Issue 125

Advertising is one of those businesses, which has changed so rapidly and dramatically in the past few years that if you have lived long enough to remember the olden days, you might think of the early 2000s as if they belonged to the pre-Diluvian age. Contemporary advertising is fast, digital, ever changing and constantly fine-tuning to reach its target groups more efficiently, helping old and young, big and small companies to prosper and succeed. Or to fail, if they underestimate how modern advertising works.

Loosely picking on the tune of The Beatles's Let It Be, Kolev set it to Bulgarian verse. Its refrain ran like this: "When will we catch up with the Americans?"

Concert venues and town squares cheered on when Todor Kolev made his appearance. Audiences jumped up and intoned: "When shall we catch up with the Americans?" "When? When? When?..."

Supposedly haunted villages and sites frequented by UFOs rub shoulders with  "miraculous" springs and rocks, memories of dead clairvoyants and rumours of extraordinary events. To these, add in places venerated for centuries by unorthodox religious denominations or modern spiritual movements, plus locations that have inspired urban myths, and you will end up with a fascinating itinerary of mystic Bulgaria.

Here we offer you some of the most interesting of these places. Take note: the clairvoyant Vanga, and the Strandzha feature heavily on our list.

Take Yordanka Fandakova, the mayor of Sofia, a former teacher who was handpicked for the job by Boyko Borisov. Some time ago the Sofia City Council installed pedestrian buttons at traffic lights, supposedly to alleviate congestion. People, especially elderly folk and visitors from out-of-town, failed to understand how those worked because no one had explained to them. Significantly, the new buttons were installed at major crossings in Central Sofia where there is always a steady flow of both vehicular and pedestrian traffic.

It is an image that stays in the mind. In a brightly-lit, austere tavern, a pair of men in traditional Bulgarian costume dance, surrounded by onlookers. Rachenitsa is a horo popular all over Bulgaria and is usually danced by one or two men, not holding hands, but on their own. Famous for its difficulty and the stamina required, in the olden times it was used as a competition between rival parties.

Through the 1970s and 1980s Alexander Ivanov was one of this country's most innovative photographers. He was the mastermind of the association of photographers in his native Kazanlak, and his experiments in colour photography at the time brought him prestigious national and international photography awards.

Since 1988 Alexander Ivanov has been a freelance photographer based in Kazanlak.

The first place of interest after Lakatnik might look strange to a foreigner: a five-metre statue of an old man apparently staring into the gorge, at Ochindol village. The 2005 monument represents one of the best known literary characters in Bulgaria, the Dyado, or Grandpa, Yotso from the short story Dyado Yotso is Looking On by Ivan Vazov. The story is about a blind octogenarian from an isolated hamlet in the Iskar Gorge who is fascinated by every single sign of Bulgaria's independence from the Ottomans; from the uniforms of an official and a soldier to the newly-built railway.

At this moment they are trying to impose on us a false 'collision' between the grandsons of the Communist Politburo and the grandsons of the drivers of the Politburo, who after the elections will make a big, pilfering coalition.

Radan Kanev, leader of New Republic, on BSP and GERB

As a pupil my dream was to march on the parade ground.

Boyko Borisov on why voluntary military service is on GERB's election programme

To G. N.

I have a first-hand experience in this: I have consciously sat in a Chinese restaurant while in Bangalore, I have ordered sushi in Bangkok, tom yum goong in Scotland and pizza in the Loire Valley.

The good news is that we live in a world where it is increasingly easy to win the battle against time, stress, over-expectations and the desire to preserve our youth and beauty. Aesthetic dermatology is developing, using the latest news in scientific discoveries, in its mission to understand in depth the ageing mechanisms and to slow them down. Traditional and new methods for relaxation and physical exercises help us to restore our inner balance and physical shape.

In our dynamic world education is a wealth that no-one can steal from us and that we can bring with us no matter where in the vast world we decide to live. Studying foreign languages, the choice of a profession with a future, the ability to blend into a multicultural environment, to be a leader, to have innovative ideas: these are just some of the requirements modern children and youths should meet in order to be successful tomorrow.

Since the dawn of history, humanity has been searching for the answer of how to raise and educate children in the best and rightest way. The trend has been speeding up in modernity, when Facebook is dominated by posts on which other people's children always look better dressed, more joyful and better behaved than ours, and when gazillions of articles lecture you on the latest demands for you and the newest fads in child nutrition and education.

An increasing number of foreigners is seen and heard on the streets in the centre, and in the annual ranking of Mastercard Global Destinations Cities Index for the European cities with the fastest growth of visitors for 2009-2016, Sofia takes the ninths place. In 2016, the Bulgarian capital was visited by 1.01 million people, a rise of about 7 percent in comparison to 2015. Sofia performs better than a preferred and well-known tourist destination like Barcelona, which is on the tenth place.

Why is Sofia so popular, particularly when Woody Allen hasn't featured it a movie (yet)?