site.btaRoma Community Celebrates New Year's Eve on January 13

The Roma community celebrates New Year's Eve on January 13 as a prelude to Bango Vasil (the feast of St Vasil, the saviour of all Roma) on January 14. There are several legends associated with the feast.

Some of them portray Bango Vasil as the guardian of the Roma. According to one, he restored a bridge destroyed by the Devil so the Roma could cross it. According to other legends, he was a limping shepherd who saved a child from drowning or gave shelter to a man who was trying to escape from his enemies.

There is also a myth according to which St Vasil saved the Roma people from perishing in a raging sea. He sent them a flock of geese to take them across the expanse of water.

The feast of Bango Vasil is a family holiday. On this occasion, the Roma eat poultry (either goose or rooster). The dinner on the evening of January 13 abounds in symbols. The traditional menu includes sarmi (stuffed cabbage leaves), banitsa (cheese pie) with fortune slips hidden in it, pitka (New Year's bread), wine and brandy. Before the people start eating, the food on the table is censed and blessed, and everyone kisses everyone else's hand, asking for forgiveness for any wrongdoing.

All houses where the feast of Bango Vasil is celebrated remain locked until midnight on January 13 to keep good fortune from dissipating. Guests are welcomed after midnight. The hosts hope that the first visitor is a good person, so that he or she can bring good luck.

The ritual of surva (survaki, survakane) can begin in the first minutes on New Year's Day, or Bango Vasil (January 14). It consists in lightly patting people on the back with a decorated stick to drive the evil spirits away and wishing the respective person good health and fertility in the new year. It is like casting a spell. The underlying philosophy of the Roma New Year is that what you do or get the first day of the year determines what you do or get throughout the whole year.

On Thursday, Roma children from the southern town of Peshtera performed the surva ritual on Vice President Iliana Iotova, the President's Press Secretariat reported.