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Spicy Bulgaria

Did you know that shaking your head (the universal sign for "no") in fact means "yes" in Bulgaria and nodding up and down means "no"?

The famous Bulgarian rose-oil, produced in the region of Kazanlak, is a component of French and of other world-famous perfumes.

The Voyager spacecraft, launched in the 1970s on a voyage to meet and communicate with other planets, carried a laser disc of ten songs believed to be representative of Earth. One of these songs was the Bulgarian tune Izlel e Deliu Haidutin from the Rhodopes region.

The inventor of the first electronic computer John Vincent Atanassoff is of Bulgarian origin. Professor John Atanassoff, together with graduate student Clifford Berry, built the world's first electronic digital computer, at Iowa State University, between 1939 and 1942. The Atanassoff - Berry Computer represented several innovations in computing, including a binary system of arithmetic, parallel processing, regenerative memory, and a separation of memory and computing functions.

According to the statistics, Bulgaria ranks 3rd in Europe only after Greece and Italy for the number of its valuable archeological monuments.

The Oldest Golden Treasure in the world was found in Bulgaria (more than 3000 golden objects dating back 6000 years).

The recognition of the Autocephalous Bulgarian Patriarchate of Constantinople in 927 AD makes the Bulgarian Orthodox church the oldest Autocephalous church in the world.

Bulgaria is the birthplace of the Cyrillic alphabet, which was developed in Preslav and Ohrid Literary Schools during the tenth century. More than 200 million people from different countries today use the developed version of the Cyrillic alphabet, which by 1 January 2007 with Bulgaria’s accession to the European Union become its official alphabet.

Despite enormous pressure from the Nazis, none of Bulgaria’s 48 000 Jews was sent to the death camps during the World War II.

The hottest mineral water is found in the village of Separeva Banya, near the town of Dupnitza - its temperature is 103.8 degrees centigrade. According to some sources, this is the hottest spring in Europe.

Before 1989, while enjoying the generous and fraternal protection afforded by the Soviet military, Bulgarians were required to learn Russian. Today, many young Bulgarians study English, German or French as a second language.

The citizens of Gabrovo, are notorious for their unique sense of humour. Their jokes are related to stinginess and rivalry with neighboring city of Sevlievo. Numerous anecdotes are told about this famous part of the Bulgarian population - good at moneysaving and bargaining with economy runining in their veins (or, as other Bulgarians consider them, stingy). They know how to get something out of nothing - an invaluable lesson taught by their ancestors. It is these anecdotes that created the phenomenon Gabrovo Humour being as viable and vital as ever. The city is now known as an international capital of humour and satire.

It is believed that Bulgarian women are among the most beautiful in the world.

On the first of March Bulgarian people celebrate the beginning of spring. The day is called Baba Marta (or Grandma Marta in English). On that day people give one another as gifts Martenitsa - tassels made of red and white threads, as a symbol of  health and happiness. They wear them pinned to their clothes until they first see a stork. Once the first stork of the season is seen, the martenitsa is tied to the nearest tree.