This is the last episode from Season 1, Komorebi (木漏れ日) my short form newsletter, in which I focus on my storytelling, document but also decompress from everything around photography, movement, life and other brain stuff. The season ran for almost 1 month (34 days; the first episode was on the 17th of April). I wrote 19 short episodes, with a total of 5519 words and about 500 images made it to my archive. One of the biggest achievements of this season was that different people reached out, so many of them in person either to subscribe or just to share about a daynote that made them think about this, feel about that, which is awesome. Another more pragmatic success was that I managed to create an easy-to-use blogging system. Everything is fully automated, so I can focus on the process of creation, and don’t bother with tooling that much. I write everything in Notion, and then my website fetches and renders everything, while MailerLite listens for the auto-generated RSS to send out the newsletter with the freshly written new entry on the next day. This is a huge success, because technology is serving its main purpose. It makes things easy while not being on the way. That’s me tapping myself: “Good job, you design you.” This first season of daynotes had no rules, nor restrictions about what and how to do it. The main goal was to stay consistent and introduce something new and exciting to my own ventures around storytelling, photography and creativity, while you keep living life, facing challenges, dealing with the daily routines, having a family, doing work, you know, being a human. As a creative person, it’s helpful to add layers to your work that allow you to explore new opportunities, and make you enjoy the process and results even more. And you can clearly see how everything evolved in just those 34 days. My writing improved drastically, my thought process became more structured, and my ideas more sophisticated. You’re literally finding your voice. As with any creative venture, we know that our work comes in waves. You have to catch the wave of creation, but you also need to wait until the next opportunity presents itself. At this moment of stillness, it's important to stay on board and be ready, but also relax. That way, you avoid both the expectations of constantly doing things, which might cause everything to feel mundane and boring, but also find a way to become better for what’s coming next. There are already ideas lingering about what and when to start the next season, but until then it’s better to take a breather and enjoy this for a while. It’s a wrap, until next season Boris 👋
It’s now a few days in Las Vegas. And Downtown Las Vegas, let me tell you, that’s the vibe. Everything that I got from my first contact with Las Vegas was wrong, it was because of the Strip. Downtown Las Vegas is exactly what you might be looking for. It’s real, and so cinematic. It’s a good mix of locals and tourists. Abandoned motels, wedding chapels, graffiti, specialty coffee roasters (pin Iwana), shopping malls (but small, cozy, open, focused on community with crafty shops), liquor stores and the best of the best retro hotels like the El Cortez, Plaza Hotel, or Golden Gate Hotel. I can’t say if it’s nostalgia talking, or just more familiar and expected infrastructure, but you can walk around and enjoy the diversity of the cityscape so much more. It’s been 3 days already, and I see everyone around is trying to find their circadian rhythm back, but it takes time. In the meantime, you might go through migraines, sore throat, headache, dizziness or something else. So you’re either sick, anxious or nervous, but in your own way, and it’s totally normal. After a while, you start to normalize the system. Only the jetlag remains. What’s fascinating is that flying 10,000km for a week or so is both a stretch and excitement at the same time. By the time you adjust, and you start functioning well, it’s time to go back, and then probably spend a few days again to adjust back. Everyone was finding out their own routine of how to recover and recharge. I was walking on my own, with a camera in my hand, late at night to enjoy the neon vibes of the city.
