Bulgarian life
65. If you don’t like cats, you may want to skip this one
One of our cats, Moona (the mother cat), has been missing since the end of August. We choose to believe she’s gone to live elsewhere in the village rather than departed for cat heaven. To be honest, the kittens have grown up to be quite a handful, so I don’t really...
64. малко по малко (little by little)
The lovely young Dimana has been giving us Bulgarian lessons for about a year now. That sounds a long time doesn’t it? Surely we must be fluent by now?! Erm, well, no. In the beginning it was rather sporadic and we pretty much cried off lessons all winter. (What?...
61. A tale of two vegetable patches: Part two
A little while ago I wrote a post comparing our (first ever) veg patch with our (very experienced 64-year-old) neighbour’s veg patch. Needless to say, the comparison wasn’t kind. Svilen’s veg patch is glorious - regimentally organised rows bursting with huge fruits...
58. MOT. Easy as one-two-three
My car MOT was due this month, the first one since we moved to Bulgaria. I was a little apprehensive as, although Uma the Puma has only done 7,000 miles in the last year, they’ve been tough miles. The roads here aren’t too kind to cars. Especially silly,...
57. The one where everyone comes past our house for a nosey
Rush hour in the village! We’ve been planning to replace our ropey old concrete path with a stone one. Imagine our delight when Rob started pulling up the concrete this week and discovered an old stone path already there underneath. It was quite uneven and...
56. A tale of two vegetable patches
On a break from gardening... Our neighbour’s garden is entirely devoted either to raising animals or growing food. Every inch is maximised and, in a garden the same size as ours, he has sheep, a donkey, chickens, turkeys, and enough vegetables to feed two...
55. One Born Every Minute – Bulgarian Style
Last year we stole a cat. Not really a cat, a kitten. One of our neighbour’s kittens. Whaaaat? *innocent face* They had a litter of six. We didn’t think they’d notice mind us stealing adopting one of them. Oh, shut up. Anyway, Moona (as we named her) has lived with...
53. Folk-ing brilliant
A few mornings a week we go round to our neighbours' house for coffee. There’s a GMTV-style programme on from 9.30am called Predi Obed, which we all watch together with interest, Svilen and Penka explaining in great depth what each story is about (like that...
52. Snoooooooooooooooow
This is a story of survival. Of pushing the human mind and body to its limits. It’s a story of triumph. And Scrabble. This is a story I like to call ‘Epic Snow and a Really, Really Big Power Cut’. To be fair, the forecast did say ‘Heavy snow’. So it’s not like it...
51. White Christmas
What is it about snow that makes me behave like an idiot? It starts with me screaming “It’s snowing, IT’S SNOWING!” while jumping up and down (and clapping). That humiliating display is followed by me taking photos of everyday things covered in snow - “look,...
50. Neighbours. Everybody needs good neeeeeeeighbours
Being in a village (as opposed to the middle of a field) we have actual neighbours. Obviously this is marvellous, especially when they are as lovely and helpful as Svilen and Penka. They are in their sixties and, as their sons no longer live at home, they...
48. Autumn in Bulgaria
Okay, so we had a freak snowstorm in October. Yes, October. Thankfully it happened a few days after we got our heating fitted so we stayed nice and warm. Apparently it’s pretty unusual for the temperature to drop so much in October. Although, saying that, we were...