This article was compiled during the 2024 sCOOL Media Bootcamp by a team consisting of Simona Vasileva, Petya Lozanova and Angel Angelov.
The walls of the Day Center for Elderly People in Veliko Tarnovo, Bulgaria, are decorated with paintings, embroidery, and craft works. Most of the artwork is made by the elderly themselves. A bulletin board is covered with a pile of ads for cultural events. Next to the window, a bunch of house plants creates a garden corner in the room. Visitors come to the center to maintain an active life, while having fun with a wide range of activities such as: sewing, reading, painting, singing folklore songs and knitting. Pensioners visit the center to diversify their daily life.
“We organize exhibitions, knit socks, sew, […] and sell them downtown at the market,” said Maria Ivanova, a 78-year-old woman who visits the center regularly.
The Day Center for elderly people was established in 2011 and belongs to the non-governmental Association Center for Social and Health Care, according to the website of the Municipality of Veliko Tarnovo.
It is located on the outskirts of the city and shares the same building with a secondary high school, and it has been co-funded by the Municipality while the other part is covered by the Association Center For Social and Health Care (ACSHC). The center can accommodate up to 35 visitors, but 49 are currently signed up to attend. Around a dozen seniors visit the center per day. It offers a range of services, including administrative assistance, rehabilitation, occupational therapy, psychological consulting, etc.
“The elderly people choose our center, because no one else provides such services in the region of Veliko Tarnovo and it is a chance for them to socialize with other people. We know that most of them are lonely, so we want to make them feel worthwhile, because they have given a lot to society due to their work and deserve our respect,” the manager said.
The role of the Day Center is important to the elderly people because those facilities help elderly people find companionship, find socialization outside of their home, and reduce feelings of loneliness. They offer a variety of activities in order to entertain the seniors. These activities can help keep their mind and body active, making them think positively and enjoy life.
According to research from the National Statistics Institute (NSI), respondents at the age of 65 or above have the highest percentage of people that feel lonely most of the time, 14.6%, compared to people aged 16-64, which is 3.8%.
In addition to entertainment, the center helps the elderly to practice new skills, meet other peers, and to have variety in their everyday lives. It also aids visitors with filling out pension and social benefits applications.
Milena Alexandrova and her team act as liaisons between seniors and institutions. “It is hard to multitask between administrative and psychological work,” said the manager, half-jokingly adding that she was doing the work of two different people.
The center also employs an occupational therapist and a social mediator to work with the visitors, engaging them in a range of activities, including crafts, and organizing charity events.
Alexandrova often invites hairdressing trainees that do haircuts for the elderly. “They are extremely happy. There is a great desire for this type of service. Because there’s no one to pay attention to them, realistically. Elderly have already given everything they can to the world and society, their children are away in other cities or countries, relatives and friends have passed away and they slowly lose their will to live. That’s why they would never think of going to such treatments,” Aleksandrova said. Some seniors might avoid leaving their homes and settle down into an uneventful daily cycle, which leads to them neglecting their physical health and appearance.
Maria Ivanova and her husband of 62 years, Encho Ivanov, 83, are pensioners who enjoy their time at the Day Center. They share that the center organizes summer excursions, as well as many activities for them to participate in. Ivanova said that her children did not help her financially, but rather she and her husband supported them.
However, many elderly people struggle to make ends meet. According to the National Statistics Institute (NSI), the average pension per person per year for 2023 is 3451 BGN, which is roughly 287.58 BGN per month.
According to Eurostat statistics, as of 2021, the average old-age pension in the European Union is €15 428, which is roughly 30 174.54 BGN. Given the average pension, many seniors may struggle to cover their daily expenses.
For many pensioners, even buying food and medicine can be overwhelming, and therefore they cannot afford to attend cultural events or go on excursions. This economic reality underscores the importance of day centers for the elderly, which provide essential services, social interaction and support, helping to enhance their quality of life and alleviate feelings of isolation and financial stress.
Aleksandrova, an experienced manager and psychologist, has been working for the only Day Center for Elderly people in the Veliko Tarnovo region for six years. She has been organizing many activities since then. “If you want to work in the field of social work, you should have a big heart and love helping people,” she said.
“We organize different cultural events and attend concerts, theaters, have trips and invite children from different schools to show their talents in front of the pensioners,” she added.
However, running a daily center for seniors is not easy, as the center faces some problems.
Because of insufficient funding, elderly people attending the center can only afford two trips per year. The first one is covered by the association, but the second one is covered by their own money.
“Most of our income goes towards buying medicines and food; everything else comes second if we have any money left to spare,” says Encho Ivanov.
The center uses the funds raised during concerts and charity events they organize to fund their activities and make improvements for the center.
They have many projects planned for the future which are currently not possible because they share a building with the school. “We wish we weren’t based in a school building. We feel a little bit like intruders,” the manager of the center said. The building is owned by the Municipality of Veliko Tarnovo, which is in charge of deciding who can use it.
The changes that the manager hopes to happen soon are getting a national map of social services where there will be lots of allocations and possibly more specialists, which will need premises accordingly.
Back in the Day Center, Ivanova and her husband are happy to report that the center brightens their days. “There is a variety [of activities], it’s not the same mundane stuff as at home – washing, cooking, cleaning,” she said. “All in all, the girls [social workers] take great care of us. ”
Unlike the Day Center, where people go for a few hours a day, some pensioners choose to go to a retirement home, where they reside fully. It provides full living conditions to the pensioners, including medical care, as well as physical and psychological help. In the home there is room for only 134 people, and it’s nearly full.
According to the website of the Municipality of Veliko Tarnovo, the retirement home “Veneta Boteva” is the only one in the city. It’s managed by Zornitsa Radlovska and was founded in 1979. The main goal of the home is care, 24-hour medical supervision and social interaction to ease the feelings of isolation and abandonment, fostering a sense of community for the elderly.
Ilka Ganeva, 68, has resided in the nursing home for almost 5 years. She used to sing in an amateur group in the home called “The Golden Age”, which consists of 10 women. “I used to sing, but when my husband died I stopped singing. Now I go to occupational therapy here. “I feel useful,” Ilka Ganeva said, referring to her knitting.
She feels there is a greater purpose in staying in the facility rather than at home. “I’m on an oxygen machine. Every night I turn on the oxygen machine to breathe and for that I can’t take care of myself,” said the woman.
Her children help her when they can, but she feels fully taken care of. “I avoid looking for them because there’s just nothing to do. We find everything here,” she said. “Whatever I wanted to talk about, they have always listened to me,” said Ilka Ganeva.
Desislava Marinova works at the retirement home as an occupational therapist. She organizes different games, events and celebrations for the elderly. The woman explained they have an ice cream party every year in the summer. There is also help for the elderly – not only physical but also mental help, provided by three therapists.
Velika Minkova, an 80 year-old resident, likes the home and the attitude of the workers there. “[And] in recent years the garden has been maintained well enough,” said the elderly woman.
She also likes traveling, especially with her family, and has lived for a year in Las Vegas, USA. “I have been taken to all the casinos – all of them!”. One day she came out of one and immediately recognized that the guy playing the accordion outside was Bulgarian, although no one else believed her.
“They told me ‘you’re a crazy grandma’. I went there and said ‘Hello!’ [in Bulgarian]’.” Then she suggested that he play a horo dance. Strangers enjoyed his music so much that his busker’s hat was filled with coins.
