by David Mossop
David Mossop first came to Bulgaria in the distant 1987 to work as a teacher at British Council Bulgaria. He had previously studied Russian and wanted to learn one more Slavic language. Little did he know then that his entire life was to become ineluctably connected with Bulgaria, its language and culture. He spent the past 27 years almost entirely living and working in Bulgaria, interpreting for Presidents and Prime Ministers, and translating poetry and prose from Bulgarian into English.
“I would like to think that my entire professional career as a linguist and my system of moral values both acquired and innate has led me to want to serve as a bridge between the two cultures which I love and which have shaped me as a person.” – David Mossop
My greatest adventure in Bulgaria was in January 1997 during the protest rallies caused by hyper-inflation and political corruption. On returning home one evening I found myself in the midst of the protesters in front of the National Assembly building, when I received a call from a friend who worked for CNN. Did I know about the protests? Yes, I was in the middle of them. I then proceeded to relay events directly from my telephone to CNN studios. The next day a CNN team came out to Sofia to report. I would like to think that my serendipitous involvement made some contribution at that moment in time to Bulgaria’s liberalisation and enhanced image before the world.
There are two moments which fill me with pride and gratitude for my life in Bulgaria. They both took place recently. In 2013 I was awarded a Doctorate by the Department of Bulgarian Language in the University of Sofia for my dissertation on how the English Language has influenced modern Bulgarian, for better or for worse. With my academic work I felt I could give back to the academic community at least what I suppose is a positive prognosis for the development of the Bulgarian language. Too many Bulgarians seem to have a pessimistic view on the matter.
The second moment of great joy and pride in recent years is connected with my other passion – a passion which was given to me and fostered by my life in Bulgaria. I own and train three horses which I keep in Bankya, just outside Sofia. In 2012 and 2013 I won the Bulgarian Amateur Dressage championship with my horse Minister. I must admit that when the Bulgarian national anthem was played in my honour at the prize-giving ceremony, a tear of pride and joy came to my eye.
On 11 January 97, I got onto Channel 4 news offering to be their fixer for a series of news stories. A week or so later, the late Gaby Rado (sadly killed in an Iraq accident in 2003) duly turned up with a cameraman and secretary. We did the run of the good, great, and the the ugly at the National Assembly, government and opposition, also doing ‘vox pops’ around Sofia and nearby provinces when time allowed.
The team did their own tape editing in the Sheraton with me dubbing, and managed to send their story four minutes (!) before the 7pm start of the hour-long news programme, in which they took the lead spot. The report was retransmitted by News at Ten on ITV.
Nw, it so happened that BBC News (who misrouted my 11 Jan phone call) also had a team in Sofia, and their story also took the 9 O’clock News lead. A friend in London taped the Channel 4 and BBC leads. I was immensely gratified to see that the former beat the latter hands down. The hapless BBC reporter had come upon a cabal of inebriates who had amazingly managed to convince him that Filipovtsi village (or somewhere like it) was the centre of the protests. His report looked like Breugelian bacchanalia come alive…
The proxy CNN office at the time was the Sofia Western News office in Brandenburg Street. Juliet Terzieff was working for me at the time and she contacted CNN in Buffalo NYC. If I remember correctly David Mossop was on his cell phone to my office, and I was relaying messages to Juliet who was standing there next to her then boyfriend Ken Leftowitz. Our objective was to get CNN to come to Bulgaria to get it onto the media map.
At one stage you said to me that someone had thrown a stone at the Parliament building, so I reported that someone had thrown a pavement slab, a message which was duly passed onto CNN. My next act was to report that the crowd was shouting ‘We want CNN, we ant CNN,’ and that was the clincher.’ Juliet was an American and she hoped that their might be a job at CNN if it all went well which of course it didn’t!
Two days later Christiane Amanpour turned up to see what was going on – which was nothing – rented a floor at the Sheratan Hotel, and ended up interviewing various disgruntled Bulgarians in the street about bread shortages. Out of desperation she finally interviewed Stambouli – the owner of a small chain of shops in Bulgaria – and was shown round his main store which was then, close to my office in Sofia center. This was where they discussed the various makes of chocolate and electrical goods he was selling and other overpriced goods he had on display. Very interesting!
Afterwards we all had dinner at Eddies Bar – one of the few places foreigners likes to go to, although Portuguese Eddie was a gangster – and consumed some rather sub standard pizza. Christiana then got got bored, interviewed the waiter, went home, and the next day finally left Bulgaria.
There was one rather dull program on CNN a few days later and the joke was over. Mr. Stambouli gave me $500 for my troubles, which Saatchi & Saatchi would have charged somewhat more for – had they been employed by Stambouli, who was a notorious skinny flint – and the whole matter, including Bulgaria, was swept off the board.
The Sofia Western news met Christiana Amanpour in Havana the following year when she covered the visit of Pope John Paul. ‘Hello Patrick,’ she said to me rather grandly, ‘what on earth are you doing here?’ I replied, ‘simply snooping around Christiana, just like you!’