In the first hours of the morning

Image by Ognyan Lazarov

In the first hours of the morning,

I still love him,

even under the thick cover of charcoal

from my broken heart.

The beautiful moments together

are stubbornly keeping their faces unchanged,

no matter how many times

I run the wash cloth over them

and wish they will fade away

and become debris in the pile of old flames.

In the first hours of the morning

my head is buried in pillows,

aching to start another day.

Maybe today I will pack my belongings

and befriend the image of a girl

wearing worn-out jeans and a tattered sweater,

walking through the streets of an unfamiliar city…

In the first hours of the morning

It's time for another travel,

another adventure,

another bite at my soul.

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Please note: All articles and photographs contained here are property of © Gypsy Letters, 2014 unless otherwise noted. No part of this website may be reproduced without the explicit permission of the copyright holder.

Divided (Travel through the Golden Festival)

Dedicated to the people of all Balkan countries,

to their fiery spirit,

to their passion,

to their music.

The first snow day in New York for 2016 is a Sunday. A glorious gray January morning opens eyes and tucks my cover tightly. It’s certifiably cold. My consciousness follows the wake up call around noon, but my body refuses to engage in a vertical posture all day. I stay in bed the remaining Sunday hours. The hyperactive child that I once was, has capitulated after 2 days with no sleep and a true example of what happens when the “rhythm gets you”.

Zlatne Uste • Golden Festival is one of the biggest Balkan festivals in US. It has been taking place in New York for 31 years and for 2 days it brings together people from all around the world, who love to share and experience the music from the Balkan countries. It’s not the typical gathering, where the audience watches passively. Under the drums, the twists of accordions, the “odd-metered” rhythm your limbs obey, whether you hear this type of music for the first time or you’ve been born into it. For me, an avid dancer to all types of music, the Balkan melody in particular works like the Pied Piper of Hamelin’s tune to mice - it’s in my veins, it flows with my blood and it fills every pore of my skin. Everytime I hear the voices of the bagpipes rising, goosebumps crawl down my spine. The melody works like a magic key to a sanctuary hidden inside of me, where I always feel safe. It makes me want to cry and sing at the same time.

The Bulgarian "101 Kaba Gaidi" Bagpipe group based in New York

The 2016 edition of the festival is the 2nd one I’ve been to. A year ago I dragged my beaten body to it after 4 weeks of bed rest. I had completed a double mastectomy and neither my flesh nor my spirit were in the mood to mingle. The winter of 2015 was vicious, giving anyone even less of a reason to go out. However, my nephews were performing at this festival and my aunt (my only family across the ocean) had convinced me to go see them, maybe stay an hour and go back to bed. I was grumpy and achy. My arms refused to follow any normal movement patterns, which made putting on winter layers a 2 hour clothes-wrestling session. The wind kept smacking me left and right, as I slowly conquered the short distance from the Park Avenue station to the Grand Prospect Hall. I arrived at 6pm and had all good intentions to be on the way back home as soon as my nephews finished their 20 min set. I left at 2 o’clock in the morning.

A howling wolf taxidermy

I can’t explain what happened exactly. Some sort of energy transfusion occurred the second I stepped into the Hall. The building is fascinating - dressed in kitsch, glamorous chandeliers, mirrors at odd places, hidden small rooms and some really interesting taxidermy. The warm interior sort of hits you. It carries the face of an old lady that knows her way with makeup, but often puts too much of it and then dims the lights to look more attractive. I don’t think that trick has ever worked, neither for real women, nor for the Grand Prospect Hall, but the effort is so endearing, you have to love the young spirit that still lives in the outdated body.

My nephews sang beautifully, their voices massaging my bruises and cracking open my wrinkled bag of feelings. I peeled off from the audience as soon as they finished and followed curiously a pack of wildly kicking arms and legs into the main ballroom, where a long horo line was forming. Horo is a dance of connection and unity, you hold hands with other dancers to form a large circle. The electrifying touch of strangers made me disappear within the the repetitive pattern of hops and soft steps. I felt part of something familiar, where noone asked questions about my wounds and accepted my hand willingly instead. More dances followed, some were violently loud and cheerful, others weaved around me like a serpent. The mood erupted, movements of all performance styles and dimensions were accepted. I kept telling myself - “just 5 more minutes and I’ll go home”, becoming exhilarated beyond my physical pain with every passing minute. Before I knew it, I was flapping arms and shimmy-shimmying shoulders, testing joyfully the limits of the bandages hidden beneath my knitted layers. I left feeling energized, alive, light, painfree, convinced I have to get involved behind the scenes of the festival.

This year I’m part of the decoration team and we transform all stages into Balkan sanctuaries, cosied under original hand-made Serbian and Bulgarian carpets and blankets. Some of those are over 100 years old. Others are so heavy that 3 of us are needed to lift them. All the items have been carried to the US as early as the 1960s by admirers of the Balkan culture. My team works carefully with the precious textures, using safety pins, cords, closed pins, copper wire to spread the beauty of the patterns onto the walls.

