Three years ago, in New York, distinguished Bulgarian photographer Ivo Hadjimishev was having dinner with Nellie and Robert Gipson, a Bulgarian- American family, who had sponsored educational and museum projects in Bulgaria for years (see Vagabond No. 23, August 2008).
In 1909, 9 September fell on a Thursday. Usually, Thursdays were business as usual for the numerous Jewish shops and other establishments in what at the time was a city with a significant Jewish population. But on that day they were all closed, as if it was a Sabbath. The streets of the Jewish neighbourhoods – the rich lived on either side of what is today Maria Louisa Blvd and the poor in Yuchbunar, present-day Zone B5 – were nearly deserted. The only sound was the buzz of thousands of voices coming from the market near the Banya Bashi Mosque.