българин опит

My friend Eric has been working in Karlovo, Bulgaria for the past three years for the Peace Corps. We went to Benson high school together, both were in architecture there, had our first architecture job at Group Mackenzie and then both went on to University of Oregon for architecture. He met a wonderful girl there, Dimitrina, and they are newly married as of the week after we left. Congrats to them! She is a very talented artist so both have such a creative energy about them. So I don't know what I really expected of Bulgaria, I think bland communistic buildings, bland food and oppressed people. I was wrong on all accounts which was wonderful. The architecture varied so much, a little run down, but still had a warmth to it and diversity from the Ottoman influence. The food was an explosion of flavour (cheesy expression, but there is no better way to put it my taste-buds have not been stimulated since Portugal because of bland Irish food). And everyone we met was so friendly!

We started out in Sofia, the capitol. We stayed in a great little hostel that night after a nice meal and a good tour of the older areas of downtown. It was grey and foggy, but no rain, until the next morning. Dimitrina has a place in Sofia where she is taking English classes. We walked around the old town, and tried out the Bulgarian food. We just wandered the streets since it was a nice night out and then headed back to our hostel. The following morning we got on a super packed double-decker bus for a three hour journey to Plovdiv. The city was hilly with several old Roman ruins. It had to have been one of my favorite older ruinous cities. Run down with a lot of character and various cultural influences. It was a foggy day but there were some clear patches which was perfect since we climbed to the top of one of the many hills to oversee the whole city. There were cats everywhere. And when we stopped to take a picture of one, he called all his buddies and next thing we knew there were cats running towards us. As the day started to wind down, we met up with Dimitrina's mother who drove us to Eric's town!

Karlovo city centre is quite small, but there are many cute little shops. There have been some great programs for street improvements recently, but the actual repaving of all the old cobblestone streets with asphalt and selling off the old cobblestones is quite sad. Other cities in Europe will have old Bulgaria cobblestones lining their streets. We got to see some of Eric's many bus shelters that he designed and had created all over the city. This was one of his projects while he was in the Peace Corps. We went exploring a little bit on our own so Eric and D could have some time together so we hiked up behind the water turbine plant and checked out the local waterfall. The water was so clear and clean. The leaves were just staring to fall and all colours of autumn were abound. If I could bottle the smell of a crisp cold autumn day with a hint of a smoke from the neighbouring chimneys, I would be forever happy. Autumn is one of my favourite times of year! We luckily remembered Eric's directions back to our hotel and after winding around some streets and up some more hills, we arrived. The four of us had a wonderful dinner at our hotel, they had everything there, and it was all amazing. The next day we got up early and Eric showed us around the outskirts of town. We went back to Eric's place so he could bake a pie for his birthday. It is a European thing to bring cakes/sweets for your birthday to share with your friends. Although Ben had never met Eric before, they became fast friends due to their love of Macintoish's. They could geek out together on Apple stuff which Ben needed since I am unable to share in that area of expertise. While they talked computers I enjoyed watching the local kids play below us, one kid was afraid of cats so they kept putting a kitten in front of his face and he would start crying. It was entertaining, as I made up what they were saying since I do not speak Bulgarian. After the pie was done, we went to the best restaurant in all of Bulgaria and got to meet all of his friends. We had a great meal (once again) and great company. Dimitrina is the sweestest person and I am glad that I had a chance to get to know her over our dessert and strong rakiya. That stuff puts hair on your chest!

The last morning we got up before the crack of dawn to head back to Sofia on the bus with Dimitrina. We all left Eric in Karlovo. D showed us where to go and set us on the right path and taught us how to say "to the new airport please" (към определителен член нов самолет харесвам). We meandered through the town, had some lunch and then it was off to the airport and back to work...... Once again, another great trip, but not enough time off from work!