Name: Daniela Stuebi
Place of birth: Switzerland
Nationality: Swiss
Occupation: Founder of the Art Centre Zora in Sofia
Date of arrival: June 2005

If at times you wonder where the peaceful and calm people have gone, or whether they exist at all, then look no further than 28-year-old Daniela Stuebi. The young charitable Swiss woman has spent the past year in Bulgaria and now shares her story.

Most recently she arrived here in Bulgaria last June, but this is not Daniela's first experience of Bulgarian life. Two years ago she visited Sofia for three months with the youth organisation Service Civil International, an international network organising work camps for young volunteers working for local projects and organisations such as ecology and social initiatives.

In her time in Sofia, Daniela was an organiser of international initiatives with the Service for eco holiday camps for young Bulgarians both in the country and abroad.

But this short visit to Bulgaria's capital wasn't her first encounter with this region.

She tells of her fondness of the Balkan region, and how a few years ago she volunteered to attend a Civil Service project in Romania, where she organised holiday work camps for an orphanage in a small town. There she saw an excellent opportunity  to put into practice her studies in social work, and help some of the less fortunate among us.

She describes her first encounter with the Bulgarian lifestyle as surprising.

"In Romania I worked mainly in small towns, and when I came here I was impressed at how much better everything works, and I liked how much initiative people had and how work-ready they were."

Then in June last year Daniela chose to return to Bulgaria, this time to the scenic northern town of Veliko Turnovo. She worked for the International Social Service that helps troubled people outside their homeland, victims of trafficking or children who have divorced parents in different countries for instance, and helps them cope with the problems at hand. The things she recalled as most appealing to her were the beautiful surroundings, the hills and nature around the town. She also admired the Preobrazhenski monastery near the old Bulgarian capital. In the town itself she found the Tzarevets hill quite interesting, but disliked the fact that the pedestrian walkways there were too small and the cars dominated the otherwise peaceful town.

In Veliko Turnovo, she attended a summer Bulgarian course along with 400 other foreigners, some of whom she still keeps in touch with.

Since then Daniela has moved back to Sofia, where, with three Bulgarian friends, she founded the "Art Centre Zora". A location for the centre has already been rented, and organisation has been underway over the past few months.

The Art Centre Zora is a combination of three elements. First it provides hobby workshops for traditional and modern crafts, including ceramics, scriptwriting, dancing, carpeting and photography. Second comes a teahouse, where various different kinds of tea are offered to customers, a first for the Sofia metropolitan area. The teahouse is a place for relaxation and peaceful rest, where parents can sit down for a cup of tea, while waiting for their children to finish with a crafts-class for instance. And last but not least, there is a gallery, representing mostly unknown artists and photographers, giving them a chance to break through in the art world. Daniela describes her new-founded art centre as a perfect opportunity for people who would like to do something new and learn arts and crafts to get invaluable experience. The centre already provides summer and autumn trips to Chiprovtsi, for carpentry practice, and photography journeys to the Rhodope Mountains. (For more information visit www.artcentrezora.com.)

Another thing that Daniela hopes to achieve is to run classes for disadvantaged and handicapped children free of charge, but before she can turn that dream into reality, the centre requires the necessary funds.

"I hope we can manage it within a year and a half, but it will happen when we have the money to do it."

Outside of her work, Daniela likes to go hiking in the mountains, in nature. Having grown up in the Swiss capital Bern, a well known, albeit small town, she has grown used to natural surroundings. In Sofia her favourite places are Ujen Park, the Borissova Gradina, and the park in front of the National Palace of Culture.

She likes to sit and relax with friends in the shade. Another of her favourite time-off activities is hiking in the Vitosha mountains, often reaching the Cherni Vruh peak. There she admires the elderly people who have chosen to get to the top.

"I really like how the older people walk all the way to the peak, getting exercise and having fun. Another thing I found amusing is how some people go hiking in bathing suits and bikinis, it's interesting to get to meet strange people like that."

Up at Cherni Vruh she likes to have a bite to eat, preferring to have the traditional beans and tea for lunch.

Daniela has already undertaken a serious business here in Bulgaria, and is planning to spend the next few years expanding and improving it. After all, it has been a lifelong dream for her to live abroad, and she has found an excellent opportunity to fulfill it here.

Her recommendations to the Bulgarian public are to find a way to make more peaceful places, to have fewer cars and noise disrupting the quaint atmosphere of the towns. Another thing she finds annoying is the lack of information supplied by customer services, and an improvement is indeed necessary. But the thing she finds most interesting and different to the Swiss lifestyle, is the spontaneity here. "In Switzerland everything is planned, you can't postpone a meeting time and time again; here people are more communicative and easygoing. I like the day-to-day lifestyle."