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ivankulekov translatedbyrobertsturm I was born in 1951 in the village of Hirevo. This village is not shown on most maps of Bulgaria for the same reason that Bulgaria itself does not appear on some maps of the world - an inferiority complex. Understandably, perhaps, I have spent most of my adult life trying to overcome this complex: I went to University in Sofia, spent nearly sixteen years with Bulgarian National Radio, spent a further sixteen years making regular appearans on Bulgarian television, published five satirical books in Bulgaria, two books in Italy, one in Hungary, I was one of the four bulgarian writers included in the book of contemporary eastern european writing "DESCRIPTION OF A STRUGGLE", published by PICADOR in England and by VINTAGE in the USA, I traveled four months all over USA and I published a book about America, I took part in the 11th Edition of Miami Book Fair International, animated film "Sunday", produced on the basis of my screenplay is in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art, New York, four of my plays were put up on the stage, in two of them I played as an actor, and even I put myself forward as a candidate in Bulgaria's first presidential elections, although some people took me seriosly, Bulgaria was transformed into huge stage... As a result of all these activities, I have now developed an even bigger inferiority complex. Consequently, if you try to look me up - be it in literature or in theatre, or in Bulgaria, or abroad - I won't be there.

Once upon a time there was a fabulously beautiful bird. She lived in the dreams of the artists, poets and hunters. The artists tried to draw her their whole lives, but never succeeded in capturing her image. And the people said to them: -If you can't draw her it means there is no such bird. The poets tried their whole lives to describe her, but did not succeed. And the people said to them: -If you cannot describe her to us, it means that there is no such bird. -What do you mean she doesn't exist? –cried the hunters. They grabbed their rifles, fired in the dreams and killed the bird. Then they stuffed her. And the people said nothing.
A piece of bread lay drying on a table. Two hungry puppies circled around it. One of the puppies grabbed the bread and fled. The second caught up with him, seized the bread and returned it to the table. One puppy died of hunger, the other - at his post. On day the animals cried: -Down with the tsar! -Remember, in the end - cried the tsar to the animals - as long as there are still wolves, ducks, snakes, asses and monkeys among you, there will also be a tsar. See you later! With much flying, the Eagle reached the peak. And he was dumfounded. The peak was already taken by the snail. But of course, explained the snail, I was hatched here. A crocodile was hungry. He ate a fish. Afterwards, he became sorry for the fish and began to cry. He had barely calmed down when he again became hungry and began to think of live fish. The ram and the eagle reached the edge of an abyss -Abyss! cried the ram. -Big deal! said the eagle and flew on. The ram followed him. And after him followed the sheep. Somewhere there lived a very good lion who all day long wondered what good to do for his animals. The good lion permitted the rabbits to hop, the fish to swim and the lambs to graze on the grass. The butterflies asked if they could fly from time to time and the good lion said they could. And one day the good lion removed all restrictions and permitted the animals to eat one another. More endlessly grateful animals have never existed in the whole world. If it's still not clear, the moral of this fable is that the good lion is good and the animals are grateful to him. The animals.

A man wrote a fable. The people were amazed by his public daring. The mayor himself saluted the man. The fable writer thanked the mayor for the conditions created in the town under which the writing of a fable was an expression of public daring. A writer was looking for his language. He tried to write in his native language. Nothing came out so he tried another – the same. Flipping through old books, he discovered the language of Aesop, studied it and began to use it. Not much time passed and the readers began to understand the writer - Aesop's language was nationalized.

Some parakeets flew up to a group of people. The parakeets said: -You are the happiest people on Earth; You are the happiest people on Earth; You are the happiest people on Earth. It was an old circus act, but those people believed the parakeets. The happiest people on Earth, of course, are you.

Once upon a time art was a revolt. The artists broke all the frames. Art was left without frames. Art fell apart. The artists disappeared. Such stories are told by frame-builders. A tsar asked his wisemen about the world. The wisemen answered: -All is an idea, your highness. -All is a battle, your highness. -All is libido, your highness. -All is openness, your highness. -All is relativity, your highness. -All is preordained, your highness. -All is absurd, your highness. -All is funny, your highness. - the jester spoke too. -All is clear. - said the tsar. Beat the clown with a hundred sticks.

