When the first group of Bulgarians arrived in the Komi ASSR in early 1968, there was no ready-made city in front of them, but taiga, snow and temperatures around minus 40 degrees. The agreement between Bulgaria and the USSR from 1967 provides for joint logging, but in practice the Bulgarian workers have to do more than just cut down trees. They build roads, housing and entire settlements in one of the harshest regions of the Soviet Union.
There are different estimates of the number of those who left. The Bulgarian National Radio indicates that between 1967 and 1985 alone, over 100,000 Bulgarian citizens passed through Komi. Regional Russian publications speak of nearly 150,000 people for the entire period of cooperation, which lasted approximately a quarter of a century. In some years, up to 17,000 Bulgarians live in Komi at the same time.
Bulgarian settlements grow from the taiga
Usogorsk becomes the largest Bulgarian center in the region. Blagoevo, Mezhdurechensk and Verkhnemezensk are added to it. In place of small wooden settlements, streets with multi-storey blocks of flats, schools, kindergartens, a hospital, heating plants, shops and a House of Culture appear.
According to the Bulgarian National Radio, Bulgarian builders built nearly 8,000 kilometers of forest roads, 167,000 square meters of residential area, four schools, four kindergartens, a hospital and health posts. A regional publication in Komi indicates a lower estimate of about 7,000 kilometers of roads. The difference is probably related to a different period and method of reporting, which is why both numbers appear in publications about the project.
“A small Bulgaria in the heart of Komi“, Tsvetan Todorov from the Vratsa village of Liliache, who spent 13 years in Usogorsk, told BNR. He works in the district heating system, and his wife is an accountant. Their children studied there before the family transferred them to Bulgaria during perestroika.
The cold is harsh, but the money attracts
The winter in the Udorsky region lasts a long time, and temperatures sometimes drop to minus 51-53 degrees. Ivan Ivanov, who arrived in Komi in 1978, remembers minus 51 degrees in the first winter. After arriving, the new workers undergo training, and some of them start as valuers, tractor drivers and chokers - workers who tie the felled trees to the machines for transportation.
The working day often lasts 10-12 hours. In order to fulfill the plan, the brigades go out into the forest even on weekends. In return, the income is significantly higher than in Bulgaria. Ivanov says that with the money he earned, he bought a house and a "Zhiguli" car in Bulgaria. Kiril Dimov, who arrived in 1986, indicates monthly salaries of about 1,000 rubles at first, and later up to 2,000-2,500 rubles. According to him, the average salaries in the USSR and Bulgaria at that time were about 50-80 rubles. This is a personal story, not a universal rate for all professions and years.
Money is not the only incentive. Bulgarian enterprises have the right to import duty-free food, clothing, medicines and household goods. Bulgarian canned goods, compotes, sweets and other products are sold in Usogorsk, which are a rarity for local residents. There are mixed classes in schools, but Bulgarian children also study their native language, literature, history and geography of Bulgaria.
The end of the project
After the collapse of the USSR, the economic basis of cooperation collapsed. Bulgarian companies began to lay off workers, and local authorities insisted that foreign citizens without ties to the Soviet system leave. The mass return took place in the early 1990s, and the agreement between Bulgaria and Russia was finally terminated in 1994.
After the withdrawal of the Bulgarians, some of the settlements lost their population and industries. Verkhnemezensk gradually became an abandoned settlement, while Usogorsk, Blagoevo and Mezhdurechensk continued to exist. About 500 Bulgarians remained in Komi according to media estimates.
For some, Komi remained the place of the hardest work and the long separation from family. For others - of the first car, the purchased apartment, a mixed marriage or children who grew up in the taiga. The common denominator among the memories is that the Bulgarians did not just extract wood: they left behind roads, blocks and cities built in land where winter begins at minus 40 degrees.
Sources: old-news.bnr.bg, komiproject.ru, ourreg.ru