourselves a lot of time because we didn’t have to sort through 1000s of photos, that’s what!)
Once I get all the photos organized and uploaded, I am starting a series of posts on my blog about the trip. In the meantime, I am going to enjoy the weekend and prepare for my meeting with a very special guest that is coming to Bulgaria on Sunday and Monday…can you guess who that might be?
More to come soon!
My friend Scott is here from the States visiting, and he is a huge soccer fan. So when we found out that our local soccer club, PFC Beroe Stara Zagora, was playing the best soccer club in Bulgaria, PFC Levski Sofia, we absolutely had to go! I was pretty excited about going, as I love sports (as you all know) and I had heard that Beroe Stara Zagora had some of the best fans and largest crowds in all of Bulgaria. So, on a beautiful Sunday afternoon, Scott, my sitemate Shane, and I all set out for Beroe Stadium to take in the match. Unfortunately, I didn’t have my camera with me, which really is too bad because it was quite a cool scene at the stadium, but I did find some photos online. Here is the stadium:
Going to a soccer match in Bulgaria is a totally different experience than going to a football or baseball game in the United States. First of all, tickets only cost about two U.S. dollars each. It is general admission, so you can pretty much sit whereever you want. However, you might want to bring something to sit on, because seats at Beroe Stadium look like this:
Nice, yes!? Fortunately some friendly guys sitting behind us gave us some extra newspapers they brought with them and we sat on those. Next time I will have to remember to bring a newspaper with me.
Not unlike a football or baseball game in the States, the atmosphere was electric. Rabid soccer fans supporting both teams were very loud and chanted cheers and insults at one another throughout the match. One of the more interesting things about soccer matches in Bulgaria is that they take all the visiting team’s fans and isolated them from the home team’s fans at one end of the pitch. I imagine they do this to prevent fights from breaking out, because these fans seemed pretty rowdy. Here is a picture of some Beroe fans:
Needless to say, we didn’t sit in that section!
You might think that fan behavior was being fueled by them drinking excessive amounts of beer at the event, but, believe it or not, they don’t sell beer at soccer games here. In fact, they don’t sell much of anything! You want a soda? You’re out of luck. How about a hot dog? Nope, you can’t buy one of those either. Perhaps a home team jersey to take home as a souvenir? They don’t sell those either. Can you imagine going to any professional sporting event in the States and not being able to buy refreshments or team apparel? I mean, I’ve gone to professional sporting events in the States and easily dropped at least $100 between tickets, parking, drinks, food, and so forth without even thinking about it, and going to this soccer match cost me only $2! While it would have been nice to have something to drink during the match, there is something kind of charming about the organization not trying to market crap to you during the entire match…this was about Beroe vs. Levski, plain and simple. I am sure this will change in years to come (Maybe they can start by selling Beroe seat cushions?). In the meantime, fans will continue to buy sunflower seeds outside of the stadium, bring them in, and spit the shells on the empty seats (see above photo)…apparently sunflower seeds are to Bulgarian soccer fans as what peanuts and Cracker Jacks are to American baseball fans. But, once again, you have to buy them before you come into the stadium.
The result of the match was a 0-0 tie. Plenty of Beroe players took dives and looked like a bunch of pansies. That’s right, no scoring and the players come across like wimps. These are the two major reasons Americans always provide for not liking soccer. However, I can see how the rest of the world’s population appreciates the sport. Beroe was actually packing back their players and playing for a tie because they were completely outmatched and knew it would be next to impossible to score on Levski. So, in essence, even though they didn’t get the “W”, they accomplished what they set out to do, and the fans went home happy knowing they tied mighty Levski. And while there was no scoring, it was definitely exciting at times. The crowd went wild when the Beroe keeper made an unbelievable save on a Levski penalty kick, preserving the scoreless tie. There was passion and excitement in the crowd during the whole match, and the atmosphere I felt at Beroe Stadium on Sunday afternoon, even though it was maybe only a crowd of 10,000 people, reminded me as to why soccer is the most popular sport in the world.
