Ok, lots and lots of things have happened since last time. After four months with HP i have already changed jobs. Had my second day today and so far so good... Im now local admin for a company in Barcelona. I save about an hour a day in travelling times while working in a smaller company, which for me is a positive thing at this time.
Im also looking for a new place to live, while having a cold and giving up smoking again. This while trying to convince my body to work at normal office hours instead of the night shift i had for the last four months.
Its quite intense...
On other news my dear sister will start sailing over "the pond" soon. The plan calls for almost three weeks of no land. I wish her all the best and really really hope they dont get any serious issues on the way.
I got a short talk with her today. Unfortunately i was a bit stressed out at work but if i understood her correctly Mr Richard Wright likes my mix cd's. Something that made me really happy :) If i misunderstood it was the crew that liked them, which would also be good :P
Anyway, gotta get up for work again in a few hours, so cant really expand on all this. Its interesting times for sure. And to me that is not a curse no matter what Terry Pratchett might think or say.
torsdag 15 november 2007
onsdag 26 september 2007
Longest Wednesday
Ok, time for a short recap of what has been going on lately.
I was visited by my parents, my sister has been in town for two weeks now and last weekend Dennis came to visit.
Lots of going out, drinking beers and mohitos etc. (really, almost every day for weeks. Its getting damn expensive and probably not to good for my health. Will roll with it for a little while longer before starting to restrict myself)
Went to Montserrat; which was really beautiful even though we had to cancel the planned hike and just look at the monastery before going home again. The place itself is quite impressive and I got to light a candle for my loved ones (something I always liked doing even though im not a religious man at all) and of course I also drank out of the fount of life (or some such).
Things are quite good at the moment - have some pressing stuff to attend to; im still not properly registered in the country etc. Hope to get it sorted this week or I will end up paying higher taxes for a while.
Other then that its a bit disapointing that I havent really had the chance to hang out with my sister more then I have. Always liked spending time with her and probably wont have the chance to do so again for quite some time starting next week (when she skips town for some sailing ship bound for god knows where).
In other news the temperatures are dropping a lot here as well. Today i actually brought my grey jacket to work. To hot to wear it over the shirt on my way here around noon; but at 10 at night you need it if you are going to stand still (it drops down to like 16 degrees at night now).
Well, thats it for now. Slowly slowly getting some kind of rythm here. Its always changing a little bit as i get to know more people and new places but it is getting sort of stable by now.
I was visited by my parents, my sister has been in town for two weeks now and last weekend Dennis came to visit.
Lots of going out, drinking beers and mohitos etc. (really, almost every day for weeks. Its getting damn expensive and probably not to good for my health. Will roll with it for a little while longer before starting to restrict myself)
Went to Montserrat; which was really beautiful even though we had to cancel the planned hike and just look at the monastery before going home again. The place itself is quite impressive and I got to light a candle for my loved ones (something I always liked doing even though im not a religious man at all) and of course I also drank out of the fount of life (or some such).
Things are quite good at the moment - have some pressing stuff to attend to; im still not properly registered in the country etc. Hope to get it sorted this week or I will end up paying higher taxes for a while.
Other then that its a bit disapointing that I havent really had the chance to hang out with my sister more then I have. Always liked spending time with her and probably wont have the chance to do so again for quite some time starting next week (when she skips town for some sailing ship bound for god knows where).
In other news the temperatures are dropping a lot here as well. Today i actually brought my grey jacket to work. To hot to wear it over the shirt on my way here around noon; but at 10 at night you need it if you are going to stand still (it drops down to like 16 degrees at night now).
Well, thats it for now. Slowly slowly getting some kind of rythm here. Its always changing a little bit as i get to know more people and new places but it is getting sort of stable by now.
torsdag 30 augusti 2007
Role models
I guess it started with "Sommar i P1", the radio show I have written about earlier. Several of the people that hosted the show this year have impressed me and in some ways affected me in ways i never expected from a radio show. It really has inspired me more than it probably should have.
Some of those hosts made me think, and once I got thinking I also remembered more of the people that have inspired me in the past (and continue to do so).
Bill Tillmann comes to mind, a great explorer and adventurer who not only lived an extraordinary life but also wrote some excellent books about it.
Alma Karlin was one of the first famous female travelers and journalists, some of her writings about her adventures are also quite amazing (she spent 1928-38 traveling alone).
It would impossible for me to write about these kinds of people without also mentioning Harry Martinson - probably my favourite Swede of all times. His writings and theories about the "world nomad" have had an profound effect upon me.
There are of course many others, adventurers, politicians, religious leaders etc.
What has been occupying me lately is trying to figure out what they all have in common.
I came up with a lot of things like: empathy, compassion, sense of adventure, lack of fear, integrity, command of their language(s) etc...
