After a bit of preparation I’ve already here. When I took off the plane, I took a big breath and said to myself: “Okay, let’s start this adventure!” In a few minutes I was lost and there was no wifi connection at my terminal! How I am going to contact other volunteers? What I am going to do all alone in Sofia?

After another big breath, then I started to think and found wifi at the coffee place on the airport. It didn’t take a lot of time and we were all together – four volunteers from different countries on their way from Sofia to Kazanlak. And it was a pretty long way! I didn’t expect it will be like 3 and half hours. To be honest, I slept at least for a half of the way.. I was on my way from 2.15 a.m. When I woke up, still in the bus, what I saw really excited me. Mountains literally surrounded the bus. Remained time of my travel I spent watching the scenery out of a window, enjoying the view.

Suddenly, the city appeared in front of us. We have been in Kazanlak. Two nice guys showed us the town. That’s how we met one of our mentors and coordinator of the project. Kazanlak for me is really similar to my hometown, so I think I will quickly get used to it. When we walked around, I understood why people also call it “Rose valley” – they have roses everywhere and they absolutely fit into the environment.

In Slovakia, I live in the flat. Here, they rent for us one big old house with beautiful garden full of grapes and plums right in the middle of the town. Okay, we’re not allowed to eat those, but still…

It’s nice to have everything close. Rosarium is the nearest place. It’s a tiny park with big amount of benches for everyone to relax, to meet friends, to go there with kids or for a little walk. What I really like is, people use it. The park is daily visited by a lot of habitants who are coming here for a bit rest.

When you want to live in Bulgaria it’s much better when you know their language. In this part of Europe is usual that “English is language of youth”, which means the vast majority of the population doesn’t speak in it. For now, me and other volunteers are a bit lost because we know just few words. All of us are highly motivated to learn the language, so when we go out, we read every sign and title around. Despite the fact that locals aren’t best English speakers, they compensate it with their kindness, their will to help in every situation and with honest smiles on their faces.

I am giving Bulgaria 10 stars for now. With this tempo it will be impossible to count all the stars at the end of the project and I am pretty sure nobody will try to do it, because they will need one more year for it.