It’s 7.30pm. Do you know where your friends are? If it’s the first Friday of the month, check out the French Institute in Sofia, where the fresh cream of Bulgaria’s creative set congregates for an event called Apero Elektro.

Apero Elektro #1 took place on February 6 2009. News about a new, hip event had spread via word-of-mouth and through Facebook invites, and, over the course of the night, about 120 people stopped by. Five leva and a stamp on the hand later, they were allowed entry into the cultural centre’s main hall, which had been transformed into a glowing Lego land, design courtesy of Click-Clack, with electro-techno-pop being mixed by DJ Elenko, while a video made by Nikola Mihov and projected at the event added to the visual depth.

This outlet for creativity is the brainchild of Elodie Miéville, audiovisual attachée at the French embassy, and Yves-Jacques Cassabo, embassy cultural attaché, put together because, as Elodie put it, they wanted to give the French Institute something "a bit younger". The cultural centre has already made a name for itself in the alternative world through its collaborations with Yalta Club – the intermittent Excuse My French DJ evenings at the Sofia club – and with the magazine Edno. Apero Elektro simply brings the focus back to the institute space itself – as a place where young artists can show their stuff, and where a like crowd can network.

"Things have come together naturally," Elodie told The Sofia Echo. "The people who participate are people whom I have met at other places, and through friends."

She tells of getting connected to the house DJ Laylla Dane while at Toba&Co, where Laylla Dane is a resident DJ, after the first Apero Elektro wrapped up for the night. The two started talking, and a few minutes after Elodie put the question to her, Laylla Dane responded with enthusiasm to spin at an Apero Elektro. This will be episode #3, taking place April 3.

It was a similar thing with DJ Elenko – he was playing at a club one night, and he fit the vision, and Elodie asked him, and he said yes.

On March 6, ClIpper will DJ with a spacey-electro, and the Click-Clack team will again do the design, this time with a "disco-flash" theme. The works of the so-styled "Bulgarian pop artist supreme" Yasen Zgurovski – the same one who has done a number of illustrations for Bulgarian lifestyle magazines Egoist, Edno, Lady, Capital Light, Intro and The Sofia Echo – will comprise the artwork for this coming episode. His exhibition, entitled Over Indulgence, will open on the same day, a few hours earlier.

Like with #1, the upcoming instalments will have an open bar sponsored by Pernod-Ricard. Elodie said that there had been some concerns about having free access to alcohol, but that no one ended up overindulging.

Elodie herself is from the Paris area, having moved to Bulgaria in February 2008 to take up her current job. Before that, she worked a bit in the French film production industry and studied in Montreal, where she also participated in organising cultural events.

She chose Bulgaria because she had, firstly, studied Russian in school, and was drawn by the Cyrillic alphabet, and, secondly, wanted to go somewhere where she had not been before, and somewhere that was in the south of Europe. When the Volontariat International position opened up, she grabbed the opportunity to discover the country. After her contract ends in February 2010, she’ll see how things look, and decide from there where she wants to go – and if she wants to stay in Bulgaria.

She said that she got a "positive feeling" about the first Apero Elektro. "I think that the attendees appreciated it. They did not dance much at the beginning, but as the night progressed, people started to dance more."

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Address:
French Institute
2 Dyakon Ignatii Str, Sofia
Tel: 02/ 937 79 29, institutfrance.bg
When: Every first Friday of the month, from 7.30pm to 11.30pm
Tickets for Apero Elektro are 5 leva