Check out Meag’s blog to see what else we have been doing lately. If nothing else, we’ve definitely been eating well. For example, I tried caviar for the first time this weekend at the Black Sea!
I also discovered real American coffee in Sofia!
Caviar and Dunkin’ Donuts. What more can I say? I am just living the dream!
Okay, so I really need to add a link to the side of my blog that goes to Meag’s blog because she is so much better at keeping up with stuff than I am. Anyway, her latest entry talks about how much fun we had at my colleague Yana’s wedding (with a ton of pictures) and our trip up to Shipka. The only thing I have to add to what she wrote is that the wedding was a blast and probably one of the best experiences I have had in Bulgaria so far. So, next time you get invited to a Bulgarian wedding, don’t turn down the offer!
I have to warn you in advance, this is probably not going to be the most interesting blog entry in the world…I have no pictures to post. However, in the interest of keeping my blog updated on a semi-regular basis, let me tell you what I have been doing recently…
This past weekend, Meag and I were going to take a trip to the beach…Nesebar to be exact. We had to be in Sofia on Friday so the plan was to spend the night in Sofia and leave for the beach Saturday morning from there (which wasn’t ideal because the beach is at least six hours from Sofia versus three from Stara Zagora, but what are you going to do?). Even though it was a four day holiday weekend, it was still “too early” to be going to the beach (at least according to a few Bulgarian acquaintances that I spoke with) so Meag and I thought it would be the perfect weekend to go to the beach before all the British and German tourists invade and ruin it for the summer. Well, apparently every person in Bulgaria thought the same thing, because when we went to the bus station to get tickets to the beach in Sofia on Saturday morning, we weren’t going to be able to get tickets until at least the 12pm bus. Considering we hadn’t even made hotel reservations (we thought the beach would be dead), we decided that we didn’t want to get to the beach and struggle with finding a hotel room (and likely fighting the crowds we thought we would be avoiding in the first place). Thus, we made a change of plans and decided to go to my friend Mel’s Tapas Party in Gorna Oryahovitsa. This was not an unpleasant turn of events, as we had a great time hanging out with many friends and enjoying all of the delicious food that was on hand. Sometimes the best trips you make are the unexpected ones. We will just have to enjoy the beach later this summer…see you soon half of England and Germany!
Another benefit of not going all the way to the beach was that we actually had to be in Dupnitsa (which is on the other side of the country from the beach and Nesebar) by Tuesday morning for a presentation that I had to give for the new B21s Peace Corps Trainees that recently arrived in Bulgaria. Thus, we weren’t really going to have four days to spend on the coast anyway. On Monday afternoon, we headed off to Samokov (a short distance from Dupnitsa) to stay with our friend Kevin. It was great to see Kevin and return to the place that called home for nearly three months. Since we were only there for the evening on Monday, we didn’t get a chance to visit my old host family and some other friends I wanted to visit, so hopefully we will return soon.
It was a long weekend away from home, so it is really good to be back. The plan for this weekend is to clean and prepare for Scott’s arrival from the States next Thursday…I can’t wait! Then Anna will be coming later in the month and we will do some more traveling in both Bulgaria and neighboring countries…once again, I can’t wait!
-Ryan
P.S.- Another one of those ‘things I never thought I would say while serving as a volunteer in the Peace Corps’ occurred last night: “Hurry up, we are going to be late for the new showcase at the art gallary!” That’s right, Meag and I went to the local art gallery last night to see the opening night of our friend’s exhibition…not exactly your stereotypical Peace Corps experience!
The last three weeks have been really busy! My friend Mindy came to Stara Zagora to pay Meag and I a visit, we went with her to see my friends Shane and Christine do their thing at Green Balkans (a great nature-conservation NGO in Bulgaria; click here to see how you can help them), we visited fellow friend and PCV Tracy in Zlataritsa for Easter, and we took a trip up to see Shipka Pass and Shipka Monastery this past weekend. For a full account of all of this (with the exception of our trip up to Shipka…I will save that for my next blog entry), check out Meag’s blog here. There Meag goes into great detail about how we have been spending our time lately. I would write about it too, but we just started running on a regular basis again and I am tired tonight!
