A Typical Evening Meal on St Nicholas Day in Bulgaria

This blog is the last of a trilogy of articles about St Nicholas Day or Nikolai Name Day in Bulgaria. It is more of a picture blog as the event as the day came to a climax in the evening. and not a anyone called Nikolai in sight. This is no excuse for having a family gathering and a party here. As always in Bulgaria the family and food plays a major part on these occasions less than three weeks before Christmas.

I was honoured to be given responsibility and take charge of the fish, which wasn't the traditional carp due to the cost. We had bought another cheaper freshwater fish called a tolstolop. It was to be prepared salted and barbecued on this warm and sunny December day.

The fish was the main course, before that the women were preparing a meze type of starters that will see us through a few hours of talking before the tolstolop fish was served up.

Starting form the top working round clockwise, let me take you through the table of food prior to the fish being served:

• Lettuce and Yoghurt Salad - A simple Bulgarian lettuce in December grown under glass, oil salt and vinegar added place plain yoghurt, simply delicious

• Pig Skin - Galia's son had been to a pig slaughtering earlier today and had brought some of the skin that had been scolded and scraped. It was just salted before eating.

• Skalitsa Salami - Home made salami from another pig slaughter given to us from our neighbours in the village.

• Sweetcorn and Gherkin Salad - Plain sweetcorn from home grown cobs and homegrown gherkins that had been preserved in salt/vinegar water a couple of months ago.

• Green Tomato, Cauliflower and Carrot Pickle (centre) -Again, all home grown vegetables that had been preserved n salt water a few weeks ago.

And to accompany the meals, dark beer from Sofia and homemade Yambol rakia along with Yambol produced orangeade. The only non-Bulgarian food in the table were the coated peanuts.

The main course fish was superb and the whitest fish meat I have every seen, it was swimming in crystal clear pollution free reservoir waters some 5 kilometres away from Yambol 48 hours earlier!

It was a very long day but only because this year is fell on a Saturday. Next year is is on a Sunday so big family meal with all the traditions surrounding will happen again. A beautiful soul stirring day that hopefully will never be diluted with commercialism.

A Bargain Bulgarian Lifestyle

It was with deep reflection last night thinking about what has happened over the last four years. Four years ago I didn't even know where Bulgaria was. There wasn't any reason for me to know at that point.

How did I find out about Bulgaria? Well it was an accident. It had always been a dream to be self sufficient with a smallholding, the intention was 30 years ago to do this in England, but got priced out straight away. Then the idea was to go to France, again this idea was always there but family and career held the plan back and of course, we were priced out again!

Then by a quirk of fate a search on eBay was made with the word 'smallholding' and a property came up in Bulgaria. It was an auction of course and there was only 8 hours remaining at the bid, without reserve, was a mere £1,800.

My instant reaction was of total disbelief looking at the property and land. I put it down to a scam but curiously followed the bidding to the close. The property was sold for just over £2000! It was mind blowing to me that conceivably you could buy a property for the price of a two-week family holiday, or the price of a jalopy second-hand car!

The seed was sown as I set about searching for other properties that were for sale and found that these prices were commonplace in Bulgaria. It was at that point that my whole world was turned upside-down and the opportunity to live a self-sufficient life on a smallholding came alive again. There was no way I was going to wait and be priced out again!

Four years on form that day I am now living a life in Bulgaria and produce most of the food we eat here. I have a Bulgarian partner and can now get by very well with the Bulgarian language.

The luckiest part of all is that I absolutely love Bulgaria, the Bulgarian people and the way of life that is led here. It is living in poverty but I’m happy and will never go hungry. We work together as a family and a community to make ends meet. There is never a time where you are ever isolated. In reality, it wasn't only a home I bought that I could just afford outright, but a bargain way of life of which no amount of money could buy.

Bulgaria is not for everyone though. Other expatriates who have come here have not settled as the only reason they are here is because it is cheap not because they like the country or the non flamboyant lifestyle. They may not be honest or brave enough to say so, but from what I see, that remains a fact.

Where is Maria?

During the journey of life things happen, experiences unfold and in the light of these experiences many thing just seems so cruel and unfair. Today was one of those instances.

From the first time I came to live in Skalitsa, one family have always been there to just a degree it feels that I have become part of their family. Sasho, the man of the house has been adopted celebratory ‘brother’ for two years now and quite often we are in each others’ houses to the early hours I the morning. All the things I have learnt about village life and country living, has been given to me by Sasho and Rosa his school-teaching wife. I have lost count how many times we have been helped out by this family.

Two years ago Rosa father passed away and this was a very sad occasion but acceptable as he had a good life and was of the age were many Bulgarian males do pass over to the other side. I saw him the day before he died and this sight has stuck with me ever since. The sight of someone who you know will not be in this world for much longer just brings to the front what is important in this life and how humble it makes you thinking that the problems you have matter.

Part of the family live in Ovchi Kladinets the nearest neighbouring village from Skalitsa. Maria, Sasho’s sister and her husband Mitko live there. From the very first day I met Maria (and I have written an account of this) there was a deep affection and total joy in her being around. Everyone has the same opinion of her – she is the kindest, generous and more sincere person that you could ever meet.

Many times we have visited her in Ovchi Kladinets and treated like close family. There has never been a time that we have left without a boot full of garden produce and a big slobby kiss goodbye.

Maria is as big as her personality, loud, brash, unassuming, speaking her mind at all times. She has a very open based sense of humour, which crosses many subject boundaries and she has no scruples about anything. Without Maria this world would be a much poorer place and never at any point did anyone ever conceive that she wouldn’t be here. This is where the totally inconsideration of fairness in this world strikes.

On our return to Skalitsa, Rosa brought the shocking news that Maria was very ill and didn’t have any chance of recovery. We couldn’t believe that this woman, the life and soul of Bulgaria and the same age as me could ever have got this way.

We offered to take Sasho and Rosa to the village as they didn’t have any transport although we did dither as Maria would get out of her death bed to cater for us and we didn’t want to stress here further. But we decided to go as we may not see her ever again.

On arrival we went in and I just didn’t know that that was Maria sitting on the bed. It looked nothing like her. She had lost so much weight that she was unrecognisable. Her bubbly forceful talking tone had diminished into a whimper as we greeted her. Everyone was in tears as the full impact of her illness became a reality before our very eyes.

The next hour or so was painful for everyone, as we knew that this is probably the last time we see her. I won’t go into detail about her illness, as it is complex and not something that should be broadcast.

We left with this picture in our heads of a woman who had been in our hearts and head for so long transformed into a woman just clinging on to life. How cruel can life be?

This again makes us feel so guilty about anything and everything we complain about, how insignificant these problems are compared to what we see before us. Why is it that the good people of this earth are destine to leave it early and the evil remain? If there is a God why does he play cruel games all the time?

Absolute Bliss

Well I'm back home in Bulgaria and although no home I could call my own am very happy to be living with Galia and her Bulgarian family who make me feel more welcome that anything I have ever experienced before.

New experiences galore and the writing will be starting up again shortly.................

So glad to be out of and away from England you would not believe! I may be penniless and have no job but you cannot buy happiness. It is a challenge living as many Bulgarians live making ends meet through non materialistic practices and making the most out of the resources they have.