Well I'm a Bulgarian and I was also quite surprised. It seemed like he said it in order to explain why his last name lacked vowels (Grlscz).
I can assure you that Bulgarian last names do have vowels, but I guess they had to explain the exotic name with exotic heritage. Bulgaria's a neighbour of Romania (you know, Transilvania, count Dracula and stuff), but on the other hand, they might have just picked it up randomly.