Thank you for the shoutout - and welcome to the newest players, awesome having you here!

Hi everyone 🤗 I am Iskra from Bulgaria. I have been practicing qigong and taichi since 1995. I participated in many national and international competitions in Yang style. After the European championship in 2004 I realised the way I was learning needed to change and I went with a new master. He taught practical applications of the internal martial arts, rooted in old Chinese scriptures which he translated for us his students. With him I studied Wu and Sun style taichi, plus a couple of weapon applications. Taichi became a way of living for me, helping me balance the very stressful hectic lifestyle of a film producer, working endless hours, travelling often. I developed tools for personal transformation based on my understanding of the Yin-Yang concept, Yi (intention), TCM. What I want to do is bring back the regular practices to my routine. Apparently I was doing daily taichi and qigong for at least two hours when I “had no time” compared to now being a coach and mentor working at my convenience from home. And I am looking forward to connecting with like-minded people in this community interested in using taichi for healing and personal growth. Last note about the healing aspect: taichi helped me recover faster from tuberculosis, improve my eyesight and grow in height (stretching and loosening my spine cord).

@Jake Hill here is a list of the first things that come to mind when I am asked about my country. I started short, then more tings came to mind 🤩 💛 Bulgaria is one of the biggest world producers of rose oil used in premium cosmetics. Rosa Damascena is grown in the Rose Valley, thousands of tourists visit the annual Rose Festival to participate in the ritual of morning gathering of rose petals. 💛 We are famous with yogurt - one of the key beneficial probiotic bacteria strains is Lactobacilum Bulgaricus. Apparently, we export daily tones of Bulgarian yogurt to Japan as this bacteria is hard to live outside of our territory. 💛 It is generally accepted that Bulgaria is the oldest country in Europe. It is also the only country that has never changed its name since its creation as a state back in 681. The oldest technologically processed gold in the world was discovered in the third-largest city, Varna - 7000 years old. 💛 We celebrate the Bulgarian (Slavic) alphabet - created by two Bulgarian priests in the 9th century AC. The key Slavic countries using it include Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Bulgaria (of course), North Macedonia, and Serbia. Other non-Slavic countries also use variations of the alphabet, such as Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Mongolia. 💛 We are also famous with our folklore music - one of the songs on the golden human heritage disk sent with Voyager 2 into the far away cosmos is a traditional folklore song performed by Valya Balkanska. The Mystery of Bulgarian Voices vocal group has been featured in many movies. Peter Gabriel, Lisa Gerard (from Dead Can Dance), Kate Busch have collaborated with them. I will link a couple of songs below. 💛 The Balkan peninsula has its name after our longest mountain - the Balkan (Stara Planina) which splits our country to Northern and Southern Bulgaria. The 3000m Musala summit is the highest on the Balkans. Some more current human achievements: 😊 💛 Sport achievements: - Volleyball: We have current (2025) world champions and vice champions. - Wrestling: This is the most successful sport, with a total of 73 medals at the Olympics (including 18 gold).