A couple of the visitors to the exhibition were asking us what was happening with minority “integration” in Stolipinovo, or how we were “integrating” the children from the neighbourhood through our project.

We do not like this word, because it depreciates the life and experience of people that are, in fact, living, feeling, creating, suffering, socializing and taking care of each other. “Their” world is of no less value than “ours”. So, we in Duvar Kolektiv do not “integrate” anybody. Rather, we are trying to bring together two worlds which in 30 years have become separated beyond measure.

The process of coming together can only happen when both sides are working on it.

Well, since we are being asked about minority integration, I’ll share a short story from this Saturday. We were going with some of our co-authors from Stolipinovo (the children from the photo) to the opening of the exhibition and we took an informal taxi from the neighbourhood. The driver, around 55 years old Turkish man from Stoliponovo, told us that he had just returned from working in Germany. While we were passing by Kino Kosmos (in socialist time – Komsomol), we noticed that the shops around the building of the ex-cinema, have been demolished. The taxi driver remarked:

“Finally, they cleared around here! How were they even able to build so much around here? And to leave it in such state of disuse? What a building was that! Here it was the best cinema in Plovdiv! We have skipped classes so much in order to come here. Kino Komsomol! We’ve seen here all the films. “Ivan Kondarev”, “Haathi Mere Saathi” … (and a few more, which I don’t now remember, as I am not so well “integrated” as he is)…