One thing that isn’t on Meag’s blog is this video, which I believe everyone will enjoy, especially my fellow B20s:
I feel like I am starting to run out of things to write about regarding Bulgaria, because the newness has definitely worn off. The fun that comes with living overseas is always when “random” stuff occurs. Fortunately, there have been a few “random” events that have happened this month!
The first “random” thing that happened this month is that my agency hosted the final event and partner meeting for TrainSME (click to learn more about it). The event was great because it gave me a chance to meet and spend time with interesting people from all over Europe. My responsibilities were primarily limited to meeting & greeting people at the airport and showing our visitors a good time in Stara Zagora, but that’s what my agency needed me to do and the responsibilities did play well to my skill set!
This past weekend, starting last Thursday night (yes, sometimes the weekend does start on Thursday, even if you have to work the next day), was fairly “random” as well. A group of us went out together. The evening started out at the Stara Zagora Opera, and Meag’s blog contains a full account of the performance, so I won’t go into details about it here. Although, something should be pointed out that isn’t discussed in Meag’s blog: tickets were only 5 leva! And that’s 5 leva for 4th row center seats! 5 leva = about $3.35! Pretty darn good deal!
Wow, I really wish I understood Italian right about now!
Going to the opera is kind of one of those things that I didn’t think I would do in the Peace Corps, you know? Volunteers here often joke about the things they never thought they would say while serving as volunteers in the Peace Corps. For example, my list might include:
“Gee, I get 65 stations with my cable television and there is never anything on!”
“Let’s go do karaoke tonight!”
“This cover band totally rocks!”
“There are so many wines to choose from! I can’t decide which one I want!”
“I’m hungry. Let’s call Venezia and get a pizza delivered!”
Anyway, you get the point. One of these days I am going to do a blog entry consisting entirely of things I thought I would never say while serving in the Peaces Corps. Until then, there’s your preview. As you can see, the lifestyle here isn’t too rough compared to, say, Peace Corps Gambia. However, while we don’t struggle with having clean water and electricity like they might, we have a different set of challenges we have to deal with. But that is another blog entry for another day…
Back to last Thursday night. After the opera, we went to this place called Absolut for dinner and a little karaoke action. Unfortunately, the room that is always open for karaoke on Thursday was rented out to a private party. Thus, we decided to go to a place that just opened a few months ago called the new Go-Gos/Marmalad/Jam depending on who you ask. Since their new sign on the outside reads “Club Jam”, let’s just call it that, shall we? Club Jam had a 2 leva cover charge at the door because a band was playing. The band played a bunch of rock music cover songs and was great! We listened to them jam (get it?) and sang along and danced with their music until their show was over, and by the time Meag and I got home, it was 3am. Before this new club opened in Stara Zagora, the live music scene consisted on our favorite bar Drums occasionally bringing in small solo acts on the weekends, so this Club Jam is a great new development!
The best cover band in Bulgaria
These guys rock!
Meag and I at Club Jam
The best sitemates in all of Bulgaria!
Alex, myself, and Meag at Club Jam
Somehow I was able to get myself to work on time on Friday. On Friday evening, Meag and I went with my sitemate Jessie to Chirpan, where we met up with a bunch of people and celebrated Trevor’s birthday (a PCV that lives in Chirpan):
Meag and I with Trevor and his friend
Trevor, in conjunction with the city of Chirpan, organized a soccer tournament on Saturday to raise money for the At Risk Youth Fund. The weather for the soccer tournament was perfect (sunny and around 65 degrees F) and a good time was had by all. I think there were 8 teams entered into the tournament, including a team of PCVs from Peace Corps Macedonia. It was really cool to talk to the volunteers from Macedonia and “compare notes”.
Alex and Melanie at the Soccer Tournament.
Team Macedonia between matches
After the tournament, they decided to come with us to Stara Zagora (only 40 minutes away from Chirpan) and hang out for the evening before returning to Macedonia the next day. We had a great time hosting the PCVs from Macedonia, and we look forward to visiting them in Macedonia soon!
