How Do I Map Sustainable Holidays in Bulgaria?
With this blog post, I continue an environmental series about eco-friendly educational Bulgarian projects.
My book Cultural Insights into Conservation Volunteer Bird Watching Holidays in Bulgaria. It's Not Only About Birds! offers to choose the most comfortable format of sustainable activities in Bulgaria.
Download it at the end of this article.
With the short blog posts, I address the question of WHAT participants can learn from participation in the five major birdwatching Bulgarian activities.
And with my book, I provide more details on HOW and WHEN one can sign in for the vacation.
So, you can choose many thematical communities and participate in other activities.
What is the Pomorie Lake Conservation Brigade?
Such eco-friendly vacations as the Pomorie Lake Volunteer Brigade by Green Balkans, the legendary initiative with a 25-year history, are the most comfortable way to learn about environmental issues.
Thanks to volunteer activities, lectures, parties.
This year, with the volunteers, we promoted - the Pomorie Lake Conservation Brigade on social media and reached over 500 people.
The Pomorie Lake Volunteer Brigade is a part of a conservation initiative by Green Balkans.
It is devoted to the restoration of sandwich terns in Pomorie and the support of their habitat.
Pomorie Lake is on the European second largest bird migration route - Via Pontica.
Since 1996, the Pomorie Lake Volunteer Brigade has been uniting nature lovers on a September vacation by Pomorie Lake.
This year, 30 volunteers from different countries participated in the Brigade. The youngest was seven years old, and the oldest was 57.
For one week, we worked to restore a washed-up artificial island where hundreds of sandwich terns rest and breed.
The sandwich tern is a gull-like bird coloured grey above, white bellow with a distinctive black cap on the head.
The species breeds in dense colonies. They don't build traditional nests and usually lay their eggs on the sand or ground.
To protect themselves from predators, the birds choose more aggressive feathered neighbours.
With a long-lasting conservation programme and volunteer support, Green Balkans restored the sandwich tern colony in Pomorie from 6 pairs in 1996 to 1500 pairs.
One of the most impressive ecological successes in the modern history of Bulgaria!
Two newly created artificial islands on Pomorie Lake became the practical solution. However, waves regularly destroy them.
Every September, volunteers come to Pomorie to improve the birds' habitat.
Celebrating the 25th Anniversary of the Pomorie Lake Conservation Brigade
I was lucky to twice participate in the Pomorie Lake Conservation Brigade in 2020 and 2021. Here are the last year's insights into its activities.
Lake Pomorie is part of my project 'Mapping Sustainable Holidays in Bulgaria: Combine Volunteering and Holidays!' funded by the Bulgarian Fund for Women.
With my 2-year ethnographic study, I have researched over ten projects in such Bulgarian regions as Pomorie, Burgas, Stara Zagora, and Sofia.
They deserve more public attention because they were inspired by a powerful but underestimated Bulgarian birdwatching social movement.
It all began over 30 years ago with the establishment of the two oldest Birdwatching volunteer vacations by the Bulgarian Society for the Protection of Birds (more details are in this post) and Green Balkans.
Playing while working by Pomorie Lake
For this edition of the Pomorie Lake Conservation Brigade, I prepared two activities for the volunteers – two presentations and a game based on sharing of social media posts with the hashtags #рибарка2021 or #рибарки2021.
The hashtags featured the symbol for Pomorie Lake bird species – the sandwich tern.
During my two presentations on communication and networking, we explored new meanings and opportunities the Brigade offered the volunteers.
We did it through an interactive game that aimed to attract more people from different social groups.
We shared social media posts about our activities.
The Pomorie Lake Conservation Brigade is a very prestigious environmental project.
So, it offers its participants great professional benefits.
This point was one of the topics of my final presentation related to strengthening the volunteer network during the 25th Brigade.
I offered the volunteers to join a game and share different Facebook and Instagram posts about the Brigade using the hashtag #рибарка2021 or #рибарки2021.
By playing, we learned to communicate, involve more people, and reflect on our experiences on CVs.
The idea was to promote the project by reaching more social groups and learn to support each other while working on a common cause.
Everyone has a different user experience.
It's essential to assist each other by sharing posts, adding comments, and more hashtags to link the message to the place, Pomorie, and the organization, Green Balkans.
Overall, seven volunteers participated in the #рибарка2021 game.
We reached over 500 people for one week in 5 countries (Bulgaria, Italy, Hungary, Turkey and Ukraine).
