I am living in a small village about an hour southeast of Sofia, Maluk Izvor (Малък извор). There isn’t much here, but there is a small shop and a cafe. Shopping is done in Yablanitsa (Ябланица) about 6KM away.

I’m living in what is very close to my dream house and what I would love to find in Mexico! All I’m missing is an extra bedroom to use as an office.

This is the exterior of the guesthouse. I live on the ground floor. Those windows you see in the white part are in my bedroom.

The entry hall is the heart of the house. To the left is my bedroom:

In the middle is the bathroom, and to the right is the kitchen:

See what I mean about this being my idealised Mexican home? White plaster walls, dark beams on the ceiling, and colourful textiles.

I have this cupboard for storage as well as hooks behind the door. It’s enough since I didn’t bring much!

The bathroom is modern and has a huge Mexican-style shower with a rain-type shower head. Good pressure and tons of hot water!

Here’s the lovely kitchen/sitting room. I wish there was a bigger armoire for storage, otherwise this is close to my dream kitchen!

Under the kitchen counter are the fridge and washing machine:

I have access to the whole property. If I go up these slightly scary stairs to the upstairs bedrooms and bathroom:

I have access to a deck with amazing views!

Here’s Maluk Izvor:

This is the main house. It has a really neat layout, but is old and needs a lot of work and a feminine touch. I’m happy to be in the nearly brand new guesthouse.

My only complaint about the house is that the bed is terrible. But even with that, I was so exhausted that I slept pretty much straight through my whole first night. I cursed my alarm when it went off, but I’d promised Max I’d be ready to go to to town by 9:00. I had coffee and ate a mouthful of trail mix (emergency rations that I’d been lugging all the way from SK!) since I was famished by this point. We took the dogs for a walk before going to town. The walk is straight uphill one way and downhill the other. I am going to get my exercise living here!

Here is Mechka (bear):

And Mechka’s brother… Sausage (LOL):

When we came back, Max promptly found me a comfortable chair to lounge in since I’d told him the house was lacking that. Doesn’t this sound familiar? LOL He found me one of those Ikea chairs that are very common and said he would look for something better, but, really, the chair he found is fine. He told me to poke around the property to find anything I’m missing, so when I found a very low stool, I took that to put my feet up.

We just need to work on my office space. Right now, there really isn’t anywhere for me to work, not every temporarily. I was promised a proper desk chair from Sofia in a couple of weeks, but we’ll see if that happens. I’m debating setting up my office upstairs, but will wait to see what sort of routine Max has during the summer as he said he’s here quite a bit and sometimes brings his young daughter with him.

After our walk, we headed to town, where we first stopped at the ATM. I was so disorganised that I hadn’t thought to move money to my travel account or figure out how many leva to take out. I knew I had about 90CAD in the travel account and vaguely remembered that 0.85GBGN was 1CAD. So I figured that I could very likely take out 100BGN. I asked Max if I would get anywhere with that and he said absolutely. The machine gave me my 100BGN without blinking (I’ve since learned that 1CAD=0.80BGN). We then went to a small supermarket where I picked up some basics, but was told to hold off on produce except bananas (which are excellent) since there is a market on Friday mornings and Max would arrange a lift for me. Food prices seemed very low, comparable to Mexico…

I was still in a bit of a daze and so it’s hard to give my first impressions of Maluk Izvor and Yablanitsa. The setting is very picturesque and the houses nearly all have terracotta roofs. It feels a lot like Mexico, but with a language barrier.

Max then had to be off, so he drove me back to the house and headed out. I was not too pleased to be left alone with no internet since I didn’t know  anyone and have almost no language skills, but was otherwise fine and very grateful to have the pets. I’d met the cat by this point, Penghu (sp?) and he fell in love with me and I with him. The minute I sit down, he’s in my lap or curled against me if I’m on my computer. That makes things a lot less lonely. Like in Mexico, I have the front door open the day, so he can come in and out, but he sleeps outside.

I did my laundry, then crashed for the afternoon. I’m not sure where I found the energy to take the dogs for their walk in the afternoon, but I knew I had a cold beer waiting, so that helped!

Minutes after I got in, I got a visitor, Jenny, a UK citizen who did this gig once and now lives near here in her own house. She just came to introduce herself and to say that she’d pick me up in the morning to go to the market. I was very grateful to Max for setting that up!

I kept checking the internet and rebooting the modem all evening, but had to concede defeat around 9PM.

I didn’t sleep as well my second night (I need to get to Sofia and buy a topper ASAP!), but it still wasn’t bad. I was awake well before my alarm, but have to say I looked forward to being able to have a lie-in today! I had coffee and breakfast and then walked the dogs. They are SO good. They’re not on a lead, so they go off on their own, but they frequently come back to make sure I’m there and if we come to a fork in the path, they wait for me to make a decision. My first night, I actually wasn’t sure how to get home, having been silly and strayed from the path, and when I asked Mechka where home was, she confidently headed off in a direction that looked right, periodically turned back to make sure I was coming, and then sat on the trail to show me this was it. I know non-dog people will smirk at this, but two other Mechka and Sausage dogsitters confirmed that the dogs do this!

