Client story
Client's story
Where they started
The client's ancestors were Bulgarians who had relocated to Bessarabia—a historical region where Bulgarians massively migrated during the 19th century. The family preserved the memory of their Bulgarian roots, and the client wanted to realize this right: Bulgarian citizenship by descent, and with it—an EU passport.
Why the standard route did not work
The problem was with documents, or rather their absence. Over a century, the family experienced relocations, wars, changes of states and borders. Documents that could directly confirm the Bulgarian ancestry of the forebears were lost—some disappeared during moves, some remained in archives of defunct administrations. There was no documentary evidence base in hand.
What BRIDGES had to solve
It is important to understand: the absence of documents in hand is not the absence of descent. The client's Bulgarian roots were genuine, and traces of the ancestors survived in archives—state, church, and migration archives. The task was not to "invent" descent, but to find and recover its documentary evidence where it had survived.
Why a standard answer would not do
The client came to BRIDGES precisely for this: to access the archives, find records of Bulgarian ancestors in Bessarabia, and compile from them a body of evidence capable of confirming descent for the Bulgarian authority.
I always knew we were Bulgarians from Bessarabia, but I had no papers in hand to prove it: everything was scattered over a century of moves and wars. I thought without documents there was nothing to discuss. Igor and his team accessed the archives—state and church—and found records of my ancestors. From these they compiled evidence of my descent. In the end, I obtained a Bulgarian EU passport. The roots were always there; it's just that the papers had to be searched for not in the family cabinet, but in the archives.
