Jane Jones

Margie Nieuwkerk wrote:Oh gosh! I just found this thread!

I'm in Bulgaria too, since 2006 in the Sliven Region. Born in Holland and lived in the States and in the UK. This is home now, I will never live anywhere else.

Helena, I'm pleased too that you know some younger people that are interested in moving to the village.

My understanding from the people I know is that most of the younger generation want to move abroad where they will earn more money. They don't want to do "farming" the way their grandparents did. Which is basically quite hard work and very repetitive. Every year tomatoes, cukes, grapes, kill the pig at christmas, etc.

I think if there were some permaculture programs on TV here, maybe a series, it might generate more interest. I think young people here DO want to protect their environment, and when they go abroad, they HATE the food and miss the fresh produce from home.

My neighbors (in their 70's) feel that no young people will come to live in the village, but I think they may be wrong. As economies struggle people here will naturally fall into producing their own again. I've not seen much in a way of large agriculture here and I think it's because most of the land is broken up into small plots. It would be really difficult to get 100's of acres of land for a particular crop here.

I've started going towards permaculture last year, and did ok, this year will be even better. I mean my 1.7 dekare plot even with 1/7th production provides way more than I can eat!

More foreigners should come here to do this. They have no idea what they're missing. The last years have been the absolute best in my whole life and I'm in my 60's.

An English friend in Sliven has a little shop with crafts things that she makes. Recently a journalist came and took some pics and did an article for the "local paper" but it went national as well. She's had a lot of people come as a result.

I'm thinking that if we all took pictures of our progress, and maybe had a joint blog/site, it might get picked up. Particularly if we looked at it from the point of view of attracting younger people. Make it picture heavy with just short little blurbs underneath. Similar to the lady who has the Bealtaine Cottage site, just a bit more organized (http://bealtainecottage.com/). You just get sucked in by the pics! and what she did is brilliant.

Margie, thanks so much for this post! I'd never seen the Bealtaine Cottage site- so wonderful and inspirational. I suspect I may well be in my 60's too, or at least very close) by the time I'm able to move to Bulgaria, I'm glad to hear it's working out so well for you.

Great discussion!

My husband and I are just back from a trip to Bulgaria. Once we no longer need to be in the UK to assist his elderly mother, we'd very much like to move there.

Helena, I'm wondering which village you live in as we are also looking at the Veliko Tarnova area. We've visited twice now, staying in a village close to town. Though there are a disproportionate number of old people there still living very traditionally, there are a number of younger people living there too. I feel we have so much to learn from people who raised families on what they could produce on what is really a very small amount of land.

I'm not romanticising their lives though. Very tough. I know I'm not hardy or detached from material wants enough to live as a peasant farmer, totally dependent on the food I could grow. I'd like to live a hybrid lifestyle of living lightly, no car, repairing and restoring an old earth and stone house using natural and recycled building materials, setting up off grid systems for water and power, and growing what food I could, but having an outside source of income too.

Our only problem is that my husband is somewhat disabled and much more a town person (Londoner born and bred). The idea of living with a sawdust toilet rather than a full flush gives him shudders. And I feel uncomfortable with the idea of having a house in town as well as a village house, even though both would be small and simple.

Thanks for the reply, Leila! It did make good vinegar in the end, though unfortunately I accidentally killed the mother

It formed a wonderful thick jelly layer on top, but stuck to the wall of the jar and dried out when the fluid level evaporated as the weather warmed up and I forgot to check on it. Well, I didn't forget. I ignored that nagging little voice telling me I really had to check on the vinegar, for weeks. My bad and a lesson learned.

Matu, that sounds like a fabulous way to do it. I have an old hand crank meat grinder and was wondering if I could pulp apples using it, then strain it. But I took the easy route and just chopped mine and added peels and cores from apples I'd used for cooking or eating. Starting with the juice would give a way better result, I'm thinking. I didn't get to make any last year as we were away from home when the wild apples ripened.

I'm so pleased I found this forum! I can see I'll find loads of useful information here.

My husband and I live in England, in a small house with a teensy tiny garden I'm working on transforming to an edible landscape using permaculture principles. Of course, I'll get it all done and it will be time to move back to Australia, but I hope whoever inherits the garden appreciates it!

I want to try making cider vinegar with the small sour apples from what look to be wildling trees on waste ground near us. Hopefully next year or the year after I'll be picking apples from the three new apple trees I guerilla planted there this Spring. Next year- a pear, and mulberries if I can get the cuttings to take.

I plan to chop the apples up, maybe mince them in a old hand cranked meat mincer, chuck the mush in some big food grade plastic jars I have, cover with filtered water then add some mother from commercial ACV to get it moving. I'm a little squeamish about the mother at the bottom of my ridiculously expensive bottles of that well-known brand of raw ACV, and don't want to waste it!

Does that sound like something that would work? My main concern with Winter coming is how to keep it warm enough. We don't heat our house anywhere near the 80 degrees F I've seen mentioned as ideal vinegar making temperature! Has anyone had experience with how cooler temperatures might affect things?