Scenery from the train between Chirpan and Stara Zagora
More Scenery
Alex enjoying the train ride
On Sunday, Meag and I were pretty tired, but we managed to quickly clean the apartment up and host a birthday party for Alex…and Trevor….and Christine (volunteer from England that works with Shane at Green Balkans)…yes, three birthdays! We were all pretty worn out from the long weekend, but we enjoyed having a relaxing celebration by enjoying the great food everyone made and playing “Apples to Apples”.
Those are the highlights of my March. Lowlights include breaking three of my glasses in one week (which is a HUGE deal when you own as few dishes as I do) and making a special trip to the office at 1:30am on Saturday to watch the Illini play in the NCAA tournament online (my internet at home wasn’t fast enough to watch streaming online video) only to totally choke away a double-digit lead towards the end of the game and lose (and then getting to bed at 4am!). At least the game was fun for the first hour and a half…
Looking ahead, the next few months should be fun. Meag and I are going to Greece at some point in April and a few of my great friends from my China days, Scott and Anna, are coming for a visit in May…can’t wait!
Another interesting story from Novinite:
BULGARIAN MAYOR PRIZES MAN WHO WEDS NURSE AS VILLAGE HAS NONE
The Mayor of Bulgaria’s village of Satovcha has announced a BGN 1,000 price for the first bachelor who manages to marry a nurse.
So far the price is only valid for men who live in the nearby village of Furgovo, because there are no nurses and doctors there and locals have to travel or wait for the days when a doctor shows up for a couple of hours.
Love is the only reason that could tie a nurse in the small village, locals believe and are now pushing their sons to look for a wife near the medical academies, Standart daily reported.
‘We used to have nurses here before but they got married and left to other villages, so now it’s our boys’ turn to make sure we have someone to give us shots again,’ mayor Arben Mimenov said.
Mimenov has even paid the bus tickets for the bachelors to travel to Blagoevgrad where the nearest medical academy is located. ‘There are a lot of girls there, we are bound to snatch away at least one,’ locals joked.
First of all, Честита Баба Марта! Or, in English, “Happy Grandma Marta!” Today is essentially the Bulgarian holiday for saying goodbye to Winter and hello to Spring…I am all about that! What everyone does to celebrate the holiday is give to there family and friends Martenitsa (which are bracelets made of red and white yarn) and wish them good health and happiness throughout the year. The white part of the Martenitsa represents the outgoing snow (which, thankfully we haven’t experience in Stara Zagora this winter), and the red represents the sunshine of the coming spring (nice and sunny today in the mid-50s). At least that’s what the handout about Martenitsa that my language tutor gave me says! Another take on this is that the white represents purity and virtue and the red acts as a good luck charm for good health and fertility. According to Bulgarian tradition, I have to wear my Martenitsa until a) I see the first tree in blossom, or b) I see either the first stork, swallow, or martin. While people don’t get the day off from work today to celebrate this holiday, it seems to be VERY popular here. All of my colleagues presented me with Martenitsa this morning, and I am sorry that I didn’t have Martenitsa to give them back! Oh well, maybe on St. Patrick’s Day I will bring Guinness to the office or something. 
There are two holidays that occurred here in Bulgaria on February 14th that I haven’t written about yet. One of them you are all familiar with: Valentine’s Day. I didn’t expect to be able to spend actual Valentine’s Day with Meag, but, as luck would have it, I ended up having some business to take care of at the Peace Corps office in Sofia the Thursday morning following Valentine’s Day, so we were able to be together the evening of Valentine’s Day. I really didn’t know I would be in Sofia for Valentine’s Day until the last minute, so I didn’t have a lot of time to make plans. I didn’t think this would be a problem. Surely, very few Bulgarians celebrate Valentine’s Day here and it wouldn’t be a problem getting a restaurant reservation, right? Boy, I couldn’t have been more wrong about that! On the Monday before Valentine’s Day, I asked my colleague Yana if she would call a restaurant in Sofia for me to place a reservation for Valentine’s Day. She looked at me as if I were Britney Spears and I had just asked her to shave my head. She says to me, “Ryan, there is no chance that any restaurant will have availability on Valentine’s Day!” I, being the foolish American that I am, insisted that she was mistaken, and again requested that she help me make a reservation. Yana gave me this “you are a totally moron” look, shook her head, and very politely called the restaurant. As I am sure you have figured out by now, they didn’t have anything available, and hadn’t for at least a week, if not more. Yana graciously called a few more restaurants, and the story was the same with them. I then apologized to Yana for not initially listening to her. I should have known better and listened to her in the first place! When will I learn? Anyway, Meag and I ended up having a wonderful Valentine’s Day even though we didn’t formally go out, as we got Indian take out, drank some wine, and watched movies at home. Not elaborate, but a great time nonetheless.