In the end I had to realise it was all summed up quite neatly in the previously mentioned theory about the "world nomad". Since it is pointless for me to try and outdo old Harry I will just ask that anyone interested enough read some of his stuff on the subject.
Anyway - a big thank you to all those people that have and keep on inspiring me. I am quite a pathetic excuse for an adventurer; but without you I would not have been able to overcome my fear even for this first little step of my adventures (I think of it as adventuring with a safety belt).
(and an extra big thank you to the people I actually know that keep inspiring me - Andreas who is now moving to Cuba before continuing to Costa Rica, my sister who keeps doing stuff I only dream about doing, my parents who have found adventure in their retirement, Göran with his wonderful stories of Tibet and incomparable talent for finding adventure in everyday life... Thank you for showing me that things are not as hard or complicated as they sometimes seem.)
Some of those hosts made me think, and once I got thinking I also remembered more of the people that have inspired me in the past (and continue to do so).
Bill Tillmann comes to mind, a great explorer and adventurer who not only lived an extraordinary life but also wrote some excellent books about it.
Alma Karlin was one of the first famous female travelers and journalists, some of her writings about her adventures are also quite amazing (she spent 1928-38 traveling alone).
It would impossible for me to write about these kinds of people without also mentioning Harry Martinson - probably my favourite Swede of all times. His writings and theories about the "world nomad" have had an profound effect upon me.
There are of course many others, adventurers, politicians, religious leaders etc.
What has been occupying me lately is trying to figure out what they all have in common.
I came up with a lot of things like: empathy, compassion, sense of adventure, lack of fear, integrity, command of their language(s) etc...
In the end I had to realise it was all summed up quite neatly in the previously mentioned theory about the "world nomad". Since it is pointless for me to try and outdo old Harry I will just ask that anyone interested enough read some of his stuff on the subject.
Anyway - a big thank you to all those people that have and keep on inspiring me. I am quite a pathetic excuse for an adventurer; but without you I would not have been able to overcome my fear even for this first little step of my adventures (I think of it as adventuring with a safety belt).
(and an extra big thank you to the people I actually know that keep inspiring me - Andreas who is now moving to Cuba before continuing to Costa Rica, my sister who keeps doing stuff I only dream about doing, my parents who have found adventure in their retirement, Göran with his wonderful stories of Tibet and incomparable talent for finding adventure in everyday life... Thank you for showing me that things are not as hard or complicated as they sometimes seem.)
söndag 26 augusti 2007
Guidelines or rules?
In
Actually a lot of people think Swedes are so square you could use them as a mold if you ever need something really square.
Add to this a huge state machinery to fill us with propaganda about what to eat, how to sleep, how to talk etc and you get a people that drive very safely...
During 29 years in Sweden I think I saw people blatantly running red lights maybe 10 times. Most of my friends would never drive if they had a drink. Actually a lot of people won’t drive the day after a decent party.
Because people follow the rules.
Now in
I don’t know how many times I have seen people running red lights in my two months here. It is however often enough to make me instinctively look if the cars are actually going to stop before walking.
The strange thing is it still seems to work. I don’t see a lot of accidents.
There probably are more than in
Now if they could only get people to drink a bit less before driving home during the weekends traffic here wouldn’t be worse than in
tisdag 21 augusti 2007
Cinematic Sunday - Stormy Tuesday
Had a nice experience on Sunday.
Decided to go to the cinema and see the Simpsons movie. So I walked the 20 meters to the nearest cinema that shows english movies and bought a ticket.
Was looking forward to seeing a nice movie and eating some popcorn. Been quite some time since I last went to the movies alone and it always feels a bit special.
First of all i get a surprise when 3 people I know leave the cinema just as im about to enter. They managed to catch the show just before the one I was planning to see. This is the third time in 2 months that I bumped into people I know by accident. Which seems quite strange to me seeing how few people I met like that in Stockholm.
Once I got into the theatre I realised that I was the only person watching. Its not a huge place, but has a bit over 300 seats. This was the first time ever I got to see a movie at the cinema completely alone. It was very enjoyable, much better than when the rest of the seats are filled...
The movie was quite decent. (with the first apearance of spiderpig making me LOL for real even though I was comepletely alone in a big movie theatre).
Monday ended with a couple of beers and a quick round about the festical de Gracia. Did not stay very long as there was not much going on at all. Last week was much much better.
Today we have another huge thunderstorm. August so far has been a lot cooler than July and with a lot more rain. Which is interesting mostly because everyone told me August would be hellishly warm compared to July.
I must admit I am quite thankful that things have not gotten warmer. After a few weeks of sweating 16x7 (not at work since it has strong aircondition) you get tired of it. Although never thinking about what the weather might be tomorrow (you always expect sun and 30 degrees celcius, anything else is abnormal) is quite nice even if you do lose half a litre of liquid before you even arrive at work.
