Brazil's new semi-Bulgarian president

OUR friends at Global Voices, an international group of bloggers who translate and link to blogs and other social-media content around the world, have rounded up some of the published reactions in Bulgaria to the election of Dilma Rousseff as Brazil's president. Readers of this blog will no doubt be aware that Ms Rousseff has roots in the country, her communist father having spent the first 29 years of his life in Bulgaria before emigrating, first to France and later to Brazil.

Despite never having visited her father's homeland, Ms Rousseff has told a Bulgarian newspaper that she "to some extent" regards herself as Bulgarian, and that she has "feelings of tenderness and love" towards the country. Yet to judge by some of the responses Global Voices has gathered, many Bulgarians are embarrassed by the round-the-clock attention their media are showering on Ms Rousseff. As one points out, Hungarians didn't claim Nicolas Sarkozy as one of theirs when he won the French presidency.

Ms Rousseff's father, Petar, came from Gabrovo, a small town in central Bulgaria. Some claim for it the status of the world's capital of humour, although the sign at the town's entrance, which reads "Welcome and good riddance", perhaps helps explain Mr Rousseff's life decisions.