Bulgaria, Part IV: The Mountains

This is the part where I get to share what I loved most about our visit, which thankfully spanned half of the time we spent in Bulgaria. The mountains near the town of Troyan, where my parents have a weekend home built largely with the help and generosity of friends, is the only place we visited this summer where I would return happily for an extended period of time. As expected, Sava enjoyed being away from the crowds as much as his parents did, and he spent close to a perfect three weeks there, doing what he loves to do most: walking, playing outside, foraging for food, shooting guns, catching butterflies, "swimming," and other such; Raya enjoyed the social aspects of the visit--hanging out with neighbors, frequenting other people's chicken coops--and she especially loved the jacuzzi and the swimming pool. My camera was happy, so I took lots of photos (as did my dad; what follows, as in all previous posts, is a mixture of his and my photographs--if the photo is particularly good, then he is almost certainly the author).
A. The Land.

My parents were lucky and smart to buy here a decent piece of land at a time when inflation was quickly reducing the value of most working people's cash; my first memories of this hill at the top of a narrow winding road overlooking a mountain village include a number of locals who lived there year-round; increasingly, the locals are dying out, and most people who come to settle are either regular weekenders (like my parents) or summer vacationers; increasingly also, only wealthy people can buy and build the expensive houses here; some of the homes would be considered affluent even by US standards, and they belong to the "haves" of the country or to people who accumulated cash abroad after the fall of Communism.

The landscape is majestic, but not in a Rocky-Mountain kind of way (it's also painfully hard to photograph). When Kevin visited, we concluded that this part of the Balkans resembles the American Appalachians in both geography and climate: complete with old mountains, a hot wet summer, and lush riparian flora and fauna.

The place is full of ruins, both ancient and modern. One night after the kids went to sleep, my dad took us on a long walk along an overgrown path to a Thracian mound that gold-diggers had gutted not long ago. Such mounds apparently abound.

 Fragments of stone walls pop up here and there, some seemingly decades, if not hundreds, of years old.

There are abandoned houses built at the ends of dirt roads that one has trouble imagining as passable in the depth of winter.

There are also houses that, though unlived in, boast beautiful vegetable gardens and orchards, where people from nearby towns come on the weekends in order to cultivate their food. The children and grandma and I came upon one such garden during an evening walk early on and, at the kind invitation of the old lady whom we found working there, we stopped by several times in the following days in order to pick delicious early apples.

At the end of another dirt road which begins right at our house's front gate, my parents discovered years ago what remain some of their dearest friends in the mountains, Ivan and Ivanka. We visited their house, too, and the children ate honey from the hives, and Sava enjoyed a walk through their garden.

onions drying in the sun

One of the things I like most about houses in Bulgaria, over houses in the US, is the fact that many people still view their land and their yards as a vital source of nourishment. There are the occasional sterile green lawns, for sure, but more often than not, especially here in the mountains, some or much of the land is taken up with fruits and vegetables. Even in our other friends' house, which features a million-dollar view and an expansive lawn, there are the apple trees and the tomatoes.

there are layers of mountains behind the trees, but the haze makes it impossible to photograph them

see all the apples and the tomatoes next to them?

B. The Walks

So, we took a lot of walks.

My favorite part of the day during the last two weeks was putting the kids to bed before 8 pm and then heading out for a long walk with one of my parents. Those hours spent walking and talking alone with my mom or my dad will remain the most precious part of the trip for me and the part that some day will bring me back here. I'd like to imagine taking just the same kind of walks with my own son and daughter when they are grown. 

Nothing eases the heart so well as the open air.

You know how it's trendy to talk about "foraging" these days? Well, my parents don't know the term necessarily, but my dad is a pro at finding edibles all around the mountains. Mushrooms are his big thing, but so are "djanki" (a sour plum-like fruit) and other berries. Sava went mushrooming with him a couple of times with great success, as there are many mushroom varieties out there, and they grow through much of the spring and summer.

where's the GIANT mushroom?

In the mountains, there are also mountain-fed water springs which locals use regularly for their drinking needs. Here is the view along the path to our water spring,

and here is one of our water-collecting parties.

Also, locals collect a lot of herbs. It took me a few days to figure out that the herb everyone was crazed about gathering right when we got there, and which my mom prepared as a tea for me when I fell ill with the stomach virus that Raya distributed to every member of our family, was in fact wild thyme. Over there, they don't cook much with it; but they believe it is good for calming an upset stomach. So, my dad and I went gathering it a few times and even took the kids along with us.

a meadow of wildflowers and herbs

again, layers of mountains in the background, that the photograph is unable to capture

Never mind that Raya ended up sometimes just "trimming" the grass with her scissors,

while Sava spent half an hour throwing stones down a steep hill (really, how much does a kid need?),

and then, with my help, mastered the skill of making "bombs" out of a particular kind of grass that as a kid provided me with hours of entertainment; it's important to pass on our life skills to our kids. Right?

Also, sometimes we just fooled around,

and more often than not, the great outdoors provided the bonding experiences that only happen naturally in, well, nature.

During the long walks, Raya could often be heard moaning that she was "too tired" to walk,

but thank goodness for her indefatigable brother, whose body and mind draw and then redistribute energy from every minute spent outdoors.

He also, the dear soul, took pictures of everything around him; I've yet to explore the hundreds of photos on his camera.