Well, thats it for today. Any day now i will stop this stupid diary stuff and write about something interesting... I promise.
Decided to go to the cinema and see the Simpsons movie. So I walked the 20 meters to the nearest cinema that shows english movies and bought a ticket.
Was looking forward to seeing a nice movie and eating some popcorn. Been quite some time since I last went to the movies alone and it always feels a bit special.
First of all i get a surprise when 3 people I know leave the cinema just as im about to enter. They managed to catch the show just before the one I was planning to see. This is the third time in 2 months that I bumped into people I know by accident. Which seems quite strange to me seeing how few people I met like that in Stockholm.
Once I got into the theatre I realised that I was the only person watching. Its not a huge place, but has a bit over 300 seats. This was the first time ever I got to see a movie at the cinema completely alone. It was very enjoyable, much better than when the rest of the seats are filled...
The movie was quite decent. (with the first apearance of spiderpig making me LOL for real even though I was comepletely alone in a big movie theatre).
Monday ended with a couple of beers and a quick round about the festical de Gracia. Did not stay very long as there was not much going on at all. Last week was much much better.
Today we have another huge thunderstorm. August so far has been a lot cooler than July and with a lot more rain. Which is interesting mostly because everyone told me August would be hellishly warm compared to July.
I must admit I am quite thankful that things have not gotten warmer. After a few weeks of sweating 16x7 (not at work since it has strong aircondition) you get tired of it. Although never thinking about what the weather might be tomorrow (you always expect sun and 30 degrees celcius, anything else is abnormal) is quite nice even if you do lose half a litre of liquid before you even arrive at work.
Well, thats it for today. Any day now i will stop this stupid diary stuff and write about something interesting... I promise.
lördag 18 augusti 2007
Dizzy Friday
Seems lately all my posts have been done after coming home under the influence. Tonight will not be different.
It is friday night, it is around 5 am and i just got home from the festivities in Gracia (hood about 3 blocks away from where i live).
It has been quite good. Quit work at 22:00, home at 23:00 and start partying at around 23:10...
Tonight i have been drinking with people from work, some random german girls, some mexican girls, a whole crew from France and some other people. The party in Gracia was great as always. And when all hte places started closing at around 3:00 we had a friend with a jambe (or however those african drums are called). He started drumming out on the street and other random people walking by stopped to dance. Then someone else started drumming and so on... The result was almost two hours of dancing on the street after the party was officially over. People stopped to drum for a while or just dance to the drums a little. We had a crowd of between 40 and 100 people all the time. It was just a spontaneous drum party and was very nice.
I got to know people from all over the world while clapping my hands to the various drummers.
Now im home and aiming to sober up a bit before falling asleep. Tomorrow is another day filled of party. And i aim to meet up with some people whose numbers i got tonight; no clue if it will happen or not.
But first i have to get my hair cut, i am truly back in full and proper "mon chi chi" mode with my head....
I apologise for all the crappy spelling, i know i didnt bother wiht capitalising "I" and stuff like that. But its dark, im drunk and i cant be bothered to find all the right keys at the moment.
good night!
It is friday night, it is around 5 am and i just got home from the festivities in Gracia (hood about 3 blocks away from where i live).
It has been quite good. Quit work at 22:00, home at 23:00 and start partying at around 23:10...
Tonight i have been drinking with people from work, some random german girls, some mexican girls, a whole crew from France and some other people. The party in Gracia was great as always. And when all hte places started closing at around 3:00 we had a friend with a jambe (or however those african drums are called). He started drumming out on the street and other random people walking by stopped to dance. Then someone else started drumming and so on... The result was almost two hours of dancing on the street after the party was officially over. People stopped to drum for a while or just dance to the drums a little. We had a crowd of between 40 and 100 people all the time. It was just a spontaneous drum party and was very nice.
I got to know people from all over the world while clapping my hands to the various drummers.
Now im home and aiming to sober up a bit before falling asleep. Tomorrow is another day filled of party. And i aim to meet up with some people whose numbers i got tonight; no clue if it will happen or not.
But first i have to get my hair cut, i am truly back in full and proper "mon chi chi" mode with my head....
I apologise for all the crappy spelling, i know i didnt bother wiht capitalising "I" and stuff like that. But its dark, im drunk and i cant be bothered to find all the right keys at the moment.
good night!
onsdag 15 augusti 2007
Mixmax
Well, I had so many things I thought about writing today I will end up writing about nothing....
Just came home, fairly early considering that tomorrow is a national holiday here in Spain (and France it seems, probably something Catholic). Nothing special planned for my day off, i did not actually realise it was a holiday until a day or two ago. Will probably end up sleeping for a bit (had a few mohitos tonight again and will need it) to long, go to the beach in the afternoon and then party in the evening.
Tomorrow the party of Gracia starts. Its one of my favourite parts of Barcelona so far that his its own party for a week or two.
