I’d say Albania, BiH, Bulgaria, Kosovo and Macedonia.

Greece is a wild card. Sometimes I see images or snippets of Greece and it looks totally Turkish. But they do a really good job of “Greek-ifying” it idk how to explain it

Most Bulgarians are probably unaware, but in recent years, a man named Aleksandar Ivanov – a Bulgarian national – has been used by far-right Croatian circles to resurrect a wartime propaganda institution: the so-called “Croatian Orthodox Church” (HPC).

The original HPC was created during WWII by the Ustaše regime, a Nazi-aligned puppet state responsible for genocide against Serbs, Jews, and Roma. It was part of a larger strategy to destroy Serbian identity in Croatia by:

•Forcibly converting Orthodox Serbs
•“Croaticizing” Orthodox Christianity
•Destroying Serbian cultural and religious heritage
•Creating a fake ecclesiastical structure to sever ties with the Serbian Orthodox Church

Over 2000 Serbian Orthodox churches were destroyed or desecrated. The goal was not theological—it was ethnic and political cleansing disguised as religious reorganization.

Fast-forward to today, and the resurrection of this “church”—with a Bulgarian priest acting as figurehead—is a disturbing continuation of that same erasure.

It sends a message: “There are no Serbs here. Just Croats who happen to be Orthodox.”

It’s important for Bulgarians to ask:

•Why is a Bulgarian priest being used to lend credibility to a fascist-era construct?
•Does this not insult both the memory of the victims and the dignity of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church?
•Is Bulgaria’s name being manipulated to serve an ethno-nationalist agenda in Croatia?

This is not just a church issue—it’s about instrumentalizing Orthodoxy to mask ethnic cleansing, past and present.

One of my favs is from Samokov, near Sofia

Been seeing WAY too many posts and maps including Moldova, and I wanna see what the rest of you think. Do we accept them ? They’re 0% Balkan geographically and I’d say up to 30% culturally…

From my Russian POV, Montenegro seems like Belarus to Russia - a little bit different, but in a lot of ways very much simillar. Is this true?

Didj

Which Balkan country is the most religious?

Has this trend changed recently or is it still the same?

Can Albania be considered southern european like Greece?

Honest question, genuinely curious as an American. Thanks!

This is part of my weekly series on Bulgarian architecture and cultural heritage, exploring how it appears across the Balkans.

How do you see the challenges and conversations around Bulgarian heritage today?

P.S. I only engage with minds that respect culture. The rest won’t even register.

Wherever you look - suburbs of Belgrade, Split, Sarajevo you see same designed ugly houses built without any architecture in mind. Like they are built by same guy. The situation is better in the north in Vojvodina and Slavonia - yes they are small houses, poor houses but they had some style to them.