A ship was sinking. The passengers gathered on its deck. They decided to change captains. A man had a cow. She gave him milk. The cow died. The man built her a monument and continued to milk her. It was desired that a doll factory produce rubber babies, wooden teachers, lead soldiers and plastic doctors. Due to an error in the technological cycle of the factory’s assembly line, a real person came out as well. All the dolls played with him. A man was seeking the ideal man. He found him. He felt worthless before him and destroyed him.

A lonely ruler bought himself friends: the first to wake up in the middle of the night; the second for eating and sleeping; the third for leading conversations; the fourth for services; the fifth just in case. The lonely ruler bought many friends because there was nothing else a lonely ruler could buy in Bulgaria. Friends could be bought everywhere. Then one day when the lonely ruler was left without a dime, all of his friends got together and sold him. A lonely ruler got married and was happy. He had someone to command when to get up, when to go to sleep, what to eat and what not to eat, what to wear and what not to wear, what to like and what not to like, what to love and what not to love, what to think and what not to think, But the lonely ruler was even happier when his child was born. A lonely ruler got a pistol. He made the cook prepare tripe soup. He made his wife throw herself at the door. He made politician make him the center at their politics. He made the scholar tell him how great he was. He made the artist paint portrait after portrait of him. He made the priest declare him God. He ordered the mosquito to land on the table. But the mosquito did not land on the table. The lonely ruler screamed and yelled, screamed and yelled. He realized that he had no power over the mosquito and committed suicide. A lonely ruler had a nation and ruled over it from morning to night. He spoke to it, he sang to it, he fed it, he molded it, he spread it out person by person to see what each was made of, then he gathered it together again on a table, shoved it first into the refrigerator, then into the oven, took it out into the street, played war with it, made it cry or laugh, say "mama", get drunk, groan or do something until the batteries were completely exhausted. Even at night, the lonely ruler did not leave his nation, but lay down to sleep with it. And when all of this tired the lonely ruler, and he threw his nation somewhere and forgot it, the nation did not feel free, but alone. When a lonely ruler was walking in the park, threading fallen leaves on his cane, he noticed that among the fallen leaves he had begun to pick up fallen people. "What a problem", the lonely leader said to himself. "What shall I make with the fallen leaves?" He knew what to make with the fallen people - a party!

Three fanatics saw a mouse and screamed. Hearing the screams, 90 000 fanatics also began to scream. The next day a newspaper reported that demonstration had included 500 000 participants. 100 fanatics divided into two teams. They played in the cave of life and death. At one moment, justice asked to be included. The 100 fanatics laughed, divided justice in half and continued playing life and death until the complete victory of their fanaticism. 33 000 fanatics were... Oh , they were ours! And we're not fanatics. We are not fanatics! We are not fa-na-tics! 1,000,000 fanatics swore to strive for that which blows. True to their oath, they deprived one another of food and clothes, of truth and freedom, of life and health. But that which blows told them that they hadn't strived for him at all and everything went to the wind. A fanatic had a cave in which he created other fanatics. And one day his mother said "If you had ahome like normal people, you wouldn't create anything."

A kind chameleon was turned a barely visible grey on the trunk of a tree. A red ant approached him and to our great amazement, completely against his nature, he turned red. But when we realized that the ant was carrying a pistol, we turned red too. The lazybones chameleon really hated to change colors. He was big and black as anything and as soon as he saw anything shining, he ate it immediately. The chameleon sleepyhead adapted to the dirty brown of the surrounding world, but they found him and ate him anyhow - he dreamed pink dreams. The chameleon standard-bearer waved the tricolor: white, green and red. Naturally, like him, all the others beneath the flag, we were all white, green and red. And just as we set off for the attack, we looked and saw that the chameleon standard-bearer had turned white. In the symphony, the chameleon musician played whatever the others played, "Beethoven's 5th Symphony" and not Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue". Birds of a feather!