This means that with my current schedule (2-10) i can go out and party every night and still be ok for work! They have prepared for well over a week with decorating the streets and building temporary bars all over the place (although gracia is mainly made up from bars to begin with). I have been told its a great week to go out and have a good time...
I had a bunch of ideas about other stuff to put here. One entry about differences in housing, one about active lifestyles, one about how weather changes things, one about how written Catalan is similar to French, one about the big differences to Sweden etc etc repeating myself incessantly, ad infinitum, over and over again without end. -ibid ;)
Right now I feel like this will all have to stay in my head. I'm drunk and i need to drink some water before i go to sleep.
So no matter how intriguing and generally great all those blogs would have been you will just have to be happy with this little diary style entry. I'm sorry about this and perhaps later this week i will be composed enough to type something worthwhile...
The short version is this: Things are generally quite nice here.
Just came home, fairly early considering that tomorrow is a national holiday here in Spain (and France it seems, probably something Catholic). Nothing special planned for my day off, i did not actually realise it was a holiday until a day or two ago. Will probably end up sleeping for a bit (had a few mohitos tonight again and will need it) to long, go to the beach in the afternoon and then party in the evening.
Tomorrow the party of Gracia starts. Its one of my favourite parts of Barcelona so far that his its own party for a week or two.
This means that with my current schedule (2-10) i can go out and party every night and still be ok for work! They have prepared for well over a week with decorating the streets and building temporary bars all over the place (although gracia is mainly made up from bars to begin with). I have been told its a great week to go out and have a good time...
I had a bunch of ideas about other stuff to put here. One entry about differences in housing, one about active lifestyles, one about how weather changes things, one about how written Catalan is similar to French, one about the big differences to Sweden etc etc repeating myself incessantly, ad infinitum, over and over again without end. -ibid ;)
Right now I feel like this will all have to stay in my head. I'm drunk and i need to drink some water before i go to sleep.
So no matter how intriguing and generally great all those blogs would have been you will just have to be happy with this little diary style entry. I'm sorry about this and perhaps later this week i will be composed enough to type something worthwhile...
The short version is this: Things are generally quite nice here.
fredag 10 augusti 2007
My new role model
Today i decided to finally take a look at that podcast thing people have been talking about for the last couple of years. Go to iTunes store and take a look, and am pleasantly surprised to see that the download list is topped by various programs from SVT and SR that you can get for free.
Not only do I now get "Dagens Eko", "Aktuellt 21" and "Världens bästa land" (or whatever Fredrik Lindströms latest project is called). I also get "P1 Sommar"! I always did like this program and I started downloading all episodes from this year and a couple from last year at once. I listened through a couple of episodes and found several very good ones already. Renata Chlumska had some nice thoughts about what drives her to adventuring and Knut Knutson was also a decent speaker.
But the real surprise was a guy called Lars Fredriksson. He is a librarian for a huge collection of asian litterature in Stockholm. But in his youth he managed to live in Marocko and China. His passion for music and somewhat quirky personality shine through his extremely polished and often poetic words. I never heard of the guy before but this radio show has made me respect him immensely. I urge anyone able to understand Swedish to go to SR's homepage at once and listen to "P1 Sommar med Lars Fredriksson".
From the homepage you can even listen to the whole show including the music. With the podcasts i listen to you only get around 20 seconds of every song before they cut it. Which is a shame; but at the same time means i have time to listen to a whole episode on my way to and from work. Which is exactly what i will be doing over the next couple of weeks.
Thank you SVT and SR, you keep proving over and over again how public service can truly represent high quality culture and entertainment while remembering the "service" part in the job description.
Not only do I now get "Dagens Eko", "Aktuellt 21" and "Världens bästa land" (or whatever Fredrik Lindströms latest project is called). I also get "P1 Sommar"! I always did like this program and I started downloading all episodes from this year and a couple from last year at once. I listened through a couple of episodes and found several very good ones already. Renata Chlumska had some nice thoughts about what drives her to adventuring and Knut Knutson was also a decent speaker.
But the real surprise was a guy called Lars Fredriksson. He is a librarian for a huge collection of asian litterature in Stockholm. But in his youth he managed to live in Marocko and China. His passion for music and somewhat quirky personality shine through his extremely polished and often poetic words. I never heard of the guy before but this radio show has made me respect him immensely. I urge anyone able to understand Swedish to go to SR's homepage at once and listen to "P1 Sommar med Lars Fredriksson".
From the homepage you can even listen to the whole show including the music. With the podcasts i listen to you only get around 20 seconds of every song before they cut it. Which is a shame; but at the same time means i have time to listen to a whole episode on my way to and from work. Which is exactly what i will be doing over the next couple of weeks.
