Going from France to Sweden or from Denmark to Poland is different than going from Portugal to Bulgaria (or Georgia or Israel). As soon as you’re crossing the border to Bulgaria (or get off a plane) you won’t be able to read any signs. Not only don’t you understand what’s spoken, you cannot even even make sense of what’s written.
The Bulgarian language is written in Cyrillic script.😱
English, French, Swedish, even Estonian or Turkish are written in Latin script (maybe with the addition of some diacritical marks and sometimes special pronounciation). When going to the respective countries you won’t be able to understand what you read, but you can at least recognize the letters, and type words into Google Translate to get a translation. Not so in Bulgaria. That’s a bummer.
Becoming comfortable with Bulgarian requires you to learn the Cyrillig alphabet first. Only after you mastered that and are able to “decipher” written language you can expect to start learning the language.
I had the good fortune of learning Russian in school at a young age. Although I’ve forgotten most of it, it helped me when I came to Bulgaria for the first time. Although Russian Cyrillic script is different from Bulgarian Cyrillic script, I was able to read pretty much everything and even recognize some similar words. That was a great start — but of course does not make me able to understand Bulgarian.
For you it’s harder to acquaint yourself with Bulgarian, may it even be just to get around during a vacation. You have to learn the letters first. How to do that?
I recommend you head over to the service of the good folks at bulgaro.io. They, too, are dedicated to teaching Bulgarian — but are using a different approach than I am envisioning. Still I like how they are doing it and used their service myself for a while.
To learn the Cyrillic script with bulgaro.io just sign up on their website. It’s free for the first couple of lessons including learning the letters.
You’ll be greeted with an overview of all their lessons (25 at the time of writing). The first one being about learning the Cyrillic script:
The lesson consists of a number of exercises structured into three parts:
recognizing characters on their own,
reading single words, and
pairing words.
This lesson is not about learning words. That’s why the words used are names or foreign words you already know (e.g. шоу for “show”).
Are you ready to start your Bulgarian language journey? Then sign up with bulgaro.io and get a grip on the Bulgarian alphabet. I’ll see you back here once you’ve mastered it.
Късмет! (“Good luck!”)
P.S: There is a simple test if you’re really feeling comfortable with the Bulgarian alphabet: if the ъ is your friend.😯 Check here:
Do you enjoy this playful use of alphabets as much as I do?🤯 Then you’re ready for the next step!😁
Don’t forget to install a Bulgarian keyboard layout on your computer! Again bulgaro.io is providing help.