Bulgaria’s Las Vegas

*Caroline Knowles

Sofia is the first Belt-Road stop in Europe after Istanbul. I catch a Turkish train overnight that grinds slowly towards Bulgaria’s capital city. Many lengthy stops manage the single track for passenger and freight trains, meaning we are three-hours later than promised by the timetable arriving in Sofia. I thought that the rail transit corridors connecting China and Europe might speed up at this point, but the slow train turned out to be a fitting introduction to the future-facing project I had come to take a look at. Widely referred to in local media as a ‘smart city’ and ‘Bulgaria’s Las Vegas’, the China Daily described this project as ‘funded mostly by Chinese capital’. It came with extravagant promises about GDP growth and five or even ten thousand new local jobs. The Las Vegas Smart City was conceived in spectacular terms as a holiday and entertainment complex with an indoor water park, hotels, casinos, a mall, a concert hall, and other facilities spread over eighty-eight hectares around the village of Ravno Pole twenty kilometres from Sofia. It was announced a decade ago but has gone quiet ever since. I had to go and see it.

First, some soundings from locals. The lawyer I spoke with compared Bulgaria with Serbia. Serbia has more Chinese funded projects and as a result is more embroiled in debt-traps that increase China’s control over local infrastructure — a country’s key assets — when loans are not repaid. She points out with a hint or irony that Bulgaria on the other hand is dependent on the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the European Union, which may not be much of an improvement. The architect sitting with us disagrees. He says that during Xi Jinping’s visit to Belgrade, local Falun Gong were rounded up and imprisoned just in case they protested China’s human rights record. He insists that China’s financial clout means it can silence dissent in counties it collaborates with and so softly produce collusion in oppression and persecution. Chinese investments he says make it harder to take a tough line on the policies of the Chinese Communist party.

Lawyer concedes that it is important to see the political agendas behind Chinese investments as they are not just about business. But she thinks most Bulgarians disagree. She says, ‘people are very romantic about communism. When they hear China they always think, this is a very prosperous nation, so everyone is open to China hoping that Chinese prosperity might spread’ even to low-income countries like Bulgaria. ‘But if you owe them, you are obliged’ to dial back any opposition. Of course, openness to Chinese investment ultimately depends on local politics, but for cash-strapped former Soviet Republics large injections of Chinese capital especially for expensive infrastructure projects are tempting. I emailed the British Embassy to ask if we could talk about China in Bulgaria because I know that they follow these matters closely. They were they replied ‘unfortunately not in a position to contribute on this issue’ but would be interested in my findings!

The Las Vegas Smart City in Ravno Pole is only twenty kilometres from the centre of Sofia but takes four hours to get there on public transport, suggesting a distanced relationship to the city. I take a taxi to save time, intending to return on a series of trains and busses so I could feel the ground beneath my feet. My taxi ride ends among tranquil cornfields with a soundtrack of birdsong. I walk around the golf course and watch the wedding preparations. I take in the small hotel, the expensive restaurant and the wellness spa. I ask the young woman who runs the club house about the Smart City. She says she’s never heard of it, but next time the mayor visits she will be sure to ask him. There is a sign at the golf course that says ‘St Sofia’ the only sign of the Las Vegas Smart City that isn’t. It’s quiet. Roads are empty. There is no sign of construction. There is no Las Vegas Smart City; only the idea of it sits silently unknown even to those who work where it isn’t. Without explanation, it seems the project silently died, among rumours of a shortage of finance — these projects often rely heavily on borrowing — and disputes over the ownership of the land on which the golf course sits.

I head into the village in the hope of finding transport back to Sofia. The village looks a bit run-down, and I wonder whether the Las Vegas Smart City would have benefitted its residents in any way. I fill my knapsack with snacks and water from the local grocery shop for tomorrow’s twenty-nine-hour train ride to Budapest where I’ve heard about controversial plans to build Chinese University campus. Outside the grocery store I join a group of middle-aged women at a table smoking and eating pastries from brown bags. Another woman is feeding stay cats nearby and yet another is shouting at imagined enemies. Heading back to Sofia I walk a couple of kilometres in searing heat towards the train station. When I get there it’s derelict. I can’t believe trains stop here, although a local man assured me they did, saying that it was the ‘old train station’. I wait a while. There is no shelter from the sun and no platform only tangled weeds. I wonder if I should walk to the level crossing where the road crosses the railway track. This might improve my transport options, but there is nowhere to walk except the rail tracks. I’m walking along the train tracks not far from the derelict station when I notice the train coming towards me and develop a new appreciation for slow trains. While trying to calculate the width of the train and by how far I must clear the tracks, I wave to the driver somehow hoping that the train will stop. This causes me to lose my footing as I step back and fall into the weeds on the steep railway embankment behind me landing virtually upside down, and floundering like a turtle on its back unable to move because of my heavy knapsack.

Here I might still be if the train hadn’t stopped. The kindly driver and guard hauled me out of the undergrowth and onto the train and my Belt-Road tour took an unexpected turn. Not to Budapest, but to Sofia Station, to the hospital trauma unit, and to a splint and crutches that made it difficult to go anywhere but home. The Belt-Road tour may be paused for now but will resume in a few weeks.