WE'RE at the gym. You can hear the voices of the players and the loud sound of the dribbling ball at the nearby basketball courts. Silvia Kara is a little bit nervous about being interviewed. A sexy short skirt and a fashionable blouse have taken the place of the sporty outfit she was just wearing. Only the blush of her face reveals that she took an aerobics class 15 minutes ago.
Smiling, like she always does, Kara tells her story. She's now in her second year of studying journalism at Sofia University. Two years ago she faced the dilemma of choosing between studying economics in Romania or journalism in Bulgaria. Her destiny was decided as soon as she received a scholarship. That day, she started packing.
"When I understood I won the scholarship, I said to myself, `That's it, go girl! This is your lucky chance!'" she said.
So that's how a 20-year old Moldovan girl, born in Chisinau, chose Bulgaria to pursue her education. Now, having taken the adventurous step of coming here and making her way in an unknown country, Kara finds herself entering adulthood.
Bulgaria is the place where she understands what independence, responsibility and freedom mean, she said. It is also a country full of crazy people, she says, who everyday eat some kind of spoilt milk. (That's her Moldovan point of view towards Bulgaria's famous yoghurt.)
Besides discovering so-called strange food, Kara says she's found that Bulgarians know how to enjoy themselves. They throw wild parties and you can always find a disco or a pub to have some fun each night of the week, especially in Studentski Grad. Kara loves its vivid atmosphere. The neighbourhood never sleeps, she says.
"Hey, Mom, you won't believe it - this student city is so cool. It's even bigger than our neighbourhood in Chisinau," she said to her mom on the phone.
Of course, at first it was very difficult. New country, new people, new language. Kara says that, at the beginning, she didn't know how to ask for bread in a shop. "I hated the phone, I was afraid to use it," she says. "All I knew were a few words, I just didn't know what to say."
After a year of studying Bulgarian, she is now fluent - a feat perhaps accomplished quickly because she already speaks Romanian, the official language of Moldova, and Russian. And she can do a lot more than buy groceries and pass her exams in the journalism school. She's learned how to feel in Bulgarian - to love, to cry, to be happy - emotions that sound different in every language. Only a slight Moldovan accent hints that Kara is not a native Bulgarian girl. It puts something charming and exotic in her speech.
Kara views Bulgarians as friendly people. She finds that the envy Bulgarians sometimes express towards wealthier countries is a typical characteristic among citizens from the former communist bloc, which previously did not develop individualistic ways of thinking. Envy is a human characteristic, she says.
For Kara, Bulgaria is a synonym for travelling. It won't be wrong to say that this Moldovan girl knows Bulgaria even better than some Bulgarians do. For two years she has been all over the country. Now she can't resist the tender breeze of the Bulgarian seaside and the awesome beauty of the Rila and Pirin mountains.
She has fallen in love with Bulgarian nature, which gives her strength and helps the frightened girl make herself fell at home in this foreign country. Although she has been to Italy, Austria, Ukraine, Russia, Romania and Turkey, her desire for travelling is not satisfied. Just like the children's character, Dora the Explorer, Kara is always ready to pack her suitcase and get to know the world. And some day just out of the blue she believes she'll find her place in it.
"I never regret coming to Bulgaria. I enjoy my studying, have fun with my new Bulgarian friends, learn to appreciate more things that I took for granted before," she says. "I'm glad I took the bus to Bulgaria two years ago."
Now she likes the Bulgarian cold soup with cucumbers and "spoilt milk," (yoghurt) called tarator. The phone is fun, receiving more calls from Bulgarian friends than from Moldovan ones. And "te ubesk" and "obicham te" - "love you" in Romanian and Bulgarian - sounds equally strong.