Expatriate Statement - Untrue!

It was commented by an expatriate today that Bulgarians have loads of time off work for celebrations and festivities, whatever the cause, but don’t have any money to fully take advantage of the party times. This comment was taken and put in perspective when mentioning that it was the opposite in the UK where people have lots of disposable income, but no time off from work to spend it on partying.

Generalisation just makes my blood boil and this is a fine example of that. How can anyone make a statement like that and label everyone as being the same here in Bulgaria or likewise in the UK? Why say something like that, is it a reaction they are after or is it just being too lazy to draw more into the observation, which actually isn’t an accurate observation anyway?

I took the essence of the comment and made the point that many Bulgarians don’t need money to celebrate or party, they just need company and there’s plenty of that around with their normal socialable habits. Good cheap homemade food and drink with company and a television provides a formula for celebrations that cost no more than a normal evening meal anyway. In fact it is cheaper to have a get together and party as the savings on heating just one home rather than several makes good economic sense.

It is always a cold winter here and most people are tucked away in one heated single room whether entertaining others or not, why do they need riches to be happy in joyful communities?

So for someone to say that Bulgarians can’t afford to party is a categorical lie.

It's Who You Know In Bulgaria That Counts

It is with great worry that I saw Galia go into hospital yesterday. She had a check up and they took her in straight away to be operated on. She has kidney problems and other complications that others and I never really had any idea about because she would never say. This is the way with most Bulgarian women; they just work until they drop!

Galia never normally complains about anything, other than jokingly about my English habits, the rising cost of living and the cold winters, but that in the main is just small talk. She has been in pain for some time now, I know being so close to her, but this is kept a secret as she doesn't want her family to know due to the stress it will cause them, especially Baba. She often tell me to not say anything to Baba.

So right now as it stands, Galia has been through one operation today and there is another on Saturday. Baba and I sit here this evening in silence, praying that she will be okay. We are both worriers, but how we deal with this is very different. My appetite has gone with worry, but Baba insists that eating will ease the worries, a definite conflict there.

Baba was in tears knowing that she wasn't going to be at home at least until next week. Consoling Baba is difficult and the only way I can take her mind off it is to put the television on, but even this is a drop in the ocean as to what is going on in her worried head.

We just hope that Galia pulls through. I will skate to the hospital tomorrow if I am allowed by the doctors to visit her.

We count ourselves extremely fortunate that we have two doctors in our family, one that consulted and referred Galia to hospital; the other actually supervised the diagnosis and operated on her today. Without this we would have been on a waiting list and probably been sent to another City hospital for treatment. It is so true that it is whom you know that counts every time in Bulgaria!