Getting lost in Trakiya is easily done.
Confused faces weave through the blocks in search of street names, numbers, or any sort of logic, their eyes simultaneously keeping close watch on the unruly sidewalk pavers intending to take them down in their unfamiliarity.
The block numbers are painted on the side of the blocks.. as we sit on a bench beneath one of these large numbers basking in the sun, I tell Baba Dolche how I often get asked for directions when I wander around.
She smiles and shakes her head knowingly…
“Have you heard the story of the grandmother who came to visit her daughter and her grandchildren in Trakiya? She had been coming from the village for years, the bus stops have always been where they are, you see, and she knew the way. For 20 years she had been coming to see them, always getting off at the same stop. She knew the way. She would get off and she would always walk straight on the foot path, the foot path that we had all made since the beginning, until she got to the plum tree, then she would know her family’s apartment was there. Well, you see, the tree, it got sick. Very sick, and Bai Georgi, he had to cut it down. When the grandma came to visit she got oh so very lost, without the tree, she had no idea where her family lived. Those people, the people that have lived in the villages all their lives, they don’t understand things like this, they understand nature and with that tree gone, she had nothing to identify with. The numbers don’t help, they are all mixed up, the streets don’t help, they are all winding. Without the tree…”
She smiles up into the sun..
“simply..there wasn’t anything for her.”