MARIO Solatchki's childhood dream was to be an actor, to perform on stage. He didn't follow it through though because he left his artistic environment when he immigrated to Canada 11 years ago.

He had found that environment in his hometown, in the year between graduating from high school and army service: "There was a group of students, hippie and artistic. We drank lots of gin, read Hemingway, and dreamt about travelling to far-off places... this was the most romantic year in my life, with the most beautiful spring."

He also had it at the Tourism College in Bourgas, where he went to study after army service. "This was very euphoric time: I became very famous around the college after writing a sketch, and performing in it," Mario recalls. "And it passed very quickly, but it was a time of useful learning." The sketch poked fun at Bulgarian state-owned Balkantourist, and its monopoly on the tourism industry.

Now Mario, who is 36 and from Blagoevgrad, is co-founder and sales manager for ZIP/STA Travel - the Bulgarian agents of STA Travel, the London-based International Student and Youth Travel Association. He divides time between its offices in Sofia and Blagoevgrad.

When he graduated, he found out that he couldn't work in his chosen field - he was told by then monopolist tourism company Balkantourist that there are no male front-desk clerks. Meanwhile, the hard times of the Perestroika had come, when "people were going mad". These events combined made him want to run away.

In March 1990, Mario joined the post-change major emigration wave, by getting on a flight to Havana, which he abandoned at the stopover in Canada. He overcame the culture shock from the cosmopolitan, colourful world he saw there, and stayed for six years. "Canada gave me freedom and boldness, and made me cosmopolitan," he says. He misses the country; but it's very comfortable living in one's own culture, he thinks.

There, he was more successful in working in his field. For four years he worked as a front desk clerk and PR officer at a major Canadian chain of hotels (Days Inn Hotels Canada). In the meantime, he did a course for travel agents, and started thinking about his own travel agency business. In September 1994, while studying the possibilities for organising packaged tours for Canadians to Bulgaria, Mario visited his homeland. Blagoevgrad had become a student town, full of young, smiling, happy people, couples in love. This was very different from what he had left - "people with bowed heads, candles in their hands, silently protesting in front of the already dark and left by the communists Party House [now the American University in Bulgaria] building."

Mario says: "I saw a change; the Bulgarian nature touched my heart; and I started looking for ways to get back home."

He got his chance in 1996. "I came back to Bulgaria from Canada with dual citizenship, and with a dual identity," he says, "but my Canadian identity is fading away."

The first thing he did was spend three semesters at the American University (AUBG), where he found an inspiring academic and creative environment.

In 1998, while still studying, he opened a Travel Byte office in Blagoevgrad (the second in the country after the Sofia office). He did it "in the western way, with a business plan and everything."

The agency proved extremely popular, it broke the monopoly of state-owned Orbita and was the first in Bulgaria to offer youth and student travel. Its financial results were fantastic (in year two the profits were $80,000 higher than projected). But Mario wanted further development, which the Sofia headquarters did not allow, so he left Travel Byte.

At this stage - with fellow AUBG student Ekaterina Ivanova, Mario founded ZIP/STA Travel. The Bulgarian head office opened in March 2000 in Blagoevgrad, then two months later Ekaterina opened an office in Sofia.

Ekaterina, who is now branch manager for Blagoevgrad, said: "ZIP/STA Travel contributes to market competition. In spite of Travel Byte's almost complete market monopoly, STA-Sofia broke even in its third month of existence. Mario's contacts and knowledge of the field were extremely helpful."

They are considering an expansion of the network - first they want to get the Black Sea, by opening a branch in Bourgas. They also want to add to their services (ticket sales, work and travel exchange programmes, internships) - starting with ecological tourism in Bulgaria.

Said Mario: "I'm not an entrepreneur. I don't know why I'm doing this (the travel agency business). Maybe because of my desire for self-expression, for getting known."

His day starts at 7am, and is very long and unpredictable, full of meetings with different people. "I try to find time for everybody, not to turn anybody away," he says.

Mario still wants to travel himself, but not to emigrate again. To him, emigration had been only movement in space, and an extremely fast one, in which he had lost the old Mario, Mario the dreamer; that is his new destination.

Meeting people is his addiction, watching people's faces - his hobby. Mario still wants to be in the spotlight. Last Thursday night, at a thank you party, organised by Lufthansa, Austrian Airlines, and the Sofia Sheraton Hotel, he went dressed as a clown. "Everybody was sitting and eating, and Mario was dancing and having fun," Ekaterina remembers. "He became the star of the night."