Biser Svetlinov

Name: Biser Svetlinov
 
Age: 26
 
Profession: PhD student and Project Manager in Integro Association Bulgaria
 
Country: Bulgaria
 
Biser is a PhD student and a Project Manager in Integro Association, Bulgaria. He is 26 years old and he lives between his village and two towns because of his work. He is Bulgarian and he speaks Bulgarian, English, Turkish and Romani. He likes reading and trekking. He is a Roma.

It was not easy for him to find a job in his region, but he believes he succeeded in it thanks to his honesty, sense of responsibility and motivation. What he likes most of his job is the possibility of meeting and communicating with others.

 Biser likes traveling because this gives him “the possibility to meet  different people and to make friends”. He studied a few months in Hungary, he lived in Strasbourg during three months, and nowadays he often travels abroad for working reasons. During his travels abroad he discovered that "you can be different but most of the time people will accept you”. 
 
About his childhood, his best souvenir is a book called “Everything I know I learned in the kinder garden” and the worst one is a pare of shoes which he didn’t like. 

Question: What does it mean for you being Roma?
BS: Being a Roma reminds me first of all my origins but it also means that you are always facing a challenge,  a challenge which consist in proving or showing that there is no differences between you and the representatives of the majority population.
 
Question: How would you explain to a gadgé who Roma are?
BS: The Roma are the people who had the chance to know more different cultures than any other people who live in this planet. We are human beings as any other human being, and we differ from other ethnic groups just because we have different views because of the things that happened around us and the influence of a different education. 

Question: Which, according to you, is the best quality of the Roma and which is the worst defect?
BS: The best quality of Roma is their hospitality and the worst defect is the fact that they use to depend on others, and to accept to consider themselves as second hand persons. 

 
Question: Which, according to you, is the best quality of the gadgé and which is the worst defect?
BS: For gadgé? The best quality is their readiness to make friends, and the worst defect, of some of them, is the stereotype thinking.
 

Question: Have you some good gadgé friend?
BS: I have a lot of gadgé friends. My relation with them it is characterized by communication, support and sharing. Because my friends are always ready to talk to me, to support me and to share with me their feelings and vice versa.
 
Question: What is the most important value in your life, and why?
BS: Surely the respect for the others, starting from the family till the last foreigner you meets. For me the base for starting a relation is to respect the people you meet and to accept them as they are. 

Question: Which famous personalities (alive or dead) would you take as an example to follow in your life?
BS: Probably my teacher in Math from the elementary school. I’m worst in this subject, but I like her, because she taught me to be good person.  

Question: What would you do if you suddenly became a rich person ?
BS: I will support few NGOs which support the people to be independent.  

 
Question: What would you like to say to the gadgé who are reading this interview?
BS: I would certainly tell them: don’t be afraid to approach Roma, to know them, and to become their friend: they are not so scary!