A tsar from Veliko Turnovo had low blood pressure and always felt like sleeping. Oh, how the people suffered! What unhappiness befell us with that tsar. He couldn't condemn anyone to death or declare war Some prisoners from Novo Selo were freed and immediately set off for Paris, but then path led them through the zoo where the bars so pleased them that they decided to stay. A peasant from Novo Selo was on his way to work when a swallow from warm lands flew to him and told him he was a slave. A few days later, the peasant was divorced because his wife found feathers on his body. A man who came from a place where the people were divided into "we" and "they" didn't know which he was until once a group didn't ask him which he was and he realized that he was not one of those who asked "who are you?" A homeless person from Varna was sleeping on the main street in a carton from a. "Sofia" television, dreaming of the West. Activists from the Nationalist Party moved through the street and smashed his ugly face, but to the joy of the homeless man, members of the European party also passed by and gave him a carton from a Phillips refrigerator. They raised the price of yogurt for a woman from Vratsa. The woman was pretty, but poor and could barely manage to pay the old price. After staring at the new price fear five hours, the woman fainted. She only recovered after reaching the hospital, where site found herself in the maternity ward. The woman gave birth to a little girl with blue eyes who proved to be a princess and lived happily ever after in Madrid. A man from Karlovo was a great specialist in illegal border crossings and at great risk to his life imported various necessities into the country. Fine, but during an earthquake all of the border markings sank into the ground and merchants took up the importation of necessities. One day, while traveling from village to village and town to town with their trucks, trains, boats and planes, they found the man from Karlovo asleep at a crossroad. "Aren't you ashamed of sleeping while we risk our money to import necessities into the country and sell them to the starving hordes?" They chased the man from Karlovo. The man bolted to cross the border illegally, but it no longer existed and he had to get on line behind the merchants' stands. The deputy-minister from Svoge read a lot and became minister. But he didn't remain long in the minister's post because he continued to read. A leader from Sicily entered the mafia of bad leaders who let him speak for two minutes at one of their rallies. At the next rally, the leader asked for four minutes and at the next eight, and so on, raising the period from rally to rally. The leader reached the point where he could not live without rallies. Then all of a sudden the bad leaders cut his access to the microphone, and when the leader began to writhe from rally withdrawal, they told him that they would call a rally for him under the condition that he kill 2000 people. So at the next rally, 2000 fewer people appeared, and at the next 4000 and only Sherlock Holmes realized that the reason for the ebb in attendance at the rallies was not the people, as stated in the official communique, but the leaders. Out of fear for the leaders' mafia, he didn't dare tell that to Mr. Watson. An officer from N worked at the N unit. The distance between the city of N and the N unit was greater than other distances and as the officer had neither his own car nor his own motorcycle (It was no secret that the officer was neither an American nor a Chinese), he covered the distance in question in his army-issued tank. The officer's life was hardest in the summer months of June, July and August because then he didn't see the point, while in the winter months of December, January and February, Oh! The officer saw through his military binoculars how the children of N climbed over each other on the puncture-proof armor of the just-parked tank and warmed their bottoms. Mirela from Musacevo was milking a ewe which always overturned the pail of fresh milk with her hind legs, because the ewe made the milk for its own sake, not so that it coud be sold in the dairy store, (In fact, Mirela wasn't at all interested in the ewe's milk. She wanted her wool which she sold in the wool store.) The sixth most important man in Bulgaria went on an excursion to New York. It was noon when he set off wide-eyed down Wall Street, turned right on Broadway, had his picture taken in front of the world-famous financial center and then continued along Broadway untilhe reached Canal Street. There he found a place where you can eat for just 99 cents and there for first time in America he felt among his equals. Slav from Boyana was drawing bathers, but at 4 o'clock his aunt arrived and suggested that he put on two pairs of socks when he went for bread, and Slav told her that he had to finish a painting which had been ordered from Switzerland, went to his studio, loose himself in and only Freud can explain it, drew a mouse at the feet of the bathers. In a few hours, the mouse was dry - first its eyes dried, then the tail and it was left in the art as Slav's cat had for a long while lived as brother and sister with his dog and no longer knew what was good and what was evil. Someone who wasn't from Mars set off for Paris. He walked and walked and walked and reached Mars. The people of Bulgaria ate and drank with their overseers three times a day. Then one day the overseers didn't come to dinner and the people were afraid. They were so stunned with fear that they couldn't eat a crumb or drink a drop. The people of the world heard that the people of Bulgaria weren't eating or drinking and began to send them all kinds of foods, juices and money. But the news from Bulgaria on CNN and in Le Monde remained the same. Then the people of the world came in person to Bulgaria and found that in Bulgaria there is food, drink and money but no people.

After a long suite, Bulgarian radio broadcast a bulletin on the level of the Danube. Vienna - rise of 6, Bratislava - rise of 6, Budapest - rise of 6, Belgrade - rise of 6, Novo Selo - no change. "It's absurd to carry more water in your cupped hands. Here the level can be raised only with tears," said one Bulgarian to another and dropped a fishing poll into the turbid water.