Thank you SVT and SR, you keep proving over and over again how public service can truly represent high quality culture and entertainment while remembering the "service" part in the job description.
onsdag 8 augusti 2007
Grey Tuesday
Well, had rain for the first time in ages. Proper rain for the first time since i moved here. I believe this is the longest i have ever gone without seeing rain (6 or 7 weeks).
With the rain came the cold. Temperatures where down to almost 23 degrees when i left work. It felt really chilly compared to what i have slowly gotten somewhat used to.
Other then that there hasn’t been much happening. I’m slowly getting a bit tired of working these hours. Especially during August. The whole country closes down so train times and everything are different from 6th of August to start of September. This means it takes even longer than usual to get to and from work. Especially getting home is frustrating since i can either run about 1km (I have 11 minutes to make it) or I have to wait 35 minutes before the next train leaves. So either stress out completely or come home closer to 24:00 than 23:00. "Pest eller kolera" is a nice Swedish expression for that kind of conundrum.
Got to talk a bit to my kid sister today, was nice even though we didnt get to finish before our phones cut the conversation short. I find myself thinking about how she is doing a couple of times per day and am really looking forward to seeing her soon (btw dont forget to msg me Annabelles nr!).
Will try to catch my parents tomorrow, although that has proven to be futile for the last week or two. They never seem to answer when i try to call them and they manage to call me when im at work or when im on a train with no or almost no coverage. Got an e-mail at least so now i know they made it out of Poland ok.
Overall keeping in touch with people is proving more difficult than expected. My working times just make it so that i have time to talk either while people are at work or while they are asleep. At least i managed to reload my skype account. So that is one problem taken care off...
Time for some sleep, will try to finally get up a bit early for grocery shopping before work. Else i end up having nothing home that can be turned into dinner. Which sucks at 23:00 when all the stores close at 21:00.
With the rain came the cold. Temperatures where down to almost 23 degrees when i left work. It felt really chilly compared to what i have slowly gotten somewhat used to.
Other then that there hasn’t been much happening. I’m slowly getting a bit tired of working these hours. Especially during August. The whole country closes down so train times and everything are different from 6th of August to start of September. This means it takes even longer than usual to get to and from work. Especially getting home is frustrating since i can either run about 1km (I have 11 minutes to make it) or I have to wait 35 minutes before the next train leaves. So either stress out completely or come home closer to 24:00 than 23:00. "
Got to talk a bit to my kid sister today, was nice even though we didnt get to finish before our phones cut the conversation short. I find myself thinking about how she is doing a couple of times per day and am really looking forward to seeing her soon (btw dont forget to msg me Annabelles nr!).
Will try to catch my parents tomorrow, although that has proven to be futile for the last week or two. They never seem to answer when i try to call them and they manage to call me when im at work or when im on a train with no or almost no coverage. Got an e-mail at least so now i know they made it out of Poland ok.
Overall keeping in touch with people is proving more difficult than expected. My working times just make it so that i have time to talk either while people are at work or while they are asleep. At least i managed to reload my skype account. So that is one problem taken care off...
Time for some sleep, will try to finally get up a bit early for grocery shopping before work. Else i end up having nothing home that can be turned into dinner. Which sucks at 23:00 when all the stores close at 21:00.
söndag 5 augusti 2007
Lazy Sunday
Yesterday was spent with my team from work. We went to a water park, where we rode a lot of different water slides and drank beer. This was followed by a BBQ, which was very nice indeed.
The whole day proved to me that my co-workers are quite insane, and i enjoyed it a lot.
It all ended fairly early for me, since we spent the whole day from 10:30 in the sun with only beer to drink. At 2am i fell into bed without any hope of recovering enough to go out to any clubs.
Today i have not really done anything at all, went walking for an hour or so. Found some new cool buildings i had not seen before. Also found a nice museum with an exhibition with old photographs of the mediteranean area during the 1850's. Some of those pictures where awesome both in quality and subject.
For the first time in my life i went to KFC for food. We dont get it in Sweden so was curious how it would taste. I imagined deep fried chicken by the bucket to be delicious but i have to admit im disapointed. Seeing how rarely i eat fast food these days (except for the patatas bravas) i wont be going back to KFC for years yet. Even though it was nice to eat french fries again, that is one of those things that i just hardly ever eat anymore. Not by any conchious choice but rather because they never serve any around here.
Now im thinking about what to have for dinner, not sure why i bother. I just know i will end up beeing to lazy to shop for groceries and make a tortilla with whatever i have left in the fridge in it.
The whole day proved to me that my co-workers are quite insane, and i enjoyed it a lot.
It all ended fairly early for me, since we spent the whole day from 10:30 in the sun with only beer to drink. At 2am i fell into bed without any hope of recovering enough to go out to any clubs.
Today i have not really done anything at all, went walking for an hour or so. Found some new cool buildings i had not seen before. Also found a nice museum with an exhibition with old photographs of the mediteranean area during the 1850's. Some of those pictures where awesome both in quality and subject.