Elastic’s annual all hands conference was about to start, four days of talks, networking, group meetings, dinners, lunches, and intense social marathon. The need for a road trip before that was getting bigger and bigger. Doing a road trip with a complete stranger — having only seen him before in a few Zoom calls, Slack messages, and GitHub issues — was even more needed. A road trip through the desert is a real bonding experience. It was therapeutic. And we are not strangers anymore. We went through Nevada, Arizona and Utah, until we reached Zion National Park. Land surrounded by a desert of sandstone, dust, canyons, the endless horizon, and extreme heat in which even the car's air-conditioning was barely keeping us cool. You’re basically getting hot, with cold air freezing your hands and feet. We’ve arrived, and for a non-experienced driver like me, well, that was a big deal. It's 240km through the desert. I mean, a huge deal. Driving in the States, passing three states with someone else for the first time was a massive deal. We hiked in Zion, surrounded by majestic, perfectly carved sandstone walls and there in the middle of it, like with a finger-dragging motion, some giant finger had laid the path for the Virgin River to pass through. The walls are up to 300 meters high, I mean it when I say majestic. It’s unbelievable how, after so much sand and rocks, you end up in a green paradise, full of animals. It’s a real oasis. And it feels that way. Comparing the Zion morning hikers to the cigarette-smoking, early-morning gamblers at the Venetian Hotel isn’t a fair game. There is nothing to compare; these are completely different people, and that’s totally okay. But I have my Fuji X100 in both cases. And the camera’s main purpose is to capture a still image. Trying to save a specific moment, with the naive assumption that it could also store the emotions too. It's impossible in a way. On the other hand, you made it, walked barefoot through the Narrows of the Virgin River after a Riverside hike (which, as we later found out, was kind of lucky), 10,315km away from the house you grew up in, with lingering pain that has been dictating most of your decisions lately.
My buddy says: "Humans are not supposed to live like that". While we walk through the Forum shops of the Caesars Palace, having an artificially lit sky, with static clouds with no volume, surrounded by decor mimicking like you are in Rome, with its own square and the Fontana di Trevi. Your brain gets all confused right away, because you are indoors, the sky is there, but the clouds are not moving, and everything so low you feel pressed. Your conscious is trying to recreate the normal sky experience, but it’s just not working out. You walk, you’re dizzy, slowly with a pretty insecure step forward (the jet lag and dry air also gives extra points for those sensations), you try to get to your end point. Making your way through the obstacles, everything is a test of your willpower. Cigarettes (used to smoke a lot), liquor (haven’t had any for almost 2 years), drugs, sex, gambling, sugar, all the best of the worst things in life mixed in a cocktail of tempting distractions and stimuli. Every ground floor of a hotel on the Strip, is a casino with a shopping mall. You might want to go get some fresh fruit and lean turkey multigrain sandwiches, or maybe some beef jerky (which btw is okay, because it's so hot, you are sweating, losing salt all the time). Well you can. But you have to go through the casino floor of the Venetian, the Palazzo, go ↑ ↓ ↑ ↓ ↑ on the outdoors escalators, cross the Las Vegas bld, then go through Treasure Island’s casino, pass by the Popeyes chicken and the CVS is right there … about 30 minutes later. It’s a big test. You can easily walk only a few steps on your own, but you can also take the stairs. Or maybe just stop and have some fried chicken, or get lost in the casino. Everything around feels like a challenge not to fall back into the old habits, into the old you. I see people being religiously present in Vegas to have "fun". Today, after 10 years in tech, designing products gives you the ability to understand the world of stimulation better. Everything is screaming for attention, same as any big city. Bright blinking lights, loud noises, polyphonic sounds, reflective floors, soaked carpets with cigarette smell, easy access to everything, so you can focus on having fun. It looks like for some people here, the older folks chain-smoking, with a paper cup full of coins, having a casual beer at 5:30AM, that’s their own digital world. They look present and relaxed. And me, well I guess I know now, why I never went to the Fontana di Trevi.
