{"id":1369,"date":"2025-01-23T14:25:34","date_gmt":"2025-01-23T14:25:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/joelmhoffman.com\/Human-Stories\/?p=1369"},"modified":"2025-01-23T14:25:34","modified_gmt":"2025-01-23T14:25:34","slug":"graffiti-in-sofia-bulgaria","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/joelmhoffman.com\/Human-Stories\/postcards\/graffiti-in-sofia-bulgaria\/","title":{"rendered":"Graffiti in Sofia, Bulgaria"},"content":{"rendered":"

I just spent an afternoon in Sofia, Bulgaria. Before I arrived, I knew almost nothing about the place, beyond a vague notion of its status as a former Soviet bloc country that was now part of the European Union.<\/p>\n

It was January 1, so I didn’t expect to see much. Perhaps a few grand or grandiose buildings, I thought. Maybe a souvenir shop. Hopefully a restaurant.<\/p>\n

What I didn’t expect was the ubiquitous graffiti:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Graffiti in Sofia, Bulgaria<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"\"<\/a>
Graffiti over Starbucks in Sofia, Bulgaria<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"\"<\/a>
Graffiti in Sofia, Bulgaria<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I also discovered that Sofia has a long history, with a surprising number of surviving ruins:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Sofia Old and New<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

and fog, with a surprising number of cows at the airport:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Cows at the Airport in Sofia, Bulgaria<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

And when crossing the street, you have to look three ways in Sofia, not just two:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Look (\u041f\u043e\u0433\u043b\u0435\u0434\u043d\u0438)<\/I> Three Ways Before You Cross in Sofia, Bulgaria<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I lucked into a great hotel, the IHG InterContinental<\/a>, with a charming lobby and fantastic service and truly delicious food:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Lobby of the IHG InterContinental in Sofia, Bulgaria<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I actually loved my afternoon in Sofia. I hope I’ll be back soon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What I didn’t expect was the ubiquitous graffiti in this former Soviet bloc country that was now part of the European Union.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1349,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[270,13,271,269,272,36,102,63,274,273],"class_list":["post-1369","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-postcards","tag-bulgaria","tag-cultures","tag-graffiti","tag-sofia","tag-street-art","tag-travel","tag-travel-photography","tag-travel-postcard","tag-274","tag-273"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/joelmhoffman.com\/Human-Stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1369","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/joelmhoffman.com\/Human-Stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/joelmhoffman.com\/Human-Stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joelmhoffman.com\/Human-Stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joelmhoffman.com\/Human-Stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1369"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/joelmhoffman.com\/Human-Stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1369\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1381,"href":"https:\/\/joelmhoffman.com\/Human-Stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1369\/revisions\/1381"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joelmhoffman.com\/Human-Stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1349"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/joelmhoffman.com\/Human-Stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1369"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joelmhoffman.com\/Human-Stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1369"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joelmhoffman.com\/Human-Stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1369"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}