LIFESTYLE / UP CLOSE
interview by Anthony Georgieff; photography provided by Kapka Kassabova
In case you wondered what Vasil Levski's gnomic witticism "Time lives inside us and we live inside time" meant, you'll be bemused to find out you weren't alone. It took Kapka Kassabova years to decipher. Along the way she found out things that you've been exposed to, but have rarely been able to understand. One example is the persistence with which an avowedly Socialist president and the leaders of the far-right Ataka vie to be photographed kissing the hands of some gilded patriarch, either here in Bulgaria, or, even better, in "brotherly Russia." Another is the sternness of Sofia Airport staff (and staff elsewhere in Bulgaria, for that matter). If you are willing to get the epiphany — and if you can survive 300 pages of Bulgarian angst amply peppered with Bulgarian humour — Kapka Kassabova is the must of the season.
Where, how and why did Bulgaria's Transition fail?
The partial failure of Bulgaria's Transition has, in my view, a lot to do with the failure of civil society. There has been very little civil society in Bulgaria until now, which is the legacy of 45 years of Communism.
The system of oppression created and encouraged passive rather than sustained, organised forms of resistance. In that civil vacuum, the 1990s took place. The Transition cocktail of open markets, corruption, no social welfare and rapacious capital accumulation by the few, coupled with abject poverty for the many, created an ugly man-eat-man society which has left its stamp on the face of modern Bulgarian society. A society without a middle class is doomed to be a banana republic, which is what Bulgaria was in the 1990s. But I do believe that the country is coming to the end of its Wild East era of cowboy capitalism, and the middle class, the backbone of any civil society, is growing stronger and more prosperous with every passing year.
Still, the single irreversible failure of the Transition has been the failure to protect the environment and stop the monstrous property development that has uglified and defiled the country. Natural beauty is Bulgaria's greatest asset, and it breaks my heart to see concrete and steel in the midst of almost every wilderness. To fight against the lumpen forces of raw capitalism is also the duty of a civil society, and the success of the "Save Strandzha" environmental campaign last year was a heartening victory. There are still wild places in Bulgaria, and they must be protected at any cost.
Where, how and why did Bulgaria's Transition make any achievement? .jpg)
After the trauma of Communism and the trauma of the post-Communist freefall, the country is still going. That's an achievement in itself, isn't it? To make the Transition peacefully, unlike some of our neighbours, has been Bulgaria's greatest feat, I think.
Three places or things you would advise visitors to Bulgaria or expats to go and experience?
The Rhodope with its caves, villages and otherworldly Orphic music. At least one mountain monastery, for example the Preobrazhenski Monastery outside Veliko Turnovo. Home-made traditional food, like banitsa, cheverme or kapama. And, if possible, experience the Orthodox Easter in a church or cathedral. I am anti-religion, but the choral chanting is mesmerising.
Three places or things you would advise visitors to Bulgaria and expats to stay away from?
Most of the Black Sea coast: it is monstrously over-built and very crass. Exceptions are the still unspoilt far north and far south. Chalga? No, really, it's toxic. Many foreigners find it exotic but that's because they don't get the words.
Does Bulgaria need a museum of Communism? If yes, what should be in it?
Of course it does, and enough time has passed to start thinking about it seriously. My first choice venue would be the former Communist Party building which is, I believe, partly vacant. A sample of the things that should feature: all of the Kremikovtsi factory; an empty, concrete town square with a broken bench and a malfunctioning water fountain; the disintegrating monolithic monument near the NDK, built in record time in 1981 to commemorate 1300 years of Bulgarian State; hard chewing-gum called "Ideal"; translucent red lollipop sticks in the shape of roosters; the pioneers' uniform with its blood-red tie-scarf; a queue of freezing citizens who don't know what they're queuing for; jars of pickles; rooms full of very boring, alphabetically classified files; a room full of public signs along the lines of "The Hero Is Always Present!" – the soundtrack should be a recording of political jokes. It should be bitter-sweet, though perhaps more bitter than sweet. But I wouldn't like it to be as grim and humourless as the Budapest House of Horrors.
Does Bulgaria need a museum of the Transition? If yes, what should be in it?
Not yet, the Transition is still among us. Surely only dead things can go into a museum, otherwise it's not a museum but a temporary exhibition. Still, as a start, I would suggest mummifying some chalga singers and placing them there as exhibits.
Is Bulgaria "just unique," as the government-sponsored TV ads tell us, is it only "unique," as you seem to be saying in your book, or is it not unique at all when considered against the background of the former Communist states?
Bulgaria is unique in the sense that every country on the planet is unique. But it's also more unique and attractive than most people realise, because perceptions of uniqueness and attractiveness are often a matter of branding and self-image. Bulgaria hasn't been properly "branded" until now, and it's had a poor self-image. It's precisely its fusion of Orient and Occident, rural and urban, distant past, recent past and messy present, that make it such a troubled and attractive place.
Street Without a Name
Published by Portobello Books
ISBN 978-1-84627-1123-6
Kapka Kassabova was happily raised in Sofia and educated by her scientist parents, the French school and two New Zealand.jpg)
universities. In 1990 her family moved to England, and later to New Zealand. From New Zealand, Kapka made year-long escapes to France and Germany, but four years ago she moved back to Britain and now lives in sunny Edinburgh.
She considers herself a happy cultural mongrel. Kapka has published several books of poetry, including Someone Else's Life and Geography for the Lost. Her first novel, Reconnaissance, is a road story set in New Zealand and Bulgaria. It was published in New Zealand, Japan and Israel, and won the 2000 Commonwealth Best First Novel Award for Asia-Pacific.