It’s probably because I’m passing through the south side of Amsterdam, but the city is so quiet this morning. Heading towards the airport, and there is a slight pinch of nostalgia when leaving, even for a little. As I’m riding my rental scooter through the parks, carrying a backpack at the front and back, I realize it’s only Saturday morning, and people are just slowly waking up. The last 8 weeks have been a struggle. Dealing with an injury is not easy. Especially when you mix this with a long-haul flight, which has its own stress factors. Basically, you enter a state of hypervigilance, and then every muscle twitch or fasciculation that you experience, (they happen a lot during neuromuscular recovery) is a signal to the brain, with a message: “Hey, what about this? What about that? And this, yes, that too!”. That keeps you awake and worried. Of course, it’s also pointless, but you still experience it. This flight was a challenge, but I kept things pretty strict. No airplane food, no coffee, no drinks. I had my own bagged carrots, cucumbers, crackers, grapes and apples, with a protein bar. I paid for the KLM meals, and they looked good. I mean fresh salads, salmon, asparagus, cherry-based desserts, all sorts of things. Having my own routine gave me that needed sense of control, with an already-created sleeping schedule. I had to survive the 11h, which a few weeks ago I canceled, because the pain was all over the place. We land, the immigration checks are fast, and in less than 15 minutes, I’m back in the U.S. Last time I was in the States was about 10 years ago, and things are different now. Mainly because the previous time, I begged my mother to pay $1000, so I could go and work in a water park in Virginia, to get fired 3 weeks later, and stay for 2 weeks in New York, with basically no connection. Now I’m invited to an annual company conference, and I’m getting paid to do that in Las Vegas. I find those details interesting, and important, lessons learned. Sin City, in my first 8h, I walked a good 15km around the city. I had to keep myself busy to skip the CET sleeping time. An entertaining stroll around the Strip and Freemont Street helped. Seeing someone get spanked because they couldn’t finish their burger at a place called Heart Attack Grill, helped. It takes time to get accustomed to a city. You start photographing, but there is a get to know part first, because most photos look rigid, composition sucks, they are messy, chaotic. You need some time to get used to the street signs, advertising, cars, people, buildings, landscape, how and where the sun comes from. To start noticing the details that you are looking for without knowing what they are just yet. I passed out, and woke up at 4AM. Now it’s 5AM, the perfect time to go out. Talk later, I’m heading for a morning walk on Las Vegas bld.
Some of the best days are when you are out, running errands. If they are related to some photographic publication, like a riso zine, even better. Many of us are bound by the desk. Some in their homes, others in offices. There are many perks to that, like, you can walk your dog three times a day, go grab some lunch in the park nearby, maybe do a small sunbathing session, prepare your own meals. You can lay on the couch for some good 30–40 minutes and relax, spend time with your family, say hello to the delivery guy, do some vacuuming, and I bet many more. But being outside on the run, going from place to place, talking with people about a project you are working on. Well, that's special. I made two physical photographic artifacts in the last year. "200 POSTCARDS" was my first photobook, which sold out, and I will never republish again. And this year launch of "Summer in the city". A co-project with the talented photographer and awesome human Nuno Cruz. We started by showing some fine prints in March. Things slowly went out of hand, in a good way, so we added our own riso printed zine to the mix. There is something quite rewarding about doing that. You discuss, and bounce of each other's ideas, collaborate with printing studios, paper sellers, stamp makers, then design stickers, a website, evaluate packaging, and keep track of expenses. And let me tell you, that's a shortcut to meeting like-minded people, and build relationships, and I mean that in the least LinkedIn way possible. It usually all comes to that one week. You spend a humongous time preparing, planning, discussing and then it unfolds. In one week you visit the print house a few times, go pick cover paper from this mesmerizing paper shop, where you spend an unfair amount of time reviewing if it's the right orange, or texture, or if the paper lines match the folding directions. Then you go to the stamp shop. It's right there in the busiest part of town. You may rush into it, but you get a loud interruption: "Drinks outside, alstublieft!". Go back, lean down, leave the coffee by the door, hiding behind a street pole, thinking: "There is a tiny chance someone will kick it, right?”, but it doesn't matter, and you confidently go back. The stamp is ready, a quick live demo. Then the A2 prints, the labels, and stickers, because where would we be if we didn't have some stickers? Last but not least, go back to the studio (we did things with Terry Bleu), stay for a few hours, relax … breathe… watch every step, enjoy the uniqueness of the riso machine, admire the craft itself. Things are falling into pieces, and you slowly observe everything unfolding. Usually it takes time to see that, but that's the magic of making things for a long time. You trust your gut more. We are proud to share that from 17th of May, the second edition of “Summer in the city”, the riso zine will be available. Have a look, and you know what to do. Don't be a stranger.