Then, I dressed for town. Jenny met me as promised and took me to the market, which felt a lot like markets in Mexico. She helped me buy produce, pointing out what was locally grown and what was not (apparently Greek produce is unacceptable to her because it’s not “local” — I’m pretty sure we’re closer to Greece than I am in SK to Alberta!). So she vetoed my purchases of oranges and apples, but convinced me to try a Bulgarian melon. I was very happy with the quality and price I paid for my produce, including avocados and some sort of hot peppers that just might be jalapeños. Jenny said, “You don’t want those. They’re very hot!” and I had to laugh and remind her that I live in Mexico part-time!

We then met with Sarah, another UK expat who did this gig, and piled into Jenny’s car to go to the nearby town of Teteven (Тетевен), the nearest place I could get a SIM card. Jenny gets by in Bulgarian, but is cell phone clueless. She took me to a shop where I bought a SIM card and pay-as-you-go data plan, but, to be honest, I have no idea what I have or how long it’s good for. It was ridiculously cheap, though (29BGN for a SIM card and two 1GB top ups), so I’ll get more if I need it and at least I had something to tide me over until the landline internet got fixed… except that, like on Isla, I don’t have cell service at the house!

It was then time for a snack. Jenny had some sort of crême brulée thing while Sarah and I had ice cream. It’s HOT and humid here, as bad as Mazatlán has ever been for me, so we were pleased to sit in the shade with a cool treat! I must have come close to the correct word for chocolate when I ordered my ice cream because the man just pointed to a cone and a cup to see which I wanted (I said “chockolat” and it’s “shokolad”). Normally, it’d be a cup, but considering how much exercise it is to live in the mountains, the waffle cone didn’t feel like an excess. 😉

I was then taken to another little supermarket and helped in purchasing a few more things that I’m missing. I’m surprised that Bulgarians appear not to eat mustard. I’d mentioned mustard as being part of my shopping list and Jenny was listening as that was the ingredient that made her choose the shop she did. All they had was Dijon, though, no yellow mustard. Better than nothing, although I like to have both in the fridge! I didn’t want to buy meat since we had a long car ride ahead, but the meat didn’t look scary and I will buy some next time I go to Yablanitsa. I have salami, cheeses, yoghurt, and beans for protein until I get to that point.

My Bulgarian skills are completely non-existent and the language sounds alien so anything anyone tells me doesn’t stick. I’m doing a lot of smiling and shrugging while looking to my Bulgarian-speaking companions for help. I look forward to going shopping on my own so I can take my time reading labels. So many ingredients have names that are similar to French or English that I can muddle through that way. Jenny seems to speak sufficient Bulgarian but doesn’t read it, which amazes me! I am frustrated that the dictionary I bought for my phone requires web access and will look for an offline one. I did find a Bulgarian to English phrase book in the house library that will help me until I find something better. Thank goodness I took the time to learn how to read Cyrillic! I can scan the book for the English phrase and then read the Bulgarian exquivalent or point to it if I’m not sure of the pronunciation (words like bread and eggs are tough).

Today was the first time in a very long while that I was in no rush to get up. I dozed until 9AM, when Sausage literally knocked on the front door to demand his morning walk! I am very sore and exhausted from all the walking I did in London and the terrain here is challenging. So I had kind of hoped to do a partial rest day and only take the dogs out in the afternoon, but they wouldn’t let me get away with that! I took them up and then came back down to have coffee and breakfast. I had just put on my second cup of coffee when the dogs started barking. I checked the road and saw someone parked right in front of the house and standing at the gate. Mr. Internet Repairer! Woohoo! He rattled off something that included internet and I apologetically stammered out what I hoped meant “No Bulgarian” (I was close…). I took him upstairs to where the modem is and he fiddled with it for close to a half hour. Then, he turned to me and said, “Internet!” before stammering out “Router problem.” I checked my connection on my laptop and cheered when my emails started to pour in! I thanked him about four times as I guided him back to the gate.

And then, it was time to catch up with what I’ve missed since going offline… 🙂

I know that now that the internet issue is sorted, I will be very happy here. The setting is idyllic, I love the house and pets, and I’m not at all feeling closed in at living in such a rural area. It makes for a very small and very manageable world to learn. I have met one Bulgarian neighbour who does not speak a lick of English, but who seems very friendly. I learned one new word in our introductions, “dobre,” which means okay or good. I will make an effort to try to learn a new phrase or word every day and see what sticks.

Now that you’re all caught up on Bulgaria, prepare to return to London briefly!