My Home

Bulgaria is situated between Roumania (to the North), and Turkey and Greece (on the South) - three countries on the Balkan peninsula most Americans and Europeans must have heard of. To the East it borders on the Black sea and to the West - on Macedonia. It is also very near Serbia and Albania - remember, the wars in Saraevo and Kossovo, Slobodan Miloshevich, Emir Kusturitsa, stuff like that. Right now the only world famous Bulgarian is, I'm afraid, the footballer Hristo Stoitchkov. I can't say he's something to be proud of but what choice do we have. OK, here's a map that will probably help you to imagine where I'm from.

This map is remarkable. I took it from the MS Office kit and I can proudly say that if I try I'll draw Europe better. Unfortunately I don't have a scanner so you'll have to put up with this caricature.

My country has a very complicated history - I'll start with a legend, the one I like best. The rest is... sad. Everything started when one day, about 1300 years ago, the ancient Bulgarian khan Koubrat called his three sons by his deathbed. He asked them to approach and try to break a bunch of spears without separating them. Nobody managed. Then he got up, untied the bunch and started breaking the spears with no effort, one by one. When finally there was nothing but tiny pieces of wood in his hands, he told his three sons to keep together after his death - when the spears are tied up in a bunch, nobody can break them. Unfortunately when the old man died, they left their homeland without keeping their promise. The two elder brothers fought with many foreign tribes and were finally defeated. In 681 the youngest one, Asparouch, united with several Slavic tribes and settled near the Danube - the place where my country is now. That was the year Bulgaria was founded. Its people were very belligerent, very dangerous enemies - they were actually the bravest and best paid "soldiers of fortune" in Europe. When they were home, they were constantly fighting with their neighbors and eventually their land expanded - as our historians proudly say, there were times when Bulgaria bounded on three seas.

Now it doesn't. In 1251 it was conquered and plundered by the Turks who killed millions of people and turned it into a large part of their Ottoman empire to which they had already annexed all adjoining countries. They remained in our land for 5 centuries. The cruelty of what they did to make our people accept Islam and forget their roots and identity goes beyond description. Towns and villages were burned down because their inhabitants refused to destroy their churches. Men were killed on the streets because they didn't kneel when a Turk was passing by. Girls were kidnapped and forced to marry someone they didn't even know. Every year little boys were taken away from their mothers, turned into Turkish soldiers and then sent back to kill their families - that was the way to prove their loyalty to Islam and the Empire. This was called "blood tax". Many great people died fighting for our freedom but unfortunately it took us 500 years to wake up. We did - Bulgaria broke free in 1778, the Ottoman Empire was defeated by Russia and a great World Congress was summoned - the fate of all newly freed countries had to be solved. God knows why the "Great Forces" - England, France, Germany and such - decided the country should be torn into pieces which were given to our neighbors - Greece, Rumania and Serbia. Some regions remained under Turk control. What we were given was a tiny piece of land, less than half of what our country once was.

After the Second World War this tiny piece of land was occupied by the Soviet Union troops and turned into a socialist country. In 1989 (45 years later) people revolted and demanded freedom and democracy. Or at least that's what we think happened. We've been making strikes and overthrowing governments for 10 years now. I wonder if it helps.

Here are two links:
1. Bulgaria Online - it's in English and I guess you'll find something much better than what you've just read. GO!
2. Bulgaria - this is a nice site located in Finland. Links to newspapers and radiostations, pics, everything. GO!