Imagine the human head as a computer. The eyes can be compared to the video card, the ears are the sound card. But that’s just the hardware. It is important alright, but it would just be a piece of junk, if it’s not for the software that makes it tick. The brain inside the skull is both hardware and software. Our short-term memory is just like the RAM, our long-term memory is just like the hard drive. There are all those subconscious processes going on in our head, that we’re unaware of, just like the processes in a computer — we see only those of them that are displayed on the monitor. But why imagine it — it’s exactly the same, so it’s got to be true.
I wrote this short story back in 1996, for the competition L. Ron Hubbard’s Writers of the Future. It’s an old piece, and it shows how much Bulgarian language constructions I have used at that time. Looking back, 11 years seem to be a lot of time (and experience, too). I still find it a fun read (hence, it’s categorized as humor) — it’s never been meant to be taken seriously. It was also the time when I adopted the pen-name El Volgero. I guess I do owe an explanation about it. So, here goes.
I admit I shamelessly stole the El part from El Greco. I’m not a great fan of painting, but I love the way his name sounds. So I took El; and the second word had to sound similarly, i.e. ending with O. Then I took a word, and made a simple letter transition. Let me put them one above the other, and it’ll be more clear.
VOLGERO
BULGARO
In our language, the letter B is substituted with V in some names from the history. For example, instead of Byzantium, we say Vizantia. This accounts for the first letter. O and U are often substituted in the oral pronunciation. L and G remain the same. A was substituted for an E just for melodiousness. The final R and O remain the same.
It also contains the name of the Volga, the river where our people lived by (Great Bulgaria — just north of the Black Sea), before fleeing from the consecutive Khazar invasion, and then biting a chunk of the Byzantine Empire in the seventh century, thus creating the country Bulgaria, south of the Danube, on the same territory it is now.
So, in the end, El Volgero simply means The Bulgarian.
But enough about me, just enjoy the story.
11 November 2007 at 0:04
Glad you are back. I found the reasoning for your moniker very interesting and unique. Now, why Raven? Is it because you are smarter than the average bird, or because you are black, or a little of both. Well, I know you are smarter than most of us birds, and that is really all that matters.
11 November 2007 at 11:12
Raven is short for Ravenwhite — a nick I used at some boards I haven’t visited for a couple of years now. Here’s another interesting reasoning for it: This type of birds is supposed to be black, and adding the color white to them, is like combining the two ends of the spectrum, which are usually incompatible. It might mean many things, but let’s just say that I’m not conservative, I have an open mind, and I don’t unreasonably discount one end for the other.
It’s also connected with a great short story of one of our best writers, Yordan Yovkov. The title of the story is “The White Swallow”. It’s about a father, that drives in his cart his sick daughter, through village after village, in search of the ever-escaping white swallow, which people had never seen, but they’ve always heard that the people in the next village had seen; and the non-existent bird in question is the symbol of hope for healing for the incurably ill.
So, again you have many layers of meanings in a simple nickname. It’s because, you know, umm, well, you said it — this bird is smarter than some.