Boris Atanassov is a jolly, rotund 66-year-old charmer. He oozes charisma and it is easy to be drawn in by the twinkle in his eye and his broad beaming smile. Yet, there is much more to this man than rakiya and vegetable growing. He has lead a very colourful life and has seen and achieved far more than the average Bulgarian villager; up until now he kept his experiences to himself, knowing that in his tiny village they accounted for little compared with the daily strife of surviving on a pensioner's income.

He was born in 1941, one of five children, into a Bulgaria experiencing much change and hardship. Alexander Stamboliiski, his hometown, was part of the Southern Dobroudja region, which had been given to the Romanians after the Second Balkan War in 1913 and under the Treaty of Craiova had been handed back to Bulgaria in 1940. Atanassov's parents were born Bulgarians, but had lived through the Romanian takeover, which ended a year before their son, Boris, was born. No sooner had they survived one cultural hardship, they were faced with another, World War 2.

Atanassov grew up in the new Bulgarian Communist era, which was to span 45 years of his life. He was educated in Dourankoulak until he was 15 and then sent away to Lovech to train as a veterinarian. After three years of training, he decided that this was not the career for him and so changed to geological seismology, where he worked for the state water authority until reaching pensionable age. At the time of his joining, the art of water divining was still used to find the source of water in Bulgaria's villages. Atanassov was taught how to divine for water using two metal rods placed firmly under his armpits and held parallel to the ground. He earned good money for this work and such was his skill that he was sent all around the Southern Dobroudja and Yambol regions to find water.

One such trip took him to the village of Rogachevo, where he fell in love with 15-year-old Ivanka Trupkova. She was a clever girl and still a student at the grammar school in Balchik, where Atanassov rented quarters. He met her family and was invited to spend weekends with them. Their courtship lasted three years and they were married in church in Balchik.

The 60s were a stern time for young people in Bulgaria. They had heard whispers of a social revolution in the Western world where society was becoming more liberal, rock music was de rigeur and the youth were affluent as well as radical.

Yet, Atanassov was not phased by this change. He now had a young family and his work was well paid; he was a supporter of the communist leader, Todor Zhivkov. His happy-go-lucky take on life meant that he never felt bad done to him, in comparison with those around him. He listened to Western music, even though it was banned, and found that "it was rubbish, too loud, not as good as our folk music". He focused all his attention on providing for his young wife and two sons, Nikolai and Georgi.

Atanassov's work prospered and a friend told him of job opportunities in Libya, recruiting water diviners for a project with Gaddafi's Libyan government. With 95 per cent of Libya comprised of desert water was in short supply, but the new-found wealth from its newly discovered oil reserves meant that Libya could pay handsomely to anyone who could help ease the lack of supply.

Atanassov flew out to Tripoli in 1976; this was the first time he had left Bulgaria. His first impressions of the country were that it was hot - too hot to work. The temperature was a scorching 60 degrees Celsius, you could fry an egg on the pavement, the place was full of Americans and they had an abundance of this yellow food called "bananas". He was required to work an eight-hour day, which started at 8am and finished at 4pm. He was paid 112 diners a month, which amounted to around 600 leva. He learnt to speak some pigeon Arabic, which he used to charm the bank employees into converting his salary into travellers' cheques. This proved invaluable as many of his Bulgarian colleagues had difficulty getting their salary out of Libya and back into Bulgaria and many lost money in the transfer.

A Bulgarian's love for his homeland and its national drink rakiya is something not easily left behind. Used to drinking shots of rakiya everyday with lunch and dinner, Atanassov soon found that Muslim Libya's ban on alcohol was something he could not tolerate, but being a resourceful man, he decided to brew his own. Word soon travelled and he found himself supplying the majority of his home-brew to Libyan police officers, known as the sherifte. He charged 20 dinars a litre - about 25 leva. Over the three years that he worked in Libya, he took some of his rakiya money home, but it was not possible to take it all at once.

Thinking that he would return for another year, he buried his 9000-dinar fortune in the ground in the remote Libyan village of Zetuna, but his Bulgarian employers refused to send him back to Libya because there were rumours and complaints that he was selling rakiya. It is easy to think of what the money could have bought, but Atanassov was returning home with a small fortune by Bulgarian standards. In 1977, he built a new family house and bought a brand-new Lada. People talked about his new-found wealth, but he kept silent, not wishing to reveal the extent of his family's fortune to the rest of the village.

He stayed with the water company until 1997, when he was able to retire early and claim his pension. As he approached his 50s, the world started to change again. Bulgaria's greatest ally Russia spouted Glasnost and Perestroika and rumours abounded in Bulgaria that there would be many changes. Atanassov viewed this as another bout of politicians talking up the economy; yes, he thought there were some good times to come through all the talk, but he was cynical, believing they would be followed by bad. What actually happened was that there were no good times. Prices increased quickly and there was not much money around. What had once been a good pension was now in danger of failing to meet the family's needs.

As the new millennium dawned and talks of European Union membership abounded, the Atanassov family felt that it would be no different to the time when communism fell. Their experience of this mighty historical landmark had been yet more increases in prices, shortages and hardship. His pension does not go very far and his declining health presents him with a 100 leva bill for drugs every month. For Boris Atanassov, the EU is just another way for those at the top to cream off more money for them and it would be better if Bulgaria were left to run its own affairs in its own way, without interference from outside.

In 2004, Atanassov suffered sudden and unexpected loss when Ivanka, his wife of 35 years, died suddenly from leukaemia. It was a hard loss to bear and a period of great loneliness fell upon him.

Today, he spends his time living life the way he wants to. He hopes that Bulgaria will provide more work, pensions and better standards of production for its people. "There are too many poor people living in Bulgaria and this is not good for the country," he says.

Atanassov still lives by his happy-go-lucky principle of "you only have one life, enjoy it", and spends his time doing the things he wants to do, given his limited means. He enjoys tending his large garden, nursing his pet cat Mimi and drinking his homemade rakiya. He enjoys the variety of satellite TV available and sees this as his one luxury in life. More recently, his household has expanded to include his girlfriend and his younger sons; the Atanassov house is a buzzing household again.