As I am renewing my ov-chipkaart, I realise it's been 5 years. You have to update your address, phone number, and add bank details. Everything has changed. That makes me think. I often get asked: “How’s life in Amsterdam? Are you planning to go home?”. Leaving your home country and starting a life somewhere else is no easy task. My life in Bulgaria was good: a highly paid job, a wide social circle, family, comfort, and nature. Moving to Amsterdam challenged everything that I was taking for granted. I only had a job, which was the reason for coming. So, some of the reasons why Amsterdam is still my favourite city to live in. First, I love this city. It’s small, compact, quiet, calm, patient, green, and diverse. It can also be overwhelming, chaotic, noisy, and dirty at the same time. You can walk through De Pijp on a hot summer's day, and experience hundreds of people biking furiously, not giving tourists a breather just to cross the street. Bars with no empty seats, everyone shouting, trams ringing their bells, people are using the wrong doors again, and scooters flying from every direction. But you can also cross the Amstelkanaal, and things change. Amsterdam becomes quiet, calm, green, and spacious. Second is people. Every year, you meet new faces with their own stories. Some friendships are just for a moment, others stay for a while, and still others remain from day one. That builds both resilience and appreciation. Third is the flora and fauna. I’m not gonna talk about how green Amsterdam is, but about birds. As we are living in a swamp, birds are everywhere (around 570 species). Geese, swans, coots, ducks, the notorious heron, and many more, all of them living in the city. You might pass by the Oosterpark and hear the parrot festival at the corner of Bar Bukowski. Whether Albert Cuyp or the Ganzenhoef Bijlmer market, the herons wait patiently for the fish stalls to close up, so they can catch the leftover prey. At Somerlust by the Amstel, enjoying the sunset, you hear the loud clucks and whistles of a mama goose, navigating her goslings through the crowds. Staying vigilant, she will see from a distance if there is a dog around, but never alert if everyone remains calm. Last but not least, water, so much water, Amsterdam is water. People love water, live in boat houses or manmade islands, sunbathe on boats, jump from bridges during the heatwaves, and have their dinners by the river. Yes, that’s life in Amsterdam, some days.
I love this quote from Embrace Hunger: "When you start observing a system, the system changes". You become aware and that creates intention over it. As a system designer, I’m in this eternal trap of thinking everything is a system. Sometimes it helps a lot, other times it's exhausting. But this time it helped, like you want to just jump and run, and be happy that it happened. You start convincing yourself with a loud inner voice: "It just makes so much sense! So much sense. And now everything should fall into place." Starting this blog made me really excited about the future and everything I can do with it. Many of the folks I am inspired by have already adopted the method of intentional writing and seasonal blogging. And it felt right. Documenting specific periods of time, as not every moment in time, should be a highlight of your life. There is plenty of filling in between. That's how we know certain moments are important. So I decided April 2025, as the start of this journey. I’m stuck with an injury, alone in Amsterdam. It’s also important to pick a title for this first season, something to say how everything was and still is. Komorebi (木漏れ日), a Japanese word that explains a certain phenomenon: “Sunlight leaking through trees”. Picking this title was right for many reasons. I should have been in Japan walking, but had to postpone. It was also a new word I learned in one of our recent photowalks with Nuno and Chië. I also experienced that so many times in all the gardens and forests I visited. Spring was so generous to everyone in Amsterdam this year, and we took advantage. Last but not least, why Komorebi is the perfect title for this season is because of what it symbolizes. Light emerging through a filter. A metaphor for the hopes and emotions we want to let through during the hard moments in our lives.
Let's go on a solo hike. I don't remember when was the last time I did one. Maybe I never did. But I know I enjoy walking. Walking when intentional creates a special connection. With yourself, or with others if done together. Combining this with my love for photography, an open mind and things are all set. Walk from one train station to another, and go home. NS which is the principal Dutch railway company (Nederlandse Spoorwegen), are kind enough to provide recommendations about hikes in nature. With point A a station, and point B another station, a sophisticated way to introduce walking distances to everyone. So I picked one that goes through the Bornia forest in the Utrecht province from Driebergen-Zeist to Maarn. Of course, I got lost a little bit, I knew I needed to keep going east if I want to end up in Maarn station. People often say there is barely any nature in the Netherlands, but I walked on trails that kept changing their scenery, from dunes, palm tree forests, swamps and fields. Also, for the next three hours I met only two people.
