About Our Village:
Dobromirka is a small village in the mountains of Bulgaria with maybe about 500 living here (with much of the population being 65 or older). We have probably seen more dogs than children here. There is not much that we have discovered in this village yet besides plum trees and a few stores, though they are not open on the weekends. The name of this village means “Good Peace” which is exactly what it has been for us the past few days. It is so quiet and we have been able to get a lot of rest to recover from our long travels. Monday we begin our ministry, helping to get the house we are staying at ready for a group of people who are arriving on Thursday for a conference. Then we will be cooking and cleaning and serving those at the conferenc. Below, the top middle picture is our home for the next month.
Day One:
The first full day we spent here, Roumin Ivanov, one of our ministry contacts took us to a neighboring Town about 30min away called “Viliko Tarnovo”. It is an older city situated on a mountain. The views there are spectacular. Rouman
let us wander around the city for a little while and then we met him and his wife Mariana at a street side cafe. He bought us cokes and espressos which we sipped on while we watched people meander down the cobblestone streets.
He then drove us the see the castle (yes, there is a castle!). We only drove past it and did not stop, but it was lovely. We then went grocery shopping at Metro (when he first drove us there, I though we were getting on a train! haha). Shopping was kind of hard since all the signs and labels are written in bulgarian, but we managed! Produce here is not expensive which I love, and we only ended up spending half of our food budget for the week! Success! Later, Emily and I went off with Rumin to see if we could locate where our squad leaders (Jay and Jen) had gotten off their bus. After some confusion we ended up meeting them in a town called Cevliavo where Jay and Jenn got to by hitching a ride with a nice Bulgarian man! That afternoon we explored the town. Many of the elderly people who were sitting outside their doors tried talking to us, but we had no idea what they were saying! All we know was that one woman was very proud of her cow which was grazing by the street. We also found many plum trees which ate from. They were tiny tiny little plums but where absolutely delicious. The smallest fruits are often the best fruits. Anyway, thats pretty much it for day one!
Day 2:
Today we had church with our hosts: Nasko and Didi (they speak no English) as well as their son and daughter in law, Vial and Vanya, and their adorable granddaughter, Annabelle. Vial and Vanya know some english so they helped translate. We sang some Bulgarian hymns and then some American ones that they asked us to share with them. After that we had communion with unleavened bread and real wine and Nasko read from Epeshians 2, telling us that that chapter describes his life when he came to know the Lord. It was such a sweet experience having church with them. Even though we speak different languages, we all love and praise the same God. That is what matters.
Anyway, I wont be giving play-by-plays of everyday we spend here, I just wanted to let you all know about my first days in Bulgaria.
I am excited to see what The Lord will do this month!!