For the first time in my life i went to KFC for food. We dont get it in Sweden so was curious how it would taste. I imagined deep fried chicken by the bucket to be delicious but i have to admit im disapointed. Seeing how rarely i eat fast food these days (except for the patatas bravas) i wont be going back to KFC for years yet. Even though it was nice to eat french fries again, that is one of those things that i just hardly ever eat anymore. Not by any conchious choice but rather because they never serve any around here.
Now im thinking about what to have for dinner, not sure why i bother. I just know i will end up beeing to lazy to shop for groceries and make a tortilla with whatever i have left in the fridge in it.
fredag 3 augusti 2007
Still no August heat
Well, still no sign of the August heat i have been warned about. Actually tonight was the first time in ages i felt a bit cold, temperatures where probably close to 24 degrees as i walked towards the train after i quit work at 22:00. For a while there was a bit of wind also and i felt quite chilly, its the coldest temperature i have experienced outside in over a month.
On other news my first attempts at getting into Barcelonas jazz scene have been thwarted by the month of August. Basically everything is closing down for summer vacation because its supposed to be to hot to work. A lot of bars and clubs are also closing and the jazz band i talked to on Tuesday confirmed that during the next few weeks there will be very little to see or hear.
Time to get some sleep, want to visit a futon palace before going to work tomorrow. My back will commit suicide if i do not get a proper bed soon.
On other news my first attempts at getting into Barcelonas jazz scene have been thwarted by the month of August. Basically everything is closing down for summer vacation because its supposed to be to hot to work. A lot of bars and clubs are also closing and the jazz band i talked to on Tuesday confirmed that during the next few weeks there will be very little to see or hear.
Time to get some sleep, want to visit a futon palace before going to work tomorrow. My back will commit suicide if i do not get a proper bed soon.
onsdag 1 augusti 2007
Jazzy tuesday
Been a mediocre day at work followed by a quite nice night. Got home at round 23;00 (as i will do the rest of the month since im working 14:00-22:00 every night), and went right to the nice restaurant on the other side of the street. They have live jazz music every tuesday,.. Talked to a few people about joining me there but expected to eat dinner alone. Was quite surprised to find myself having two of my flatmates and one other guy as company.
Dinner was nice, music was good and wine was excellent.
We decided to have one more quick drink before going home. So we went to see if Elsa bar was open. It was and their mohitos are just as strong during the weeks. A bit of beer and mohitos, talking to my flatmates and just chilling out was quite nice. Also the jazz band from the restaurant was there, and they recognised me well enough for me to talk to them a bit. They have a very cute and talented singer (Ana), a keyboardist i just love listening to (Michelle) and a bass player that was about to move to Germany (he is a guy, quite good but dont remember the name).
Tonight i also got to hear Elsa herself sing, which aparently is her habit. She sang a few songs while all other business in the bar stood still to listen to her quite astonishing voice. This happened a couple of times during the night. And once we left it was again time to first take a huge shot of that special cuban drink (which i can honestly say i never saw her give to anyone else). And then the promises to be back soon, kisses on cheek etc.
Now im buzzed, its 4 am and i have to work tomorrow. Was hoping to get some grocery shopping done before work. But am not counting on it anymore. Bit of a shame as i was doing it with my favourite person in Barcelona so far (trust me to get a slight crush on one of my flatmates), but she was with us tonight and i doubt she will be up before me.
Well, good night everyone,
Dinner was nice, music was good and wine was excellent.
We decided to have one more quick drink before going home. So we went to see if Elsa bar was open. It was and their mohitos are just as strong during the weeks. A bit of beer and mohitos, talking to my flatmates and just chilling out was quite nice. Also the jazz band from the restaurant was there, and they recognised me well enough for me to talk to them a bit. They have a very cute and talented singer (Ana), a keyboardist i just love listening to (Michelle) and a bass player that was about to move to Germany (he is a guy, quite good but dont remember the name).
Tonight i also got to hear Elsa herself sing, which aparently is her habit. She sang a few songs while all other business in the bar stood still to listen to her quite astonishing voice. This happened a couple of times during the night. And once we left it was again time to first take a huge shot of that special cuban drink (which i can honestly say i never saw her give to anyone else). And then the promises to be back soon, kisses on cheek etc.
Now im buzzed, its 4 am and i have to work tomorrow. Was hoping to get some grocery shopping done before work. But am not counting on it anymore. Bit of a shame as i was doing it with my favourite person in Barcelona so far (trust me to get a slight crush on one of my flatmates), but she was with us tonight and i doubt she will be up before me.
Well, good night everyone,
måndag 30 juli 2007
Måndag hela veckan
Another monday done and over with :)
This whole month i will be doing the 2-10 shift, which means that today i had a few hours before work. I used that time to visit the market we found this weekend.
