So I've been thinking about my experiences here in Bulgaria on the Fulbright and this week I got an email from a candidate who has just been offered a Fulbright to Bulgaria.

I thought, well, now's the perfect time to write down some memories, share some insight and generally ramble. Then I decided, I can do one better. I am going to make a litmus test.  Yep, I just made a magazine quality test so that you can test your ability to make it in Bulgaria.

But before the test let me say this.

For me, the Fulbright experience was an excellent one. (I mean, I am still here and I am getting ready for year three!) I knew next to nothing about the country when I accepted the grant and aside from a few moments of homesickness I've never regretted the move or the experience.

Is it easy? No. But if you're up for an adventure and a challenge I don't think that you'll ever regret doing a Fulbright in a country. This said, attitude matters a lot.<!--more-->

Ultimately, I guess what it comes down to is attitude. My blog is an extension of this attitude.  If you've lived abroad before you probably know this but I jumped into the deep-end. I'd never lived abroad or for that matter really ever traveled abroad before I moved to Bulgaria. None of this play-it-safe in a Western European country or English speaking country. I went straight to Eastern Europe and a country whose alphabet is Cyrillic.

Aside from attitude, I think the other important thing is adjusting your expectations.  You'll never learn the language as quickly as you want to. Everything takes longer to do than you think it should. People never speak English when you're desperate for them to. Bulgaria is part of the European Union but you can't mistake this for being European.

In the last 150 years Bulgaria went from Ottoman rule to communism and now membership in the EU.  That's a lot of change in not very many years.  This (relatively) quick transition makes Bulgaria both very exciting and often terribly confusing.

First things first, I guess you have to decide if Bulgaria for you.  Bulgaria is certainly not for everyone.

A quick litmus test? Okay, here it goes:
<ul>
	<li>Do you like tomatoes and cucumbers?</li>
	<li>Are you lactose intolerant?</li>
	<li>Do you know your dress size in British, European, Italian and Bulgarian sizing?</li>
	<li>Are overcrowded buses charming or scary?</li>
	<li>Is cigarette smoke a problem for you?</li>
	<li>Can you roll with last minute changes and adjustments to everything?</li>
	<li>Are you good at party games like charades, pictionary and guesstures?</li>
	<li>Do you require a sidewalk to walk places by foot?</li>
	<li>Could you get used to nodding the American "no" for "yes"?</li>
	<li>Do you like standing in lines?</li>
	<li>Are you okay with drinking coffee out of plastic cups?</li>
	<li>Do you like the color gray?</li>
	<li>Are old cars, buildings, buses, streets depressing or interesting?</li>
	<li>Do you like music from the early '90s?</li>
	<li>Are you down with homemade alcohol?</li>
	<li>Are you willing to eat anything and then tell the maker of said dish/treat/preserves delicious?</li>
	<li>Will strip clubs, sex shops and/or pornography on sale at news stands shock you?</li>
	<li>Do you own a crimping iron? (Okay, I don't. <em>Yet</em>.)</li>
	<li>Are you okay with ordering straight from a menu without making any changes or special requests?</li>
	<li>What do you think about pastry and cheese? Amazing combination?</li>
	<li>How do you feel about garbage? And garbage that doesn't make into a garbage can?</li>
	<li>Does the thought of bureaucracy make you smile or shudder?</li>
	<li>Are leggings pants?</li>
	<li>Looking for something undiscovered, a little bit grimy and full of character?</li>
	<li>Are you quick to laugh? to see the humor in the absurd?</li>
</ul>
Okay, this is probably where I should give you a key of some sort to make sense of the series of questions I just posed but I am not really sure how to do that. This is probably because I am not good at black and white and I see shades of gray in everything. So I'll leave you to think about the above.

Good luck and let me know, dear readers, if you've got questions, suggestions or additional insight.  That is after all what the comments section is for!!