16-year-old Yuliana sews the Bulgarian flag for her school in Dzhulyunitsa

SHE IS ONLY 16, BUT SHE ALREADY LIVES HER LIFE WITH A MISSION – TO RETURN AS MANY CLASSMATES AS SHE CAN TO SCHOOL because she believes that education is one of the great steps that can save her friends from the vicious circle of early marriages. She also organizes charity events to raise funds for sick children, leads the Student Parliament at her school, writes poetry and essays, and wins competitions with her literature.
Her name is Yuliana Stefanova and she is different because she was born Roma, reads the Koran instead of the Bible, lives in the small village of Dzhulyunitsa, where there is no great chance of being noticed, and is already working. Juliana is a volunteer in the largest Roma organization in our country “Amalipe”, whose headquarters are in Veliko Tarnovo. Some time ago, the two people from Tarnovo, who run the NGO and are trying to change their community, Deyan Kolev, and Teodora Krumova, found Yuliana and she became part of their small but very active team.
This year, Juliana finished 9th grade in the United School “P.R. Slavejkov” in Djulyunitsa, where he studied in the class “Restaurant”. The windows in the teenager’s home are full of diplomas and awards that she won at school and in competitions. Her latest prize is from the literary competition of “Zonta Club” in Stara Zagora and “Amalipe”, called “Girls with Dreams – Let’s Turn the Page”. Juliana is a winner in her age group with her essay “An Unfinished Letter.”
“I had a girlfriend. We studied with her in Dzhulyunitsa, but they married her. And she was only 15 years old. And then I thought, what would happen if the same thing happened to me? How would I feel in this situation, to grow up without having fully lived my childhood? So somehow, without realizing it, the topic of early marriages became a cause for me. My essay is dedicated to this friend of mine, “says Juliana.
The adults she works with at Amalipe say that Juliana has already managed to persuade many of her classmates to return to school and make an effort to graduate, to be literate, to take a diploma in their hands.

“Girls who agree to get married too early do so because of a tradition that seems to me to be fading. This tradition is no longer what it used to be, so I think they do it mostly because of their parents. But isn’t it most important for them to be happy? And the happiness is in going our own way without skipping stages, to have boyfriends, to part with them, to fall in love again, to make pranks at school “, says Juliana. And she admits that her big dream is to become a student when she finishes 12th grade. He also wants to study law.

For now, however, she likes to go to school and does not hide that she is doing well. “My parents want me to finish my education. And that’s all they tell me. They keep telling me that they want to see me first in a prom dress, then a bridal dress. Somehow everything worked out on its own when I started talking to them. I asked why the other girls got married early, we talked about the community in which they and I were born, about the traditions, about whether, if we do not follow them blindly, we will change. But they don’t want me to go that route. My parents got married on time and for love and believe that I will find my love at the right time, “admits the teenager. Then, with a little anxiety, she clarifies that right now she is terribly in love and feels light and free like a butterfly.
Read all the material dedicated to Juliana on the website of Borba newspaper.

Continues here: 16-year-old Yuliana sews the Bulgarian flag for her school in Dzhulyunitsa
Author: Sashka ALEKSANDROVA