It is March the 1st - the day Grandmother Marta comes and gives everyone a martenitza. No, its not my relative. It is a lady with a very special job similar to Santa Clause's. And here are some of the martenitzas we made on Sunday to give today. These are  twisted white and red threads. It is an old Bulgarian tradition wishing good health to people and cattle, by giving everyone a martenitza on March 1st. It is worn until the person sees a stork or other migrating bird. It is then tied on a flowering tree. Decoration options are unlimited. The twists on the picture are just the base. Pompoms, tassels and bows are the simplest ones.

It is the National Holiday of Bulgaria today. One of the most Bulgarian days in the year. We have the national flag hanging outside in honor of all the heroes who died to make Bulgarian freedom reality 131 years ago. Bulgaria is in an ancient country found in 680. It was conquered twice and we live in the third Bulgarian State now. March 3rd is the day we celebrate the liberation after the Turkish yoke. A liberation that seemed impossible and absolutely irrational to happen, but the braveness and courage of numerous heroes made it possible and real. Enjoy the roses. It is one stem with many fragrant roses on it. A rose grown in a garden, not selected, manipulated or specially cared for one. One of the famous beautiful fragrant, deep red Bulgarian roses I enjoyed last summer.

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19 years ago on Nov. 10th 1989 the so called transition began. Over 40 years of planned and state controlled  economy, limited political and social rights, etc. .. and it was all over in a single day. The dominant /and only according to the constitution/ political party replaced the leader of the party and the state on a political meeting. Most of the population was surprised. Almost everybody was relieved and uncertain. We have market economy, stock exchange, strong currency and low unemployment rate now. Plus one of the highest economic growths in the region, due to high foreign investment rates and stable currency /as an effect of the currency board/. The health care and education systems are functioning worse than before. The accumulated pension funds were lost in the first transition years of capital accumulation right after the change. We can travel and visit the EU countries with no special documents as we are part of the EU. Wages are getting higher, private, SME and NGO sectors are growing. Still the economy is vulnerable as it depends on foreign investment to preserve the growth and the investors are suffering from the world financial crisis. Nov 10th is not a very important date now. But I would not be able to blog without it. So I thougth I would take some time and mention it here.

I am a Bulgarian, living in Bulgaria. It seems to be an exotic country for most of my virtual guests here. Something totally unknown, distant and maybe interesting to most of you. So I think I have to explain something about Bulgaria. It is the white country on the old map shown here /the only map showing almost all of Europe that I found - it is really old and the colour coding is quite out-dated, but you can see the location/. It is in Europe, on the Balkan peninsula /South East Europe/, west to the Black sea. It is a small country with great history and beautiful landscape situated on the crossroads of various routes, cultures and interests. This proved to be a great chance and more than great trouble. We have 4 seasons, great mountains /and vegetables and fruits/. Lots of resorts /too many in the last few years/, amazing history and cultural and folklore treasures, and a post socialist transition economy, suffering a substantial brain drain /plus negative population surplus for a long period right after the democracy introduction /1989//.... Bulgaria is a European union country, but not a euro zone one yet. We use Cyrillic alphabet, which is similar to the Russian /that you can see on some Japanese fabrics/ but has less letters. The Russians added some new letters after adopting the Cyrillic alphabet.

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