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| Plovdiv has some of the most diverse and well structured street art in Europe |
Reminding me of ploddy the dinosaur, we arrived by bus into the second oldest city in the world (according to the free walking tour guide) and Bulgaria’s second largest behind Sofia. Arriving in Bulgaria at 3am without any money is something I suggest everyone try once as it really gets the juices flowing. And just for good measure make sure it’s raining and your taxi driver doesn’t understand English. It’s a barrel of laughs. But through crude English and no Bulgarian we managed to exchange money and arrive at our hostel. Amazing!
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| And this is how we dressed whilst in Bulgaria |
Depressing, sterile communist architecture stands next beautiful golden aged structures demonstrating the incredibly uncultured Russians. In five minutes we quickly learnt the long history of torment that the Bulgarians have endured. First the Ottoman Occupation occurred, which lasted five centuries, then the Russians in all their glory liberated the country giving Bulgaria its own identity for all of five years, which they then decided, no, Bulgaria is crazy when its free, let’s take over and force communism upon these kind folk. Yeah! And now Bulgaria is battling on the world stage as it still feels the repercussions of six hundred years of occupation and oppressions. Plovidiv is a beautiful old town with its cobbled stone pedestrian walkways, buildings that beat the tax man (build each floor bigger than the one below as tax is paid on the square metre of the ground floor) and an outstanding appreciation of vodka. Plovdiv actually means seven hills, but in their infinite wisdom, the Russians decided they wanted to build a shopping centre where one of the hills was. So they blew it up. Plovidiv now only has six hills. Crazy Russians.