If they would just feed me, give me clothes, give me shoes, give me 10 stotinki to by banicka. If I could just catch the bus, pray to the portrait on the wall, recite the poem of friendship, jump 2 meters in honor of the holiday, inform the party member that my friends listen to dangerous music, get my hair cut, wash the feet of comrade the lanc-corporal, write a letter to mother in which I tell her I'd give my life for comrade the young sergeant, shave the mustache off of the portrait on the wall, jump 5 meters in honor of the holiday, get on line, emphasize before the exam committee that I don't want to eat, that I don't want to dress myself, that I don't want to put on shoes. If I could just take 30 stotinki for banicka, catch the tram, draw a new portrait on the wall, write a thesis on friendship, stop meeting with foreigners, jump 8 meters in honor of the holiday, work for punishment, get an advance, eat my fill, get dressed, put on shoes, take 40 stotinki for banicka, get on line, work for the compensation of the losses caused by the government apparatus, jump 12 meters in honor of the holiday, work for punishment, receive my salary, feed my child, clothe and shoe my child, give him 70 stotinki for banicka, get in line, jump 100 meters in honor of the holiday, work for the compensation of the losses caused by the governing apparatus, get an advance, save for food, save for clothes, save for shoes, take two leva for banicka, get on line, get my pension, take 10 leva for banicka, get on line, get my pension, take my pension for banicka, take the portrait off the wall, get on line, succeed in getting some air and… The small man. Man as man. In comparison to the things he does he looks small. What time is it?... tsk, tsk, tsk, you can neither get up nor fall back to sleep. And I woke up at the same time yesterday... I drank a lot of beer last night... And money... And those mosquitoes... they haven't come up with anything to get rid of them... This evening I’ll shower and change the sheet. If I live through this winter, I'll go to Petrovich to have him patch it. No, I won't wash it, I'll just turn it over because a lot of washing... No, it's not from the washing. I toss a lot before I fall asleep... There are people who fall asleep quickly. One sheet lasts them twenty years. And this winter... Next year I'll go to Petrovich to have" him patch it... to sew it… 1’ll gather some money. I've thought of a scheme… if it just works out... I'll get the urchin to break all the windows in the world and I'll follow after him, as if by chance, in the guise of a glazier. Ha, ha, ha... And I can go to the academy, to pose... Who hasn't learned to draw me as I eat in the field. A warm loaf, cheese, tomatoes and peppers. The more famous painters give me garlic too... But if the professor sets me by the wall to hold that damned rudder of history - I'll refuse. And I can't pose all grinning like a half-wit... On the other hand, there's a student there... If she wants to draw me naked? Oh, she'll see! That time has almost completely passed... As we built the Pyramid of Cheops, they woke us in the dark dawns, now we rise ourselves... While we carried those blocks of stone here and there, how many screws and cogged wheels were built... When I turn around and look at the pyramid I am immediately seized by that metallic taste in my mouth... All the same, there was order then. The comrades still carry a picture of Pharaoh in their wallets... At least let me keep my eyes closed, so they can rest. Tomorrow, no it's already today, they expect me in from of the computer at 8 o'clock. And at night I have to watch the eleventh episode on television... I'll get myself three beers again. If I get up five times during the night... So what, I'm a person too. If tomorrow, please no God, no... no one is going to remember me... No one! I'm sure. I've died so many times, God, so many times... From old age, and from illness, from bullets and atom bombs... It was not war, but it wasn't peace... Poor me!... No, I have nothing to complain about... Such is life, such is death... Head up... Go to the monument of the unknown soldier and bring flowers to yourself!

