Brothers Bulgarians, sisters Bulgarians, and even you foreigners who happen to be reading, greetings from a man who has not slept, because victory does not sleep, and neither does a patriot with unfinished business at the market.
I write these lines with a trembling hand, and you all know my hand trembles with difficulty, because it is accustomed to counting. This very morning, while lesser men were still quarreling with their pillows, we, seventeen glorious men, took Oltenia. Seventeen, brothers! Not a battalion, not an army, seventeen. Like the apostles, only with better boots and worse manners.
Oltenia! That Romanian corner of the map which, let us be honest, even the Romanians themselves were not entirely sure they needed. Now it is ours. I congratulate our great nation, our wise leaders, and, with the modesty for which I am known throughout three provinces, myself.
Now, certain envious persons are already squinting at the ranking and whispering in coffee shops. "But Mr. Balkansky, you finished sixteenth out of seventeen." To these people I answer, with one hand on my heart and the other, out of long habit, on my wallet - "It is ok, my bratushkas, for tomorrow I will be 15th! And the day after that? Who knows."
And now, brothers, a small piece of news has reached my ear, and when news reaches my ear it rarely leaves without paying rent. They tell me there is oil in Oltenia. Real oil, black oil, the kind that does not smell of roses but smells, if you pay attention - of money. All my life I have been a rose oil merchant, a delicate profession for delicate times, but times, as you see, are no longer delicate. Perhaps the moment has come for Bai Ganyo to trade the little bottle for the big barrel. Rose oil made me charming. Black oil will make our companies indispensable.
And here, brothers, I must be practical, for patriotism without capital is only poetry. To dig the oil, one needs drills. To buy drills, one needs money. To find money, one needs friends. And you, dear reader, if you have read this far, are already my friend, whether you know it yet or not. I am therefore opening, purely as a civic gesture, the Balkansky Oltenia Oil Initiative, a modest enterprise in which modest contributions from modest patriots will produce, God willing, immodest returns. Send what you can. Send what you cannot. The national interest does not count change, and neither, I assure you, do I.
Yours in rose oil, MrBalkansky Bai Ganyo Balkansky.