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Article: Back to Bulgaria: after the grim days of Todor Zhivkov, Bulgaria is now an improbably cheerful venue of post-Communism. (personal observations that contrast Bulgaria of 1948 with that of 1993) (Back to Bulgaria)
- Article from:
- National Review
- Article date:
- January 24, 1994
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1994 National Review, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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A FEW months ago I was, for the first time since 1948, in Bulgaria, where I once lived for some years, and in whose language I am fluent.
The reason for this fluency lay even further in the past. In 1937 my friend John Blakeway and I were bumming around Europe for eight or ten weeks, including a few days in northeast Bulgaria. When we arrived in Paris I was met and whisked off by my then girlfriend. John, left alone, saw some students begging in the gutter in the Rue de la Sorbonne. Pretty broke himself, he joined them. They turned out to be Bulgarians, and we soon became very friendly with them, in particular with Ivan Ranchev (little guessing that this ...