Parenthetically, during moments of social boredom, when everyone else was eating and drinking, while he itched to be outside, he also made the perfect subject for my photographs; I love these pictures, taken during a lunch party with our neighbors.

Lest I give the impression that Raya was a pain in the patootie when it came to walking, she had many and various good moments. For instance, she loved eating grandma's breakfasts before we went on walks: if it was bready and cheesy and fried, she was all over it.

Her favorite part of every walk was the breaks we took, 

and she definitely enjoyed the mud. 

She also liked playing hide-and-seek in the meadow up the hill with Tzveti:

C. The Butterfly Whisperer.

One of the first things Sava wanted to do when we got to the mountains was chase butterflies. We couldn't find nets to buy, so my dad used old badminton rackets, which he and dedi Rumen then outfitted with fishing nets.

I'm not making it up when I say that, at a certain point, Sava was catching and releasing a good forty or fifty butterflies a day. A few of those possibly ended up dead as he chased them around his net in order to grasp them in his hand and then release them, but most flew off without a problem.

Seriously, the kid became a whisperer. 

watching a butterfly fly off; note the mushroom in my dad's hand 

Were it not for the fact that it was necessary, on occasion, to go home and eat, he would have done this for hours and hours. It was a joy and a marvel to witness.

 

By the end of our stay, it felt as if the butterflies trusted him, as they lingered leisurely on his hand even after he had opened it.

When he grows up, I'd like him to remember that, once, he was able to do this--catch a butterfly, hold it softly, and then release it. If he can maintain this sort of intimacy with nature, he can't but have a fulfilling life.

While her brother cast spells over the butterflies, sister mostly complained that she "couldn't catch any butterflies" and enjoyed being handed the fat crickets which often got caught in Sava's net.

D. Speaking of Sava, he did other favorite things like 

Fishing.

in Troyan

With a fishing rod gifted by one grandpa and the know-how of the other one, this trip fed in a significant way the passion for fishing which our trip to Montana last summer awakened.

 Our summer list of to-do things now officially includes, "provide Sava with fishing opportunities."

Towards the end, there was also some serious 

Kite-flying, thanks to a kite that my dad had brought from the US years ago.

As usual, Raya looked on, while Sava ran his little heart out along the hill.

E. The House

Lest anyone should get confused about the chronology of all this, Rado left two weeks before the kids and I did. So, the three of us had two weeks in the mountains without him, which is the first time I've been away from him for even a single night in over eight years and the first time either kid has spent a night away from him since they were born. Crazy!

The parting was dramatic (witness above), and the reunion at SFO equally so. For Rado and me, who've always valued the trust and intimacy of our relationship, the two weeks away provided some startling insights: that we can't talk to other people as we talk to each other;  that we are better parents around each other; that, generally, we'd much rather be together than apart.

doing math problems with dad

getting chastised for being loud and obnoxious in a restaurant; I love Sava's face

So, during the solitary stay with my parents, besides all of the walks and the wonderful stuff beyond the confines of the house, we spent a lot of time just playing in the yard. Except for their "quiet time" for an hour or two each afternoon, the kids were outside from morning until 7 pm.

They spent a lot of time in the swing, using it as a bed, a wrestling arena,

a cooking space, 

and even a reading bench.

They played "house" and dancing fairies in and around the raspberry bushes,

and when it looked like the raspberry bushes might not make it, my dad built a makeshift tent.

They tumbled around on the grass in all sorts of crazy ways,

 

and happily filled the time with all sort of otherwise simple-seeming games: pouring water for over an hour,

throwing stones with abandon, 

shooting, umm, a rifle,

shooting with a bow and arrows skillfully made by dedi Rumen,

playing with dolls,

this mama is not happy 

and exploring wildlife:

Exhibit A

A hedgehog which my dad and I spent over an hour the night before trying to find, then kept in a bucket overnight in order to share with them (there are many hedgehogs there, but they are mostly nocturnal and somewhat hard to catch):

Question: How many pictures can one take of a girl in her pink striped tights and a hedgehog?

 Answer: Never enough.

Exhibit B

A dormouse caught in a trap in the attic of the house; those critters had a party going up there almost every single night, and dedi Johnie had to resort to some drastic measures; the kids took cruel pleasure in poking the poor critter with sticks before Sava and dedi Johnie released him in the wild:

F. The environs.

During brief trips away from the house, we visited Apriltsi a couple of times, where the kids got to play on a playground (a rare treat during our six weeks there)

and also watched parts of a local Folklore Festival; they did not care about the singers,

 but they enjoyed watching the kid dancers.

G. The Pool and Jacuzzi

Last but not least, and perhaps the kids' most consistently favorite part of the whole three weeks, there was the pool at our house, where they swam (much naked footage here cannot be included),

and sprayed their grandparents with water guns,

followed by a trip up the street to the jacuzzi of our friends, with a stunning view of the whole mountain range.

You wouldn't think one can swim in a jacuzzi, but when one is three and seven years old, apparently one can.

The pictures above originate in my camera; those that follow, in my dad's; he is particularly pleased with the one below:

Towards the end, the kids discovered Ivko and Vili's pool also, with yet another stunning view:

So, need it be said that a great time was had in the mountains by all, and this not even counting the wonderful friends and neighbors, who were already celebrated in an earlier post? 

To my mom and dad for their tireless work in making it all happen: a profound thank you, with love.

To the mountains: Be there for us next time.