Communism in Bulgaria: How did it happen?Interested in communism in Bulgaria? Well, the story began as so..... The Bulgarians were guarding the gates of Europe against the Turks, and stopping the invaders demolish the mid and west parts of the continent by causing too much trouble and being resistant warriors. This of course while western countries were too busy with revealing the map of the world - discovering new places and economic prosperity that followed (and great inventions of course).
The Bulgarians had no time to look east from their lands and see the potential threat. The almighty Russian brothers had an insight of the future and saw the big picture of Europe, turned into an Islamic state in the near future if an immediate action was not applied. Bulgarian and Russian armies fought bravely side by side and managed to push the Turks almost back to where they had started their advances. The Bulgarian people loved the Russians, their heroes, their big brothers. So hand in hand with Bulgaria's new best friends and their government, a romance was kindled, and course the following morning Bulgaria woke to a socialist regime themselves. Terms like free market, jeans and chocolate became a taboo. Those were the days when you could get arrested for reading the wrong book, singing the wrong song or being seen with the wrong person. But those were also the days, according to old people, when the country took care of you.Private property no longer existed, and expropriating is the term that comes to mind when one thinks of communism in Bulgaria. Anyway, the solid Soviet Block was not that solid after all, and in 1989 Bulgaria had to turn our look to the west, make new best friends (again) and forget the old ones. All red flags became blue, and the Bulgaria people were introduced to democracy.
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