The other holiday that Valentine’s Day coincides with here is a traditional Bulgarian holiday called Trifon Zarezan. Trifon Zarezan is a pretty cool alternative to Valentine’s Day, and one of these days Hallmark or somebody will pick up on it and market it in the States as a Valentine’s Day alternative for those that hate Valentine’s Day (there are many such people, and rightly so). Perhaps the marketing geniuses at Glasslite will pick up on Trifon Zarezan. For example, you remember Glasslite’s MacGyver toys, right?:
If they can market this, they can market anything! Anyway, what exactly is Trifon Zarezan? Well, Trifon Zarezan is Vinegrower’s Day!
So, the way I see it, this day is a celebration of wine! Grab a bottle (or two) and celebrate! The beauty of this holiday is that it works for those that celebrate Valentine’s Day and those that don’t. In a relationship? Well, get some wine and enjoy Valentine’s Day together with your special someone! Single and/or hate Valentine’s Day? Well, you should drink some wine too! As one man says about Trifon Zarezan, “At the very least, it will always provide a good excuse to drink copious amounts of wine and celebrate with friends and not worry about love or heartache, just the possibility of headache.” Click here to read a terrific article about this holiday and the great wine-making tradition of Bulgaria.
The Sofia Morning News e-mail had some stories about the two holidays that I found interesting:
BULGARIANS CELEBRATE THEIR LOVE OF WINE AND EACH OTHER
Bulgaria has been marking two holidays on February 14 since the fall of communism in the late eighties, when the day of the sweethearts came to the country.
Previously completely ignored by lovebirds in the Balkan country, St. Valentine’s Day enjoyed escalating popularity over the years of Bulgaria’s transition to Western-like lifestyle.
Gradually, February 14 became the date for exchanging love messages across catholic countries and St. Valentine became the patron saint of lovers. The date was marked by sending poems and simple gifts such as flowers. There was often a social gathering or a ball.
As lovers celebrate St Valentine’s Day, many Bulgarians insist February 14 should be reserved for a traditional Bulgarian celebration – the feast of St. Trifon “Zarezan”, the patron of vine growing and wine producing.
At the St. Trifon Zarezan day the Bulgarians pay tribute to the vine, grapes and wine. It offers a nice alternative to those who don’t have a loved one to share the holiday with, but can still find a reason to celebrate. Drowning one’s sorrow in wine at the sight of the sea of hearts and teddy bears has become somewhat of a cure for the brokenhearted, who tend to get depressed come February 14.
The professional holiday of vine-growers and wine-makers has been officially celebrated since 1962. When the Gregorian Calendar was officially introduced by the Bulgarian Orthodox Church in 1968, the church services moved to February 1, but the Day of Vine and Wine is still commemorated on February 14.
VALENTINE’S DAY “HEART” CRAZE IN SOFIA
Bulgarians seem to have well adopted the Catholic holiday of Saint Valentine as the whole Wednesday young and old have been walking the streets of Sofia, their faces hidden by heart shaped balloons. All gifts shops in Sofia and throughout the whole country are already short of red and pink balloons, love cards and all that is considered san appropriate gift for a loved one. The quest for the perfect present turned into a real adventure, as Sofia streets were packed with people searching for gifts.
Once again, Честита Баба Марта!
Ryan
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