News

15 January 2024

Pupils from the 4^th grade of the Neofit Rislki Innovative Combined School in the town of Samokov “creeped” into the Ombudsman Institution on the occasion of the Roma New Year – 14 January. The children performed the rite of cooking the traditional family meal and the kneading of the kulak bread for the feast. With “Bahtalo Nevo Bresh” the children wished a Happy New Year to the team of the Institution and chanted for health, success and wealth.

Deputy Ombudsman Elena Cherneva offered the guests treats to make the year wonderful and sweet and wished them to grow up healthy and smiling, to be awarded for their excellent performance at school and to guard the good traditions of their community. She told them that last June she was one of the audience at the Open Heart Festival where some 2,000 Roma children performed to make popular Roman talents and wished them to be at this year’s festival for which they immediately received an invitation from the Amalipe Center for Interethnic Dialog and Tolerance.

This year again it was the Amalipe Center that came up with the initiative for the pupils to visit the Ombudsman as by tradition the Center organizes the Vassilitsa in the institutions as a Day of Roma Culture within a campaign “Let’s rebuild the bridges between us” with the hope entertained that bridges are built to lead to days to come that, it is believed, will be better.