NO SAUERKRAUT IN BG AMBULANCES

NO SAUERKRAUT IN BG AMBULANCES

Thu, 12/31/2020 - 12:48

Late autumn is a special season in Bulgaria.

joke of the month.jpg

The overwhelming majority of Bulgarians wait in earnest for the sauerkraut, or kiselo zele, to ferment, or vtasa. Given the right preparation (in a plastic container called bidonche, stored in a basement, daily circulation of brine, or pretakane) and favourable weather conditions (neither too warm, nor too cold) the year's yield of sauerkraut should be in just ahead of Christmas.

But the 2020 holiday season was like no other since 1989, when Christmas was reinstated as a public holiday after 40 years of being declared just an ordinary working day. In 2020, in addition to all the goodies (slightly higher pensions, promises of bonuses for medical workers) handed out by Prime Minister Boyko Borisov, Bulgarians have become used to the sight of speeding ambulances with their sirens on and lights blinking. Add to that the horror stories of people waiting for up to 12 hours for emergency to arrive or of patients dying on the doorstep of hospitals refusing to take them in. Not very funny, not by any civilised standard.

Yet Bulgaria's pervasive sense of black humour can and does defy the calamities of the times, notwithstanding the coronavirus. And unlike the dark Christmasless times when jokes had to be told in a hush-hush manner for fear the neighbours might be listening in, now Bulgarians have Facebook where anything at all goes.

So, it did not take long for some anonymous user to devise the above collage of a Sofia ambulance, suggesting its cargo consisted of... cabbages being transited for sauerkraut preparation. Those unfamiliar with local practices might be puzzled, but Bulgarians are used to seeing carrier wagons of all shapes and sizes full of fresh cabbages this time of the year. So, the ambulance prank appeared realistic. Perhaps an ambulance driver was just stoking up on cabbages.

The collage in question gained such a momentum on social media that Sofia emergency services issued an official press release denying the allegations an ambulance carried "vegetables." The ambulance seen in the photos, the press release went on, carried "biological refuse" to the Aleksandrovska Hospital incinerator. The plastic sacks were marked with a hazardous sign, in keeping with established protocols. "Insinuations like that, given the extremely tough situation faced by the emergency services and the whole health care system, are, to put it mildly, not in order," the press release concluded.

Not very funny for a not very funny holiday season. 

Issue 171-172 coronavirus

Commenting on www.vagabond.bg

Vagabond Media Ltd requires you to submit a valid email to comment on www.vagabond.bg to secure that you are not a bot or a spammer. Learn more on how the company manages your personal information on our Privacy Policy. By filling the comment form you declare that you will not use www.vagabond.bg for the purpose of violating the laws of the Republic of Bulgaria. When commenting on www.vagabond.bg please observe some simple rules. You must avoid sexually explicit language and racist, vulgar, religiously intolerant or obscene comments aiming to insult Vagabond Media Ltd, other companies, countries, nationalities, confessions or authors of postings and/or other comments. Do not post spam. Write in English. Unsolicited commercial messages, obscene postings and personal attacks will be removed without notice. The comments will be moderated and may take some time to appear on www.vagabond.bg.

0 comments

Add new comment

The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.

Restricted HTML

  • Allowed HTML tags: <a href hreflang> <em> <strong> <cite> <blockquote cite> <code> <ul type> <ol start type> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd> <h2 id> <h3 id> <h4 id> <h5 id> <h6 id>
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
  • Web page addresses and email addresses turn into links automatically.

Discover More

three generations monument
'DEFILING' ABANDONED PILE OF STONES
Perushtitsa, now a small and offbeat town rarely visited by tourists, is known to every Bulgarian as the sight of a massacre in the failed April 1876 Uprising against the Ottomans.

gabrovo carnival
KOSTYA KOPEYKIN'S FOUNDATION KICKS OFF
Though Dead Souls used to be on the national school curriculum, few latterday Bulgarians, and possibly even fewer English speakers, have actually read it, so here is a short synopsis.

buzludzha night.jpg
BUZLUDZHA LIGHTS UP AGAIN
The Flying Saucer, which in recent years has become one of the Top 10 world monuments for urbex, or dark tourism, was constructed in the early 1980s. It was designed to celebrate the Bulgarian Communist Party, in control of this country from 1944 to 1989.

lz airplane
FLYING LOW
In early June a small plane flew into Bulgarian airspace from the northwest and landed at what used to be a commercial airport near Vidin. Apparently, the aircraft refuelled.

airport bulgaria
IS THERE A PILOT IN THE PLANE?
In early June a small plane flew into Bulgarian airspace from the northwest and landed at what used to be a commercial airport near Vidin. Apparently, the aircraft refuelled.

bulgarian parliament doors
IRON BARS, NO IRON BARS
Lovers of freedom were quick to cry fowl. Is this what the supposedly liberal, pro-Western Changes Continued government is doing? Protecting itself from the love of the general public with iron bars?