Lined up one behind the other, or divided by the iron and concrete walls of their homes, having opened the windows wide in order to exchange dirty hope, packed in yesterday and tomorrow's newspapers, with hands grasping watches which wind and unwind their nerves in order to kill time, they must only wait on line forming a circle. Today the weather will be nice... I’11 take off my shoes. I might cut my toenails... I like to cut my nails and also to scrape my heels. In general, I enjoy the pleasures life offers... I'm not one of those who believe in reincarnation, and when the weather's nice, I don't miss the opportunity to take off my shoes or cut my nails... I cannot understand the people who are before me or those who are behind me, and that makes me feel a bit lonely, but only when the weather is bad. When the weather improves - I'm in seventh Heaven… Excuse me, what are you selling? Oh, sunflower seeds... Give me a pack... Thank you! But how did you get here?... Hey, comrade... He stands before me and doesn't even hear me... That means that if I were a seed-seller, who knows how much further I'd get!... Interesting, from time to time various ambitions seize me... And this little man hit his head with some book as if the line didn't interest him at all... Someone couldn't stand it and broke his glasses...Yes, many people get tense from the waiting and their conduct becomes completely unpredictable... Lately I see they've begun cultivating caged birds. Functional and calming. Otherwise our life processes flow normally. If your legs fill with blood, you stand on your head, If your head fills, you stand on your feet again. Our life processes go on normally… Oh, I must go back around the circle?... Interesting, what are we waiting for today?... I could never understand what people were waiting for - today one thing, tomorrow another... Not that I'm all that interested, I expect nothing, but it would be nice nonetheless to have some information. So, what hot sun. Oh, with what pleasure will I take off my shoes and cut my nails... And if I scrape my heels!... Land, lawns, animals, people, bread, houses, pictures, monuments, sky, stars. A spider who connects all of that. Behind the picture. I have been standing here for centuries behind this picture and I have stretched webs to everything which can be seen in it. My task now is to tie up in webs the things which cannot be seen. Most of the gnats take off from there. The gnats are bad because I destroy them. If I didn't destroy them they would not be as bad. Oh yes, and they are bad because they fly. I am useful because I destroy the bad gnats. And in order to become even more useful, I must spread my net even further. And in order to spread my net further, I must tie up in the things which cannot be seen. As you see with me everything is subjected to impeccable logic. If you don’t have impeccable logic, you can’t weave a thing. Impeccable logic is the only real logic, I always say. (The thought, like some of my webs, has entered into the textbook on impeccable logic for institutions of higher learning.) But the web is not just dry science. No, before all else the web is art. Although it isnot very accessible, this art takes up ever more space in the art galleries. Where there is art there are webs, I always say. Although I have spent countless sleepless nights full of expectation, my work, winch is actually my life, is before all a joy. First, all the corners of the Earth belong to it. You can choose. Personally, I like the traditional right angle, with a deviation of plus or minus 5% because it looks good. Smaller spiders, I see, are inclined to sharper angles. What pleases them so much I can't understand, but I don't mix with them. Let them go wherever they want, as long as they finish their work, that is, to take care of their lives. Our work is "take care of your life", as I joke. (This joke of mine, like some of my webs, has entered into the jester's textbook for institutions of higher learning.) Second, the act of creation. The knowledge that you are giving something of yourself to every fiber. The trace you leave behind you. Only the genius of the spirit can portray that. And third, the great pleasure of the hunt. Oh... After you've finished your web to the tiniest details, you have nothing left but to wait for the alarm signal on one of the threads. Every alarm signal is good news, I always say. (This thought, along with some of my webs, has already entered the textbook on the art of war for institutions of higher learning...) Then, seeing up close the festival of reason which every web displays over the chaos, which the fight of every gnat displays, banging its head into the unseen net. The knowledge of its own destruction. And finally, the picking of the fruit, which fills you with life juices for new victories. Life! You just have to be careful of the wind. If you're not careful, the wind can carry you off with your whole web and everything. That's why webs are built so as not to be an obstacle to the wind, to allow the strongest and weakest wind to flow though. If you control the wind, you have no other problems and can live for centuries. Are there any questions? What if a fiber shakes? I’m coming! A mirror, hung with portraits cut out of newspapers with a