In the last few years Kapka has turned to travel writing and journalism. Her travel essays were twice awarded the New Zealand Cathay Pacific Travel Writer of the Year Award, and she writes an occasional travel guide to keep her head above water and her feet on the road. Her latest is the Globetrotter's Guide to Bulgaria, in which the photo captions were created by her South African publisher and are therefore quite entertaining. She is a regular contributor to the Times Literary Supplement and BBC radio.
Her travel memoir of what she calls the "last Cold War childhood" and her love-hate relationship with her native country, Street Without a Name: Childhood and Other Misadventures in Bulgaria, has just come out in Britain and Bulgaria, and will be out in the United States next year.
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| Regina Stefanova | 25.05.2009 07:12:41
Maybe more Bulgarians need to read, and think about the subtle message expressed in her book written for the British reader. Becasue if they did, they would not want her associated with their country at all. I am a Bulgarian who has read her book and I wrote her a short letter, which I am sending to your paper as well, so that you too can learn that there are Bulgarians who view her writing as false and designed to please a foreign audience. Kapka Kasabova, This is not going to be a positive review of your so called memoire, Street Without a Name but it is one, which I am certain a number of Bulgarians, real Bulgarians, would like to express to you if they could be bothered. Fortunately for you I can be bothered, because as a Bulgarian not much younger than you (at 31 years of age) who has just read your book, I feel it is about time someone put you in your place or at least pointed you in the direction of your place. My immediate thoughts are that there isn’t a single Bulgarian cell in your body and by some freak accident you found yourself in a Bulgarian body you do not deserve to inhabit. This means that you do not deserve to represent Bulgaria in any capacity, on any level, not even as a travel writer. As a writer I am sure you appreciate how ironic life can be sometimes, especially your life. Because if a few British people, ignorant about anything Bulgarian, buy your book, you will actually benefit financially and career –wise from the very thing or place you so desperately wanted to run away from - Bulgaria. But why am I telling you all this? The very fact that this book was even published, indicates that you already know that you can make a career out of using your Bulgarian childhood to please the British, who you have already learnt, tend to use superlatives to describe any idiot who waves an anti-socialist flag, especially idiots who come from socialist countries. Fortunately for you, you write much better than the average travel memoire writer, although not as well as some of your Anglo-Saxon readers would have us believe. But they can be excused; they too lived a life full of propaganda, only in their case it was anti-socialism, anti-Eastern Europe propaganda and as a result they have genetically evolved to respond to former socialist children who bitch about socialism with unnatural excitement and the superlatives you are now hearing about yourself. And of course, I too must give you credit where credit is deserved. You have really adopted a very clever approach when conveying your “hate” relationship with Bulgaria (I say hate because although you mention a love-hate relationship, I didn’t find the love part). Instead of using all of your literary bullets to conduct a massive assault, like the average writer may be tempted to do, you have carefully estimated precisely where to throw a single deadly one that would make you come across as both measured, yet honest and even objective. But I should not be surprised, because such high standards are to be expected from someone who was educated in a Bulgarian school during her most important, formative years. Yes, even the” poor” Mladost 3 girl, enjoyed not only the kind of education she couldn’t get in the UK , but she also enjoyed going to the theatre and the opera, and she learnt another language, all for free under the terrible socialist system, all the while reading classics from around the world her classmates in the UK had never heard of. But I get it, we should have sympathy for you because life was indeed very hard for you. You lived in a very small apartment, like many Europeans even in fabulous Paris, but who’s comparing! You had to share a bedroom with your sister and your parents slept in the living room, there were some types of chocolate you hadn’t tasted, and your Dutch friends had such nice tin boxes for their cookies, and so many, that that was a turning point for you and your self-esteem. Got it! Worst of all, are you listening Britain, breast cancer, factory accidents, a dead TV presenter and tragedy in general only happen in Bulgaria, and maybe Russia. So stay away, feel sorry, praise the Bulgarians who have the “courage” to tell you this so beautifully but wait, still visit, because Kapka is now writing a travel guide for Bulgaria. Oh and my personal favourite at the very beginning of the book, the grand opening where the reader learns that in the Bulgarian woods “ anything could lurk under the leaves, from a mushroom to a dead body”. But wait, wait, my absolute favourite part comes now, “and it usually did”. Only, Kapka, you forgot to tell us how many dead bodies you found in the woods. Obviously none, but never mind, it sounded like a good crime novel so why should you let truth get in the way of such a good story? Besides, you are writing the story for an audience who, as you said yourself, think Bulgaria is a river in Mexico, or was it a cartoon character? But don’t worry, we did learn just how traumatized your daily life under communism was, because who could forget your story about your teacher who asked you to spy on the bad kids! Well, that is just communism at its worst, isn’t it? And finally, maybe a small point and you have obviously been selling this story of your life well before you wrote it, but perhaps check again the insights you claim to have had at the age of 8-9, about your educated mum who lived in Mladost 3 and the Dutch housewife, who although uneducated had a very nice new van. Are you sure it wasn’t something you overheard your mum complain to dad about? I am just curious, but haven’t you come across uneducated rich people in the UK who drive cars that the intellectuals of the UK would have to work 20 years to afford? Now that you no longer live in Mladost 3 and you can eat lots of different kinds of chocolate in your very own room, maybe it’s time to give Bulgaria a rest and come up with new and original material for your writing! Bulgaria does not need those who openly state that they don’t feel remotely Bulgarian, yet continue to use their Bulgarian name to sell books of “memories” about Bulgaria. Oh, yes, I forgot, you are not writing for Bulgaria and Bulgarians, you are writing for a British audience! Congratulations, you do that very well! Now, I think, it’s time for you to do what you said you always wished for, to leave Bulgaria and never look back. I too want that for you. And this is coming from another Bulgarian who has spent many years since the age of 15 in foreign countries, thanks to her international scholar parents. Regina Stefanova-Ryan |
