The rain pelted down on Rakovski Street, as I jumped out of the cab and ducked into Don Tomato - the only restaurant that I knew had an English menu. I had been in Sofia a few days working as a consultant for a Canadian Non Governmental Organization, and my previous attempts to order in Bulgarian had failed miserably.

I ordered a salad and asked the man across from me whether he spoke English. He flashed a business card and asked why I was here. I told him Bulgaria was a dream - the three-month contract that brought me here would also give me a chance to track down far-flung family members.

"Grandpa's name was Ivan Jonoff," I explained. "He was born in 1894 in a village near Montana. He never went to school and took care of the family's goats and sheep until he was 16. During the Balkan Wars, he fled to Skopje, travelled to Rotterdam on a false passport, and took a ship to Halifax in 1912.

"He arrived with $5 in his pocket and no English. They called him Evan Janoff and sent him to a work camp in Nakina, an isolated northern Ontario village full of European men who worked on the railroad.

"But there were no women in Nakina. After 12 years of single life, Ivan had had enough. His best friend was Alec Gotzeff, a Bulgarian from Lom. Alec suggested he write to the Pavlov family in Lom, who had a beautiful daughter named Nikolina. Ivan wrote and asked to marry the 16-year-old girl - who had just finished high school and wanted to become a teacher. Her parents wrote back to say yes, he could marry Nikolina, but on one condition: once she arrived in Canada, he must also send money for the rest of the family to come. Nikolina arrived in Quebec City in 1925. When she stepped off the boat and saw Ivan - who was twice her age - she started to cry.

"`I don't want to marry you!' she sobbed.

"Married life in Nakina was difficult. After the comforts of Lom - which was then a thriving port town - Nikolina was soon pregnant in a log house with no running water. The winters were brutal and the black flies were merciless in the summer.

They persevered, and the first two boys were born in the late 1920s - first Alexander, then my father George. They spoke Bulgarian until they were six, but soon lost the language at school. Ivan worked hard to pay off the company loan which secured Nikolina's passage, and somehow raised the money for his wife's entire family to come in 1930.

"But the Pavlovs soon moved to Toronto, with its Bulgarian churches and restaurants. Eventually they struck it rich, buying land and building houses in Toronto's expanding suburbs. In 1955, Ivan and Nikolina moved to Toronto, where the weather was warm enough to grow tomatoes. But the Pavlovs had no time for Ivan, who had worked so hard to bring them to Canada.

"You see, this is the Bulgarian way," said my dinner companion bitterly. "Fifty years of communism was just a drop in the bucket. Historically, we Bulgarians are very individualistic. Every man for himself. As soon as your back is turned..."

I didn't want to hear this, however, and interrupted to continue on with my story. "In the 1960s, after grandma died, grandpa lived a quiet life in Toronto with his favourite son Jimmy, who never lost his Bulgarian and studied Slavic languages. Ivan returned to Belotintsi twice in the 1960s, where he was considered a very rich man. He died in 1978, when I was 20.

"Jimmy was the last family member to visit Bulgaria, while studying at Sofia University. But my father and uncle Alexander were shocked by his Bohemian lifestyle, especially since most Canadians did not travel to Communist countries at the time. When Jimmy died in 1989, our family lost its final link with the old country, as grandpa used to call it. "I'm the first member of my family to set foot in Bulgaria in 20 years.

My father is now dead, and I'm not sure whether my brother or sister will ever come. So I just decided to come Bulgaria - without names, addresses or photos. "`Go to Belotintsi,' was all my uncle told me. `If you find Belotintsi you'll find our family.'"

I thought my dinner companion would be amused by this quaint story. Instead, he just shook his head and wished me luck. Luck is one thing I'm going to need, since I must return to Canada on August 7.

Victor Janoff is a Canadian currently in Bulgaria working as a consultant for a Canadian NGO. Since his arrival he has been searching for his long-lost relatives and for the next four weeks he will be documenting his search.