Architect Ivo Dikov is the embodiment of the rule that youth and success can go together. He opened his first company in his 20s, in the midst of the 2009 crisis, and quickly demonstrated that with dedication, talent, work and knowledge it is possible to succeed even in harsh environment.
Since the construction of a cable car to Seven Rila Lakes, visiting one of Rila's most beautiful locations at an altitude between 2,095 and 2,535 m is easy. Hundreds of trekkers and casual tourists do it on a daily basis. However, the people who gather at one of the lakes on 19 August are are not tourists.
Dressed in white, they perform a strange circular dance on the green meadow, under the blue sky. They are the Universal White Brotherhood, Bulgaria's best-known esoteric teaching.
Going on your summer vacation to Greece? Returning from the Aegean? Whatever brings you to the southwest of Bulgaria, do take the time to divert from the main road and head to Teshovo.
To say that Teshovo is an out-of-the-way, off-off-off-the-beaten-track destination would be an understatement. Tucked into the hills south of Gotse Delchev, a mile at most from the border with Greece, it is an end-of-the-road settlement. It is now quiet and severely depopulated, though in the Communist period it sported a shoe factory.
With a strong interest in the history of diplomacy in general and Italian diplomacy in particular, Baldi has authored dozens of books, written hundreds of articles and participated as speaker in many conferences and events. His strong interest in the arts has prompted him to help organise major exhibitions in Sofia the two most recent being Colourful Visions of Ancient Rome: Mosaics From the Capitoline Museums and Leonardo, the Gentle Genius.
The colourful houses lining the cobblestone streets of Old Plovdiv are arguably the city's most recognisable sight. The only thing that can distract from marvelling at their painted façades, projecting bay windows and verdant gardens is the pavement. Polished by the feet of generations of passers-by, it is slippery even when dry, as traveller and historian Konstantin Jireček noted as far back as the late 19th century.
Dividing Bulgaria into two almost identical chunks, the Stara Planina mountain range, sometimes referred to as the Balkan, has influenced this nation's life and history for many centuries. The massive land barrier protects Bulgaria's south from northerly winds. In the Middle Ages, it separated Bulgarians from their main enemy to the south, Byzantium, and consequently all the major capitals were located north: Pliska, Preslav, Tarnovo.
Writers often find their true material through the subconscious mind. The obsession that has guided me to my truest writing always emerged more intuitively than consciously. A writer develops, over time, this ability to tap into a reservoir of knowledge, imagination, memory, and feeling that exists both at the individual level and the collective. You go into a dark, place full of buried treasure, where anything is possible, and begin your quest for your true story. You are fuelled, all along, by the particular energy of your subject.