Swain Uber

The American Idealist With Legal Education

One day this young American may become the next Secretary of State. Swain Uber speaks perfect (really perfect) Bulgarian, Catalan and Turkish apart from his native English. And this is only the beginning. When he lived as a Peace Corps volunteer in southern Bulgaria, he managed the impossible. Living in a forgotten village, Fotinovo, whose inhabitants, Muslims and Christiands alike spent their days in Oriental langour and almost self-referential poverty, he asked for an office in the municipal building. Instead of accepting what he saw, he decided to change it. He applied for EU grants dedicated to resurrecting and improving rural regions. The grant money arrived and all and sundry joined in productive labour under the energetic leadership of Swain Uber. No, they didn’t like expending all that effort but in the end the village of Fotinovo was transformed into a far friendlier-looking place. Swain Uber is studying law at Stanford. His dream is to work with trade unions and improve the lot of the workingman, not to amass a fortune. Not the standard path to government or the White House but we may see him there yet. One thing is for sure. He will serve many more people like the good folk of Fotinovo. Swain takes part in Batak – The valley of Saints