Pain diagrams. Who would have thought that would be my Monday morning? As injuries enter different stages in their progression, we sit down with Bram and talk it out."It's interesting, isn't it?" - that's what he is saying most of the time. Me trying to explain what works and what doesn't. Things are not linear, progress and recovery isn't either. We know that, everyone talks about it .... like all the time. But still, yeah, maybe putting things into perspective, my eye for photography, my skills for design, me being a human, have definitely changed in the last 33 years, and I want to believe for the better. I mean I get it. But still .... pain is still daily, but less. I mean way less. And sometimes it's painful, and you get that sometimes, and you try to inflate it, and that messes you up. What a human thing to do. So what did I do? As I am lucky to be off-work, I had to be in Japan walking. I walked. Walked Leiden. Walked the Hortus botanicus Leiden. Bought baguettes. Found some North Face gems in a thrift store. Had some herring with the baguettes. Enjoyed a coffee. I saw a really special police station. Here is to pain.
Last year there was this moment where I felt I didn't want to live in Amsterdam anymore. It was tough. Winter can be hard, it can also be dark, and wet, and cold. But you always have that with every city you live in, especially when you move away from your hometown. I remember living back in Sofia, and started meeting more people from different provinces coming to live in the big city. No idea what that meant, socially, emotionally and mentally. It requires a lot. You need to build new relationships, get to know the city, the people, the dynamics, how seasons play a role in everything in it. And I can think of so many more things. For the last 6 years, I have been one of those people, and I embraced it. Invested in myself, my relationships, getting to know Amsterdam. Today was one of those days: a friend, the sun, nature, and a 19km walk. Amsterdam is still my favorite place of all places for that reason. It's like living in a fairy tale. The city is small, compact, diverse and green. Oh my, so green. We ended up walking the north side of Amsterdamse Bos, a huge manmade forest which holds a rich natural area and allows you to decompress easily from the city. Walking in Amsterdam forest, I have done that many times, and yet today we found another new trail to explore. It's days like these that make you fall in love again. Also, to be humble and thankful for how lucky you are, being in this city, living this life.
I wouldn't lie to anyone by saying there was disappointment for a moment. I did a lot. Juggled between family, having a newborn, dealing with burnout, work, life, comfort, and safety, acting like a project manager for your own ideas is hard. It's also a pretty hard pill to swallow when the plan doesn't work out. I mean, after my burnout last year, I was totally numb from all kinds of feelings and experiences, and they happened a lot. It definitely took time, but as with any challenge, it just requires one simple thing. To do something about it. Spending time alone, working on a creative project (my first photo-book sold out!!!), long walks, no internet, build things, cycling until you severely injure yourself, start writing again, and witnessing your firstborn coming into this world. Let's not lie to ourselves. All those things are hard, but there is a reason why we always admire people who do the hard things. Coming from a Balkan state like Bulgaria, we have plenty of prejudice about many things, and I don't think that's only in Bulgaria. But facing them, doing something about it, well, that's extremely hard. Because you actually go against yourself, and you don't know what's on the other side. Maybe you won't be liked or loved anymore, maybe you won't love yourself. I had this crazy idea of traveling around the globe, creating a memoir about it. Making a book out of it, showing it to my kid when she grows up. Well, it's not gonna happen now, and strangely enough, I'm okay with it. It felt like if I didn't do it now, it might never happen. Then you sit down, breathe through it, and remind yourself what a buddy of mine told me once- "Okay, it doesn't need to happen right now, there is time for everything". You stand up, even with the mind-bending pain l have been experiencing for the last 8 weeks, and you keep going. Instead of bringing myself down with blame, guilt or projecting that to others, which would be so easy, I just started to write about everything. It's a memoir, but with a different beginning and I think that's way more special. Here is a photo from a walk I did between Zaandam and Wormerveer two days ago to visit my physiotherapist.
I did a few voice memos while walking in the Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen to see if it was going to be a nice experience to document my thoughts and write after that. It's amusing to hear your raw thoughts out loud. I was a little bit "Who's that guy!?". But it felt like a way to get closer to myself. Walking in the dunes of the North Sea on your own, not seeing a person for even 40 minutes in The Netherlands, especially in Randstad is a big deal. That's like one of the largest metropolitan regions in Europe. So, seeing people walking, biking, doing is something normal, so once you don't see that for a while, you start to feel funny. Recording memos was also interesting. I felt my voice dubbed, because I was in the open with nothing or no-one around me.