Creating a carpet line in the Choir Room

The event is a huge undertaking. Over 200 volunteers help put it together. There are cooks, ticket sellers, sound checkers, signs makers, hosts… While sharing a slice of pizza, we exchange stories, get to know our connection to the festival. Many are locals, who don't have any links to the Balkans but love the music. It warms my heart to hear how many are drawn to the culture I was born in. For me it is a big deal because I’m part of the “brain drain”, the “lost generation” that left Bulgaria at the first opportunity. So many like me were feeling lost at the time, convinced we are born at the end of the world, at a place everyone tries to condone or escape. The layer of bitterness had made me forget all the immensely beautiful things born from the pain of the Balkans, among them the music...

Volunteers during pizza break

Saturday night is in full swing. We are sold out. About 3000 people come to the second day of the festival - from 6 months old babies, dangling on the shoulders of their parents, to elderly pushing walkers. It doesn't matter who you are or where you were from. I see a girl in a wheelchair possess the dance floor and a 80 year old American lady lead an intricate Bulgarian horo dance. A Korean boy asks me to teach him some of the steps, as I watch the rooms fill with the cheers of people of all means, clothing, ethnicity. Swaying with the memories of last year, of how the music transformed my body, I melt and embrace the crowd. And it really hit me at this moment - the Balkans to me is one of the most divided places on Earth. Since the beginning of time we've fought for identity and re-definition of who we are. We live with inherited pain of battles our ancestors have fought and we continue to revisit unforgivingly. Yet the energy and love we pour into our music has the power to bring so many people of different origin, beliefs and age together.

The New York Crimean Tatar Ensemble performing a traditional dance

I can't describe the love and heart I saw everyone show during those 2 days. You have to see it for yourself. It's magic that the event is based on 600+ musicians, who performed for free, and 260 volunteers, who work over the span of one year to put it together. It’s magic that 3000 enthusiasts of so many ethnicities fill the halls with laughter and sweat, who break the boundaries of language to cry and sing the words of countless Balkan songs that have travelled through the centuries.

I wish I could somehow store this feeling in a bottle, pack it in my suitcase and bring it across the ocean to the lands of my foremothers and forefathers. I wish I could show them how strong their heritage is so they stop feeling like a small and insignificant part of the world. I wish they could realize what a treasure their sad and restless hearts have created.

For now I can at least tell them:

“Благодаря • Eυχαριστώ • Hvala • Multumesc • Faleminderit • Teşekkür”
(Thank You)

A view from the balcony into the ballroom, while Slavic Soul Party! is warming up the crowd

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Please note: All articles and photographs contained here are property of © Gypsy Letters, 2014 unless otherwise noted. No part of this website may be reproduced without the explicit permission of the copyright holder.

The Old Photographs

- “What’s with this fascination to look for old pictures?”

- “I don’t know… Тhey tell a story. They speak about change, progress, the fact that everything passes through time…. People often forget about it and waste their given time.

Photographs remind me that one day I’ll be gone too and there won’t be much left - maybe a shirt with the smell of my perfume, and a worn-out photograph with my face glued to the piece of glossy paper.

I hope my story will inspire someone the way these black & white photographs inspire me, even if there are nothing more but memories from a banal existence...

Have you ever thought of everything that time sets in flames?

Have you thought of what it builds from the ashes?“

The Theater Group of Nevrokop, Bulgaria (1929)

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Please note: All articles and photographs contained here are property of © Gypsy Letters, 2014 unless otherwise noted. No part of this website may be reproduced without the explicit permission of the copyright holder.

Strangers

When you were a stranger to me,

you were never fully yourself,

yet you could tell me about your whole world.

When I felt like a stranger to you,

I was stripped of a name

and I didn't carry my wounds,

my incompleteness,

my shortcomings.

When we were strangers to each other,

laugh came uneasy,

we still wrapped everything we said in it

to build a bridge between us,

so you can knock on the walls of my fears,

and I can pick the locks of your emotional vaults

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Please note: All articles and photographs contained here are property of © Gypsy Letters, 2014 unless otherwise noted. No part of this website may be reproduced without the explicit permission of the copyright holder.

Snow & Earth

The Snow arrived like an unexpected lover,

he kissed the Earth and gave her a white dress,

she tried it on and her reflection froze in the mirror.

“Shall we dance?” she asked, while the snowflakes were falling on her lap.

And they began dancing through the quiet whisper of the wind,

messing with the hair of the trees,

knocking on crooked roofs

painting windows with frosty spiderwebs.

Tired and swept away by the adventure, the Earth fell asleep,

dropping the soft ruffles of her dress on the sleepy faces of her dwellers.

Like shy kittens, they crawled out of the houses.

Curious footsteps wrinkled the gown,

playful paws dug into the white cotton threads,

sleighs cut the silhouette in pieces,

and the Earth was naked again,

but still asleep,

she was dreaming of Snow 

and their dance together.

Picture by Ognyan Lazarov

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Please note: All articles and photographs contained here are property of © Gypsy Letters, 2014 unless otherwise noted. No part of this website may be reproduced without the explicit permission of the copyright holder.

January 1st

Picture by Blagovesta Markova

The 1st day of the year is always drunk on promise.

It lets hangover catch you,

and fills your wanting heart with resolutions.

Be bold when you stride towards your desires,

be kind to yourself even when you fail,

and try again.

Small steps

matter.

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Please note: All articles and photographs contained here are property of © Gypsy Letters, 2014 unless otherwise noted. No part of this website may be reproduced without the explicit permission of the copyright holder.