It was a mixed experience. The market itself is quite nice, i bought the best vegetables i have seen in Spain there. The salad i bought was seriously the best i have had in years and years. Crunchy, tasty and fresh. Also lots of nice fresh non industry produced meat stuff.
The bad part is carrying stuff home. Four blocks is close really, no problemo.... Until you realise 6 bags in 33 celcius and no shade is pretty damn far after all. Not in any kind of exhaustion kind of way. But more in a "ok im gonna need to change my shirt before i go to work" kind of way. I was pouring away, which would have been a lot nicer if i had also gotten the exercise normally associated with shedding 2 liters of water in 15 minutes.
Which brings me to my next point for today - exercise. I need it so i can shed some weight and build some muscle and stuff like that. The diet part is almost taking care of it self down here. Not as in proper diet of course, but i am eating a lot more healthy food here by default. Hopefully that will help a little bit. But i also need to move.
This is where a big decision comes in.... Skate or BMX?
Right now im leaning towards BMX for the simple reason that i know people in Barcelona that actually do it. And also skateboarding would probably result in me breaking stuff all the time. With biking at least i can just go out riding long distance mountain trails when i get tired of the taste of tarmac.
Also i actually need to get a bike anyway. Would make getting around (inlcuding to and from work) easier. Now the question is what kind of bike to get. Do i maybe start with a flatland bike and one normal/mountainbike? It is sort of tempting but i really dont have the space for two bikes. So then... street bike? Could probably do the trick. Or a dirtbike? Or just give it all up an buy a regular mountainbike?
I just dont know. But i want to decide soon and hopefully buy a bike this weekend at the latest...
Will let you all know when the deed is done.
This whole month i will be doing the 2-10 shift, which means that today i had a few hours before work. I used that time to visit the market we found this weekend.
It was a mixed experience. The market itself is quite nice, i bought the best vegetables i have seen in Spain there. The salad i bought was seriously the best i have had in years and years. Crunchy, tasty and fresh. Also lots of nice fresh non industry produced meat stuff.
The bad part is carrying stuff home. Four blocks is close really, no problemo.... Until you realise 6 bags in 33 celcius and no shade is pretty damn far after all. Not in any kind of exhaustion kind of way. But more in a "ok im gonna need to change my shirt before i go to work" kind of way. I was pouring away, which would have been a lot nicer if i had also gotten the exercise normally associated with shedding 2 liters of water in 15 minutes.
Which brings me to my next point for today - exercise. I need it so i can shed some weight and build some muscle and stuff like that. The diet part is almost taking care of it self down here. Not as in proper diet of course, but i am eating a lot more healthy food here by default. Hopefully that will help a little bit. But i also need to move.
This is where a big decision comes in.... Skate or BMX?
Right now im leaning towards BMX for the simple reason that i know people in Barcelona that actually do it. And also skateboarding would probably result in me breaking stuff all the time. With biking at least i can just go out riding long distance mountain trails when i get tired of the taste of tarmac.
Also i actually need to get a bike anyway. Would make getting around (inlcuding to and from work) easier. Now the question is what kind of bike to get. Do i maybe start with a flatland bike and one normal/mountainbike? It is sort of tempting but i really dont have the space for two bikes. So then... street bike? Could probably do the trick. Or a dirtbike? Or just give it all up an buy a regular mountainbike?
I just dont know. But i want to decide soon and hopefully buy a bike this weekend at the latest...
Will let you all know when the deed is done.
söndag 29 juli 2007
Saturday night
Just got home from a rather nice saturday evening out.
Its still early (2am) and im not terribly drunk either. Which all makes a pleasant change to all my other Saturday evenings in this town so far.
Was a good day today, woke up insanely tired and with the cold feeling worse than ever. Also a hangover made it all seem that much worse than usual. But after a few hours of walking around (6 hours or so of actual walking today again) and some food it all started to feel a lot better.
Today i made several very nice discoveries about the area where i live.
1) There actually is a nice market (saluhall) within 4 blocks of where i live. Which is very nice since i had not found a decent place for fruit and vegetables before.
2) After beeing surprised of the total lack of sushi places in this town i found one within 4 minutes walking distance of my flat. And its really good too. It was me, a flatmate and about 30 japanese people eating there. The sushi was nice and the ginger was far better than any i ever tasted before. Im coming back there asap.
3) A small cuban bar that arguably makes the best mohito in Barcelona. Its called "Elsa bar", is close to where i live and the proprietor (Elsa herself) is a very charming lady. She plays music on demand as long as you ask for jazz, cuban jazz or latin music. She also demanded that we drink a very special cuban drink on the house before we left and do the whole cheek kiss routine before beeing allowed to open the door.
