Here the atmosphere is almost rural, the layout and the facilities remind me of a works-based, self-contained village like Bournville in England, for example – originally founded round the Cadbury’s chocolate factory. There are no houses here though but there is still a hint of that pre-Marxist, socialist utopian impulse that generated model villages in many places in Britain, spliced together with the orderliness of a military cantonment.
We are met at the door of the museum by our guide who takes us round the exhibits, emphasising the continuity of the Arsenal site dating back to the Russo-Turkish War in 1877 –78. Later, weapons were not only stored here but repaired, to be followed by autonomous production. During the communist era many kinds of precision machine tools and weapons were produced here under licence including the legendary AK47.

In a fairly large, separate room painted in relatively cheerful colours—in contrast to the historical museum which is painted in two tones of battleship grey—there is a sales display with a selection of state of the art small arms. One small, efficient looking machine pistol with laser sights and silencer is called SHIPKA… Arms exports have always provided Bulgaria with a major source of income, though in recent years, because of the decision to join the EU, business became very much more complicated since the country has been subject to American and European political pressure. This more or less prevented sales to Bulgaria’s erstwhile trading partners Iraq and Libya. This is the last of the presentation we visit and the contrast between the products displayed inside and the tranquillity  of the June warmth, workers eating sandwiches in the park, birds singing in the trees, could not be more pointed.

Back at the gate our temporary identity cards are collected, our passports returned and we are soon outside the razor-wire topped walls again.

In the afternoon we visit some Thracian burial mounds, one of which turns out to include a temple. The burial chamber itself is carved out of solid rock and as we walk inwards to the centre of the mound we notice that every tiny ledge or slight protrusion from the wall is covered in small coins of 1 to 20 stotinki. The practice seems akin to throwing coins in a fountain but in this context also reminds me of the Jewish tradition of placing a stone on a grave at each visit. The woman who sells the tickets, postcards and souvenirs discourages me from buying a DVD about the Thracians because, she says, there have been complaints that some of them are faulty and the only way to get your money back is to return it personally to the shop you bought it from.

We eat dinner in Kazanlak and, on the way back to the hotel, hear a Roma wedding taking place in the Arsenal community centre, the multi-function building which operates as community centre, theatre, library, and sometimes also as a cinema. The wedding celebration occupies the attached Restaurant Capital. We listen from outside the room, from the edges of the celebration for a while before going back to our hotel.