razor, which served for a while as models for mustaches and hair styles. A bald, beardless barber in a white smock. Nickel-plated instruments as in an operating room. A white chair with handles compressed by squeezing. A few faded slogans for color. A head ready for anything (for a trim, a cropping or a shave), praying not a hair will fall from it. Turning pale, of course. Evidently I've fallen upon a good barber - there's not a speck of blood on the sheet wrapped around my neck. There are all kinds of people, why shouldn't there be good barbers? Although the white smock gives a false impression, he appears fatter rather than thinner. I've read that fat people are good... or was I taught that? Here, behind the ears, thin it a little, I'll tell him. And here, just a little behind the neck, I’ll tell him. No, that will just insult him. He'll think I take him for a good-for-nothing, for someone who doesn't know his job. And he'll make me pay. And I didn't hear the citizen who was here before me say how he wanted his cut. And when he got out of the chair he seemed content. And he left a tip. Surely that's the rule in this barbershop: you ask for nothing, you look satisfied and you leave a tip... Why don't I give him his tip in advance? No, he'll take it as a bribe and that would be out of order. I can only bribe him with faith. With faith you can bribe even those whom you can't bribe with money. I read that somewhere, or was I taught it? I have to calm down, to let him understand that it is with complete faith, with great desire that I place my head in his hands... But that is endlessly clear to him. There was a time when the police dragged us to the barber's chair. There was a time when political activists lead us to the barber's chair, but that's something else. Now a man goes to the barber's chair fully conscious. Now there are lines before barber's chairs and everyone strives to shove his head into the barber's hands. But due to a reflex, conditioned over long years, when they wrap the sheet around your neck you begin to sweat. It's good I got a fat barber, fat people understand sweating... He smiled... He remembered something nice and he smiled... A man who has memory must have respect for a man's head. Did I read that or was I taught it? I forget. Well, if he just takes off a little bit behind the ears and just a bit behind the neck, there'll be no happier man than I... God, why is it that my hair gets cut not the way I want it, but the way the barber wants it? Where did I err? How did I provoke him? I bent my head. I moved my neck strongly forward. I didn't move. I didn't start to wipe my brow...There's some very important, secret reason, barbers act this way with us. I can't explain it any other way. I even think that as the artist is free to paint me according to his taste, the barber is free to cut my hair, trim, cut or shave according to his whim. And whether he leaves a path on my head, curls my hair or cuts me is all up to him and I am in no way involved. I even think, who stands higher on the social hierarchy - the artist or the barber? I think, when the time comes for beauty to save the world, who will people be taken to - the artist or the barber? I look at myself in the mirror and cannot recognize myself. That means the barber has finished his job... Who's next? A brick. 30 X 14 X 7. There's something mysterious in this simplicity. You want to understand it. Brick, next to brick, next to brick... A wall. You want to tear it down. -We were dirt. Swine and cattle trod on us. -The brick factory made us into bricks. There we were formed, there we were pressed. There we were baked. -We all carry and protect the imprint of the brick factory. It is our mark of quality. -On a broken brick such a mark cannot be seen. -In the rain, in heat, in good and bad times we do not change the dimensions given to us the brick factory. -Even after 100 years we're just as we were, 30 X 14 X 7. A wall can still be built from us. And every brick can be placed in practically every spot in the wall -What separates us is what ties us together. -That's the mud. We are imbibed in the mud, the mud is imbibed in us. -Recently, they have tried to connect us with mortar, but mortar, no matter how they mix it remains foreign to our nature. -The centuries have shown that nothing joins bricks into a wall better than mud. History knows cases where people, having conquered mountains, broke their heads on walls of mud. -And history knows cases where the people did not bash their heads against the walls, but the walls themselves beat the heads of the people. -History is a good thing. -In some cases it can also be used as a joining material. -We are decidedly against windows and doors. As history teaches us, they make grave wounds in the walls which we build. -There's not so much to look at. There's no great need to pass! -Walls are not built to lets pass, but to stop! -Walls are not built for the doors and windows, but for themselves! -Because if we are shaken… -As history teaches us. -From walls in which there were windows and doors, brick on top of brick does not remain. -No, we were soil - we are not going to become soil. -Hey, guy, we're talking to you. -Stop! -Stop...Stop! -Sto-o-o-o-o-p! -Ah! -Another head broken. -Another brick off the wall.



