CULTURE

The morning Tita Marie came crying into this world on her grandfather's sofa, I cut the cord. Me – a stranger, an oilman. An adoptee.

We all know how boring the Black Sea is. It lacks the saltiness of the Aegean, the rugged coastline of the Adriatic, and the rich marine life of the Red Sea. Its waters are dead, its fauna has been lost to pollution and overfishing. In short, the Black Sea is dull.

You can enter by the road from the south, the north, the east or even the west, although the west road, unfortunately, is not very good. Actually, even then it was quite bad and annoying to drive on, with lots of potholes; there would often be fallen trees. There is no reason to think that the road is better now. You cannot be sure what to expect, once you manage to get into the city. Even back then, the buildings had almost entirely lost their magnificence and charm, which was reminiscent of a decent past, and suggested a relatively prosperous future.

To my father

She has no idea if the time she has left is enough. But the desire is stronger than common sense and she starts piling up pillows to hem in the corner of the huge bed where she can sink fully into her thoughts and find peace at last. In the house time has its own clock, slow and different. She hopes nobody is going to look for her.

She falls asleep before she knows it, carried away by shouts and voices distant as the world outside this room. Everything starts from the beginning like the breaking day.

Copyright © 2014 by Shelly Oria. Reprinted by permission of Farrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC. 
http://us.macmillan.com/fsg

Kisses # 1-3

It was organised by the Free Speech International Foundation and the Multi Kulti Collective, supported by the Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein NGO Programme under the Financial Mechanism of the European Economic Area.

The UnBulgarians show the "Bulgarian life" of people from New Zealand to the United States, from Russia to India, and from Peru to Japan, but also of refugees from Syria, Afghanistan and Sub-Saharan Africa, asking thought-provoking questions about multiculturalism, tolerance and national identity.

Billy was an old-school hustler. His complexion revealed a few things – a bachelor still living with his 75-year-old mother who provided for him, permanently devoid of work habits, managing the local soccer team on and off in exchange for a puny salary granted by the village mayor as compensation for his active involvement during elections i.e.

Five years of getting up at seven. Suits, dress shirts, blazers and high heels. Hair up in a bun, nails painted nude. Less than ten years ago, I used to dream of it, hoped to build a career some day, saw myself precisely like this – in a large company, with a flashy office, in a prestigious and important position… And the weird thing is, I still like my job. Well, kind of. But more often than not I hate it.

1.

One evening, two weeks before loan sharks would chase him away into the unknowable depths of Indonesia, Frankie's father sat and sighed at the dinner table. It was the round marble table with a Lazy Susan, stained with sesame and chili oil-spills.

"What's wrong?" Frankie asked, doubled over, hands above his knees. He was breathless and sweaty from running up and down the alleyway, chasing the fat brown dog with the lolling tongue.

Frankie's father sat frowning at his left palm.

The number of clients I had was growing, and so were my apprehensions about how I was going to manage.

"Hello," the Computer Programmer said and took off his jacket, which looked like an oversized piece of kids' clothing. His red boxers were peeking out over the belt of his jeans. "I've come to you with a specific question."

I felt a sudden urge to explain what a psychotherapist's job was, and that he was neither a fortune-teller nor a TV game show contestant, which is why he couldn't be expected to give answers that were either right or wrong.