"There are an awful lot of churches here,” Gabriella commented as she lay on her stomach on the hotel bed, perusing brochures.

“What do you expect from a country that’s been around since the year 681?” Melanie was apparently scrolling through Wikipedia. “Did you know Bulgaria’s the oldest country in Europe that hasn’t changed its name? Three-quarters of the population are Eastern Orthodox, 10 percent Sunni Muslims. Hey, cool, the Cyrillic alphabet was invented here! I always assumed it was in Russia.

“Whaddaya know.”
Melanie continued reading. “And here’s a fun fact: The Bulgarian army has never lost a single flag in battle.”
“That’s comforting.”

“On the downside, they have among the lowest birth rates in the world. Only 1.46 per woman. Wow, 75 percent of households don’t have children under 16. A third of all households consist of only one person. And the death rate….”

Gabriella looked up. “Melanie, are you going to be doing this the entire vacation?”
Melanie gave her an apologetic little grin. “Okay, okay. Here’s something relevant to planning our itinerary: There are ten UNESCO World Heritage Sites…and, yup, three of them are churches. The Rila Monastery looks cool…guess you wouldn’t go there?” She snuck a peek at Gabriella, who raised an eyebrow in return.

“Come on, Mel, you’d actually consider going into a church?”
Her sister shrugged. “I’m not going to pray, it’s a national landmark. Like the Sistine Chapel.”

“You’d go to the Sistine Chapel?”
Melanie shrugged again, looking confused. Gabriella had often suspected that, when talking to her, her family made themselves out to be more liberal with their halachic observance than they actually were. Must be some sort of defensive reaction.
“Well, what did you have in mind, then?” Melanie asked.

Gabriella propped her head up on her chin, elbows sinking into the mattress. It was a nice place, this BW Premiere City Hotel. And the best part was that she’d slept until 10 a.m. this morning. When was the last time she’d done that?

“I really need to scout out film locations. That is why I’m here, after all. Today we’ll hit the main tourist drag in Sofia; I’ve already mapped out an itinerary. I’d like to include scenes of Jewish Bulgaria — not that there’s much.

“We’ll go to the Sofia Synagogue, which is the largest Sephardic shul in Europe, and check out its Jewish History museum. And we’ll walk down Vitosha Boulevard — that’s the main street, with shopping and cafés, we’ll definitely want to film the girls there. Tomorrow, I want to move out to the mountains. There are a lot of mountains in this country.”

Melanie nodded knowledgeably. “More than one-third of the terrain. There’s the Balkans, the Rila, the Pirin, the Rhodope — hey!” She stopped as she got hit in the face by Gabriella’s pillow.

“Why didn’t I ever realize what a nerd you are?” Gabriella lifted herself up into a sitting position and rolled her eyes affectionately at her sister.

“Ah, you know, big-sister syndrome.” Melanie shrugged. “Now me, I was always kinda intimidated by your coolness. Lucky you’re five years younger than me, or else I would’ve hated you.”

(Excerpted from Family First, Issue 617)