Dear Mother, What shall I write to you? Yesterday with good comrades I went on an excursion to Vitosha. There were no girls, and especially none from Sofia among us. I had taken my woolen sweater, which you knitted for me for my birthday and when I sat down to rest, despite the fact that I was not sweaty, I took it off. Obviously, I didn't sit directly on the bare ground, but set out twigs and leaves. During the excursion we found a Kent package and a matchbox, left by bad people, probably Western tourists, and we handed them over to the authorities of the National Guard. When we were returning on the bus from the mountains, we gave up our seats to some people older than we and they asked us what kind of parents we had, that had brought us up so well. I answered that my parents are ordinary people and they said "Bravo for such parents." What else shall I write to you? I eat regularly not economize on food. Last month 1 gained a kilo and 300 grams. My blood pressure is normal, 120 over 80. I have no sugar in my urine. And I almost forgot, when I sleep, if I notice that I have uncovered myself, I get up, cover myself and go back to sleep. So you can relax, I am already big and know what I have to do in this life.

I become rich, I mean super-rich, like the people on TV. I repay almost all my loans. I take a taxi straight to some fancy boutique... No, I take the tram, then a taxi straight to some boutique... or…, or maybe straight to the flea market because they have everything there... And I deck myself out from head to toe. What's a hat to me? I buy new shoes, a suit, a shirt and a tie... But I have new shoes I haven't worn in three years! So that leaves a suit, a shirt and a tie. But they'll be American! With American tags... Or at least they'll be Bulgarian with American tags... Or maybe I'll buy some great American tags and sew them onto my graduation suit. Then I'll look for a girl friend around the Sheraton. An 18-year-old! Or 25? Maybe 28, but not older than 59. A foreigner! Some rich American... or a Greek, or why not a Pole... or a Gypsy? Yeah, Gypsies are the hottest! And besides, you can always find something a little cheaper near the station. But first, to a restaurant. An appetizer, a main course and yogurt for dessert. But actually, two soups and extra bread will do just as well. I know a tripe shop where the bread is always stale so I won't even buy a lot of bread. And then, onto the tram and home! Oh, if she doesn't have a transport pass we'll walk... And if she wants to read my coffee grounds? I have no reason to expose myself to this Gypsy, it's better ifI stay at home… I'll turn on the TV and watch my life.

I'm writing you this letter from the last seat in the theatre. Here in the last rows, that which is said on stage is not heard very well. Only a few rumors reach us, but we don't believe rumors because they never prove true. Thus we in the back rows believe only our eyes. We watch what happens and believe. And we can't move forward. The ushers follow people to be sure they take the seats for which they have tickets. We feel in the best of spirits when we see someone fall off the stage. We rejoice, we rejoice, and then later we begin, to feel for the man who fell. We have Slavic souls, we slip quickly into catharsis, but we also quickly move on. Many plays that we have seen have taught us that. Others say that great art is not to fall off the stage, but rather to stay on it as long as possible, but we from the last rows don't understand that art. It's art for the elite. In as much as I've been able to comprehend, in this theatre some kind of role is given to us the spectators - so we will think we're participating in the show. We thank you. I won't sign this letter, so you won't think that I'm giving compliments withselfish motives, with the idea that I want to jump off the stage.One does not jump from the stage for selfish reasons, alldo it out of pure love for the audience, don't they? If, however, my letter has made some kind of impression on you, it's not hard to find me.

Millions whiled away their time in servitude. Hundreds perished for their freedom. The heirs - are proud. They know their history. We are all cultured people, I know how to act in society. I listen. I ask no questions. I applaud. I fulfill my quota. I worry lest you say that this is irony.

Today is the day of ephemera. There was never a yesterday - there will never be a tomorrow. Let all existence be contained in die day. Lock hands, make a cross. The goal is attained, the means are justified. People are born today and die today.

In the lands of the pygmies, everything is small, but the pygmies can't see it. In the land of the giants, everything is large, but the giants can't see it. In the land of normal people, everything is normal, but the normal people can't see it.

Good and Evil entered the ring. The people bet on Evil. It was victorious. The people won.

We have land. We have water. And we make mud.

A cell. Bars. Condemned to rust.

They appraised me. And I sold myself.

Silence. I hear the clock, it measures time. I break the clock. Silence. I hear my heart, it measures time.

Forest. Where its beginning is, I don't know. Its end is in the axe which I carry.

Spring. The south wind blows. Brooks babble. Flowers grow. Bells ring. Lambs bleat. They slaughter them.

Take off. Higher. Higher. Higher. Weightlessness. We're looking for Earth.


Buy yourself flowers. Put them in a glass with water. And forget they were bought.

What kind of thing is life? When I am… and she is…? And why am I… and she…? Why…? Why is she…? And I…? Why when she…,I…? And when she…, I…? And the opposite? Why…? Was it a judgment that I… and she…? Or is it just happenstance that I… and she…? And why don't I… and she not…? And when I… and she…, what was that? And if I didn't… would she have…? And why did she… when I didn't…? And in general, why? Yes, life is…

Questions: What is holy? What is man? What is life? What is death? What is freedom? What is love? What is happiness? Answers: The questions are eternal. The Answers are transient.