“We will start with exposure to the pain, you will perform all the movements that trigger it." That's what my therapist said today. I don't want to lie to anyone, especially to myself, when writing this but, inside I was so happy. Someone advised me about something that I believe in so much. Exposing myself, making myself uncomfortable, treating myself in situations which I know will be unpleasant, and I don't mean in some masochistic way, like not to feel pain. More about putting yourself in certain situations. Like, after a burnout and severe inner ear infection, I started to develop this phobia of flying. I'm flying again. You start losing weight because you cut off snacks and junk food, and then have a bag of chips, and you start tripping in fear that all the work is gone. So yeah, that mindset is useful to ground you down, and has helped me so much in life. Don't forget the uncomfortable conversations facing yourself, your partner, your family, your social and cultural norms. Honestly, treating myself differently has always protected me. I can tell you that once pain stays in your body, your mind starts to play tricks on you, but exposing yourself to it. Well, that's exactly what you need to hear.
Sometimes I think I enjoy doing things because I can. Like this website. I wanted to have a photographically-inspired website, but I've always enjoyed writing too. Because today was supposed to be the start of my walk in Japan (which I have started preparing for the last 14 months). Unfortunately, posterior chain injuries are a new level of mental challenge due to the severity, stress and lack of immediate treatment. I needed to postpone it. I wanted to document the experience, but I never did a thing. So, to make myself feel better, I sat down (technically I was laying on my yoga mat with knees bent and feet on the floor) and made this, amazingly simple and zero friction system to keep a blog for less than a day and completely free. I use the Notion API to call a document which I use as a database. And basically I write everything on my phone whenever I want, and it magically appears here. Everything is stored in a table, tidy and simple. It reminds me of the old Tumblr days. I even added an RSS, not because someone will subscribe for it, but because I know how to. So, you can say I created the actual system I needed.
As I'm spending a sunny day in Utrecht Botanical Gardens, admiring the greenery, the butterflies, and the educational signs, teaching us about the cycle of life, it gets me thinking. Everything is a cycle, and sometimes a cycle feels like a loop. Identifying what's a loop and what's a cycle is a hard job. But we know some. I used to smoke, I used to drink, I used to enjoy listening to people badmouth others, or blame others for my own fears and failures. I also remember reading a book about something completely different. It was about economics, and how a corrupt and poor country will always be corrupt and poor. There are no elections, no democracy that could save an already established loop. The only thing there is, is to break the system, or corrupt the loop by completely destroying it. Often it's a single event that breaks a cycle. Your grandmother's passing, the birth of your firstborn, the events of life and death have that power on all of us, as they are the essence of a cycle. But not always. Sometimes it's just a slowly growing seed of doubt that we put in us about something, and once you know that, you start working towards breaking the loop.
Curiosity has been one of the most important and useful skills to nurture and develop. It's helping me understand better what I want. It's helping me appreciate the people I enjoy spending my time with. It's also helping me solve problems and remove obstacles. Two days, friends, cameras, 40km walking, Eastern Docklands & Westelijke Eilanden. Photography has always had that therapeutic power to make me be present and appreciate a moment, with no expectation, just a point in time and you being with it.
Today I was supposed to be in Japan, but due to a severe neuromuscular posterior chain injury (yeah, I’m reading a trigger point therapy book), it's basically possible to survive a flight of 14h, but then again, I was supposed to walk for 10 days with an average of 15km, with max of 24km. It just doesn't make sense, with the pain that you experience when you sit, or when you wake up. That also brings me to the point: we all want immediate closure and action nowadays. Once you stay in the bay of pain for a while, you start to use this feeling to clear the rest of the noise. You start to observe the relationships, the behavior, the importance of the small routines. Thank you pain and see you sooner than you think Japan ✌️
I was offered morphine for the pain, which happened exactly two and a half months ago from today. Today, walking has been the only thing that saves me from the inexplicable pain. That is nerve pain. Since then, I have lost more than 13kg. I also tried cycling in Mallorca for 300km and completely destroyed my body. I’m so glad it happened, because every door that's closed allows you to open the other one. There, you find the monsters that you wanted to avoid in the first place. And you just see those are just some feelings, not monsters.
