Good morning, my friends! I hope this week has treated you well. My time in Varna ended, and I returned to Sofia last week.

It was a fairly uneventful flight, except a seat behind mine was double booked, which delayed us for an hour. It was an interesting conflict in that the two men didn't yell or curse. The man in the seat simply refused to get up and the man in the aisle refused to go to another seat. Both men stayed in their respective places, arms folded, while the flight attendant worked to resolve the problem.

Nobody complained. Nobody shot video to upload to social media. Nobody made a scene. I was struck by how different it would be back home as I taught the friendly unaccompanied minor beside me to play tic tac toe to pass the time and practiced my Russian with him. People here are quite stoic. They also applaud enthusiastically when the plane lands. 😂

I thought you might be interested in day-to-day life in Bulgaria. I have an apartment in the heart of Sofia and compared to American prices, things are very inexpensive. It seems like most folks walk instead of driving and you often see the elderly out for a stroll with a rolling cart to fetch groceries. I think this walking culture keeps people healthy for far longer. It isn't set up for the disabled at all. There are four steps to go up and down from the grocery store for example, and I helped an older lady get her full cart down the steps and gave her an arm when I picked up my own food yesterday.

Russian and Bulgarian are relatively similar and since my language app doesn't have Bulgarian, I've been taking a concentrated Russian course for the past six weeks. This has been immensely helpful as most signs and labels are written only in Cyrillic.

Two days per week, I walk to the Women's Market, a 140-year-old farmer's market about 8/10s of a mile from my apartment. It's called the Women's Market because during the Ottoman Empire, ladies were not allowed to go shopping anywhere but in the area of today’s market, and then only on Fridays.

There, I load up on incredible fresh produce and pick up a few readymade meals. They also sell tons of plants and I've included some photos of the varieties available.

Last visit, I got a container of bean, sausage, and vegetable soup and a loaf of fresh bread that lasted for three filling meals for only about $3 US. Since my kitchen is limited, this is far cheaper than I could make it myself. Even restaurant meals are very reasonable, ranging from the equivalent of $4-8 USD.

Twice a week, I visit the grocery store nearby. The grocery stores here are far, far smaller than the ones in the US. I think that's because there are so many fewer processed offerings. The veggies and fruits at the grocery stores aren't very good ,so I don't buy any there. I get staples like rice, beans, milk, and butter. This is also the place to pick up household goods like toilet paper or laundry soap. Occasionally I pick up something from the prepared food deli in the back of the store to reheat later.

Nobody around here has dryers for clothing, so you hang out outdoors. I have a teeny tiny balcony far too small to sit on, although I do like to stand out there for a few minutes in the morning with a cup of coffee and a view.

I love the laundry drying set-up for a small space. 5 Fiveods hanging from the ceiling of the balcony and they are moved with a simple pulley system. You can stagger the height of each line so that all your clothes or linens have good air circulation. Things dry so much faster this way than on a rack!

All over the city are free fountains with Bulgaria's famed mineral water. Instead of buying water, most people go and fill up their containers at these fountains, which is far nicer than the tap water here. That being said, the tap water is perfectly fine for cooking and making coffee.

Most folks take trash out daily. There are dumpsters on every city block in convenient locations.

I rarely use any form of transportation besides walking, as each neighborhood is pretty well-equipped with the essentials. I walk about 10-12 miles per week as per the tracker on my phone.

I calculated that, not including housing (which varies based on where I am), I spend about $8 a day here to stay fed, clean, and hydrated. I have an entertainment budget of $50 weekly to visit museums and historical sites. There are loads of free places to visit such as parks and quirky, artsy neighborhoods, where I love taking photos.

This allows me to save up to rent a place when I get back home since I got priced out of the market at my old place in North Carolina.

You can find more photos on Instagram.

Speaking of money, I wanted to thank those who have donated to The OP fundraiser. It means the world to be able to keep this ship afloat!

I wrote yesterday about how the website was defunded and how the government paid for it, and because it was an article as opposed to a personal letter, I didn't talk much about how it affected me personally. I always hesitate to share things like this because I feel like I'm whining. But some friends told me I should talk about it with you, so here goes.

When we were first defunded, I was determined to sue the pants off everyone who was involved. I hired an attorney, and very quickly, despite his best efforts to get them to the table, they'd buried us in paperwork. I rapidly went through my entire personal savings account which had taken years to build up. It only took a few months before I was broke. Their plan to destroy the business I had built was working all too well.

At the time we were defunded, I had seven employees. Now we're down to one part-time employee and a fabulous group of freelance writers who have stuck with me despite a period of late payments as I struggled to rebuild what the censors had torn down.

Then I was hit with depression. This is something that I have struggled with my entire life and a couple of periods have been worse than others. This bout was pretty intense. Not just was I dealing with the chemical end of it, but I was also watching my life's work be destroyed, my credit get ruined, and I was selling things off to continue to keep afloat personally. I didn't pay myself for almost a year and just eked by selling the things I owned. I took on freelance work myself to make ends meet, and I was working almost nonstop. First, there was the extra work, and secondly, not only had I let go of my staff, but I was covering their tasks.

It was very grim, and I was incredibly unhappy. Being broke and depressed is very lonely. I know that a lot of people like to scoff at terms like depression or anxiety, but these issues are very real, and they're debilitating. Most of the time, we have no choice but to keep going and push through. So that's what I did.

When I got the notice that my lease renewal was increasing by nearly $600 a month for my apartment, initially, I felt absolutely sick. How on earth would I be able to afford to spend even more money when I could barely make ends meet at the previous rent?

Then I thought, what's keeping me here, in this place? I loved living near my daughter but I just couldn't keep struggling to pay this cost of living. I decided to put things in storage for about $100 a month and take off for a while. The decision to be mobile is actually more than a thousand dollars a month lower than living at my previous location. It probably sounds frivolous to be gallivanting around Europe, but actually, it's such a financial relief that I cannot begin to tell you how much better I feel.

I can't tell you what comes next. My first concern is keeping The OP afloat, and I'm working hard to develop some cancel-proof streams of income. Meanwhile, if you can help the website, even with just a $2 donation, I would appreciate it so much.

Here are two ways you can support The OP:

You can grab a PDF copy of The Seasonal Kitchen Companion here with any one-time donation of $2 or more.

You can subscribe to our Patreon here to provide ongoing support.

If you've read this far, thank you for doing so. It's really difficult to write about these things. Feelings. Ick.