Smell the Roses

This past weekend was the Festival of the Rose in Karlovo. Two volunteers came for the event; Jim and Emma. I had never been to the rose festival before and wasn't sure if it would be very entertaining..........turns out there was nothing to worry about. When they arrived Friday night, we went for dinner at a local restaurant and talked about Peace Corps experiences and did a little catching up. After dinner we walked through the center. We were met by a local doctor from Soput outside Restaurant Karlovo. He and I are working on a project together to get medical supplies for the local hospitals. This evening was apparently an auction to raise money for children. It was a lavish event with banquet style seating, flowers and lots of food and drink. The doctor invited us to join and paraded us into the restaurant passed the front tables telling everyone we were Americans from the Peace Corps and lead us into the back where all the municipal leadership was sitting.........to say the least we were all surprised to see each other. The night continued with a few awkward hellos and introductions. The waiter brought us out cake and poured us water in wine glasses. The doctor, who was very drunk at this point in the night kept coming over with wine for our glasses. The entertainment for the night began not much after we arrived. There were women in Vegas style costumes dancing to Broadway music and a man who swallowed fire and had Jim step on his chest while laying on a bed of nails. Emma described it as what she expected to happen if she was ever tripping on Acid. I was pretty sure that no matter how much fun the next few days were this evening would be hard to top.

The next morning we woke up early and met the past volunteer and my dance group to go to the outside of town to the rose fields. Here we saw the tradition of the rose queen and her court, traditional dancing, singing and drank rose rakia......which honestly was more like cool aid with rose flavoring.

After the events in the rose fields there was a presentation in the center with the rose queen and the mayor. This was followed by kukeri dancing and singing. We decided to go for a walk around Karlovo to see the waterfall and a local rakia distillery. This distillery made rose rakia and rose water. They were giving demonstrations and tasting. Later that night, there was a concert in the center. It was an early 90's hair band. They played alot of covers and at one point played the first 3 or 4 minutes of several popular rock ballads which was a bit confusing but that might have been all the knew for those songs. At one point we only heard the drummer playing, this was because the other group members decided to take a smoke break in the middle of the concert.

Emma headed back to her town Sunday morning and Jim and I enjoyed a lazy afternoon. We made french toast and attempted to make banana bread in my testy oven. We made a crazy decision to go to Plovdiv for McDonalds. I spent almost 10 leva on food and it was worth every stutinki.

Yesterday I had an Eco club project with the kids I went with on excursion a few weeks ago. There was a presentation from a volunteer who lives in Gabrovo (just over the mountains) and we played a game about food chains then they made masks with natural and recyclable materials and finished the event with two films; one about hedgehogs and the other about lady bugs. At one point in each movie the animals were getting a bit physical.......the kids were giggling and we had to explain that is what happens in nature so there can be more hedgehogs and ladybugs. Hehe!

The class and their teacher had brought me a bouquet of flowers........it really made me feel special and welcome. After the event I was given some startling news. Thankfully the visiting volunteer had better Bulgarian skills then I and was able to clue me in on what she was saying. He just had this look on him that something was wrong. I understood that she was talking about a student and a mom but it wasn't until she used the work "monkey" in Bulgarian that I was able to piece the puzzle together. The problem was that there was a student in her class who did not come to the event because he was upset. After our trip around Bulgaria he went home crying saying that apparently I had called him a monkey. This of course was not true and not something I would ever do to anyone let alone a 10 year old child. He has a complex about his larger ears. I was told that he tends to think people are always talking about him and his ears. I assume he heard me say something to the other kids, or misunderstood something I said thinking it was related to him and his ears. I don't know where he would have come up with this idea. The teacher explained that she knew this was not in my character and even the students explained it had not happened. The mother of this student was upset as I can imagine and had contacted the teacher about the incident. I offered to speak with the mother if it would help. Even though the accusations were completely off the wall and false it certainly put a damper in my day to think that not only one of the students but also their parents thought I was capable of this.

Today was back to the real world. I started work in the information center. They have been itching for an English speaker to be working here for all of the foreign tourists asking for information regarding the town and the mountains. There has already been a man in today from Switzerland. he wants to make a film about the rose festivals in Karlovo and Kazanlak. I was sorry to say that he had missed the festival in Karlovo but had all week to enjoy the festivities in Kazanluk. I also put him in contact with the volunteer in that town.

It is a beautiful day on Waterfall street.