I chose the winners in 3 categories: the Most Creative Campaign – Maria Mitkova, the Most Supportive Campaign – Nikolay Kolev, and the Most Comprehensive Campaign – Stefan Ivanov.
Each winner has their style of communication.
While Maria prepared a report of daily events, Nikolay and Stefan reflected on the highlights —for instance, the jubilee 150th stick of the new fence.
Among other informative contributions were those by Anelia Pavlova, Polia Ruseva, and Mina Popova, and a philosophical remark by our French volunteer Lucien Depuydt: the Gods help those who help themselves.
I believe such diverse creative voices united in a joint effort are forceful to reach people from different social groups. To make it work, similar communication activities should be integrated into the programme of the Brigade on a regular basis.
Reflecting the symbol of the Pomorie Lake Conservation Brigade on magnets
All the participants of the game got nice prizes – badges with birds and specially created anniversary magnets devoted to the symbol of the Brigade - a kite.
We got the informal symbol last year.
The idea belongs to our veteran volunteer Stefan Ivanov, who joined the Pomorie Lake Volunteer Brigade in the first year of its existence in 1996.
While gathering litter during last year's Brigade, Stefan suddenly spotted a dirty but functional kite, launched it, and stated: 'Let it be the symbol of our Brigade!'.
Later, he found another 'functional' piece of rubbish that he gave me. Learn more details about this curious story from last year's post.
Interestingly, Stefan's idea inspired the logo of my blog – a person launching a kite.
It perfectly reflects the motto Share Ideas & Inspire Changes!
And this year, I decided to create beautiful magnets – a stylized post stamp documenting the launch of the kite.
The design is a creative collaboration of Jana Ivanova, a designer and maker of Kotlen carpets, and Yaroslava Bykova, an illustrator and puppet maker.
I used the idea of the post stamp to highlight Stefan's original contribution to the history of the Brigade.
Post stamps add value to any message. Only meaningful historical events decorate stamps.
Indeed, inspiring examples, like one by Stefan Ivanov, should be celebrated and remembered all the time.
It's how the positive experiences are enhanced, shared, and institutionalized.
Documenting a sensation – a new bird for Bulgaria
Birdwatching is the main bonus for the participants of the Brigade.
And it's great to do it with knowledgeable birders like Nikolay Kolev, a known eco-activist whose systematic observations make part of studies of many Bulgarian ecological organizations (Green Balkans, the Bulgarian Society for the Protection of Birds (BSPB), etc.).
This year's Niki's outstanding discovery has become a true sensation and sparked numerous discussions in birdwatching groups on social media.
He photographed and shared some images of the great knot, which he first mistook for the great knot, a very similar species.
Previously, Bulgarian ornithologists never recorded the bird in the country.
It nests in Siberia and migrates to Australia, Southeast Asia, and the Arabian peninsula.
Getting inspired with Green Balkans
This year's Pomorie Lake Conservation Brigade-2021 was organised in the framework of the project LIFE19 NAT/BG/000804 protection of the Pomorie Lagoon funded by the EU.
For us, the regular participants of the Brigade, the positive energy from a one-week vacation fuels many activities during the year.
It's due to its existence at the intersection of different cultures and generations.
Join us next year and bring more meaning to your life!
Where to begin?
Join the Green Balkans Facebook group, where you can participate in many other eco-friendly projects and 'prepare' yourself well for next year's Brigade.
To learn more about similar projects in other Bulgarian regions, download below my award-winning guide to sustainable vacations!
Download a free guide to the best nature conservation activities in Bulgaria!
Download the award-winning guide Cultural Insights into Conservation Volunteer Bird Watching Holidays in Bulgaria. It's Not Only About Birds!
It's the outcome my two-year-long ethnographic study across different Bulgarian regions.
This book is a collaborative guide to conservation holidays in Bulgaria focused on volunteering, bird watching and protection of birds’ habitats.
The word ‘collaborative’ means that the book is based on 30 interviews with participants of conservation activities in different Bulgarian regions: Pomorie, Burgas, Stara Zagora, Durankulak, Sofia, Kotel, etc. The guide is the final stage of my two-year-long project ‘Mapping Sustainable Holidays in Bulgaria: Combine Volunteering and Holidays!’.
Over 10 conservation projects in different Bulgarian regions, in which I participated personally! part of my ethnographic project, my study was among the 11 best Bulgarian ecological initiatives supported by the Open Society Institute – Sofia and the Open Society Foundations through the Bulgarian Fund for Women.