So basically i have discovered a lot more positive things about the place i live. There are really are a lot of unusually good places around here :)
Now im going to drink more water, sober up and try to get some sleep. Tomorrow is time for cleaning up a bit and maybe a few hours at the beach. It strange how i have not found time for more beachlife now that i live so damn close to a couple of km of it.
Anyway, good night.
Its still early (2am) and im not terribly drunk either. Which all makes a pleasant change to all my other Saturday evenings in this town so far.
Was a good day today, woke up insanely tired and with the cold feeling worse than ever. Also a hangover made it all seem that much worse than usual. But after a few hours of walking around (6 hours or so of actual walking today again) and some food it all started to feel a lot better.
Today i made several very nice discoveries about the area where i live.
1) There actually is a nice market (saluhall) within 4 blocks of where i live. Which is very nice since i had not found a decent place for fruit and vegetables before.
2) After beeing surprised of the total lack of sushi places in this town i found one within 4 minutes walking distance of my flat. And its really good too. It was me, a flatmate and about 30 japanese people eating there. The sushi was nice and the ginger was far better than any i ever tasted before. Im coming back there asap.
3) A small cuban bar that arguably makes the best mohito in Barcelona. Its called "Elsa bar", is close to where i live and the proprietor (Elsa herself) is a very charming lady. She plays music on demand as long as you ask for jazz, cuban jazz or latin music. She also demanded that we drink a very special cuban drink on the house before we left and do the whole cheek kiss routine before beeing allowed to open the door.
So basically i have discovered a lot more positive things about the place i live. There are really are a lot of unusually good places around here :)
Now im going to drink more water, sober up and try to get some sleep. Tomorrow is time for cleaning up a bit and maybe a few hours at the beach. It strange how i have not found time for more beachlife now that i live so damn close to a couple of km of it.
Anyway, good night.
torsdag 26 juli 2007
Zombie mode
Ok, getting up at 4:30 wasnt as bad as i thought it would be. But it was still bad.
Ending your workday at 2 is more or less useless when you are to tired to actually do anything. Espescially since i have to get up at 4:30 tomorrow again, so cant exactly stay up late...
Anyway, not gonna be doing much today. Got home some hours ago and have thrown them away on trying to decide wether or not to do anything. Now the clock has taken care of that decision for me im going to cook some simple dinner and go to bed.
The cold is the same as yesterday, which means my head is about twice its usual size but its still maneagable.
Hopefully tomorrow i will manage to take care of some of the things from my very very long to-do list.
Ending your workday at 2 is more or less useless when you are to tired to actually do anything. Espescially since i have to get up at 4:30 tomorrow again, so cant exactly stay up late...
Anyway, not gonna be doing much today. Got home some hours ago and have thrown them away on trying to decide wether or not to do anything. Now the clock has taken care of that decision for me im going to cook some simple dinner and go to bed.
The cold is the same as yesterday, which means my head is about twice its usual size but its still maneagable.
Hopefully tomorrow i will manage to take care of some of the things from my very very long to-do list.
onsdag 25 juli 2007
Double cold
Yep, its finally happened. All the bad weather (think i mentioned earlier that some of the locals have been complaining about it) has given me a cold!
Im starting to build up a fever too. Which is really nice seeing how i got of work at 7 tonight and start at 6 tomorrow morning. Which also means i have to take the 5:15 train from a station 25 minutes walk from here cause the metro doesnt run that early. And neither does the bus on the other side...
Im gonna hate this shift.
In other news most of the city seems to have power again despite predictions to the oposite. Although the traffic lights still show some erratic behaviour (like switching between on/off without warning).
Hopefully this means everything will be open as usual tomorrow. Really need to get some shopping done, my current bed has more in common with a very large, very soft bowl than a bed. Also the 90 cm sheets i bought for it are much much to wide (seriously!). I can feel both edges of the bed with my pinkies while lying on my back with my arms pressed tightly along my side.
Well, that will have to do for today, have to cook some dinner before its time to sleep.
Im starting to build up a fever too. Which is really nice seeing how i got of work at 7 tonight and start at 6 tomorrow morning. Which also means i have to take the 5:15 train from a station 25 minutes walk from here cause the metro doesnt run that early. And neither does the bus on the other side...
Im gonna hate this shift.
In other news most of the city seems to have power again despite predictions to the oposite. Although the traffic lights still show some erratic behaviour (like switching between on/off without warning).
Hopefully this means everything will be open as usual tomorrow. Really need to get some shopping done, my current bed has more in common with a very large, very soft bowl than a bed. Also the 90 cm sheets i bought for it are much much to wide (seriously!). I can feel both edges of the bed with my pinkies while lying on my back with my arms pressed tightly along my side.
Well, that will have to do for today, have to cook some dinner before its time to sleep.
tisdag 24 juli 2007
Im buzzed and have to sleep.
Power is still out in reasonably large chunks of the city, no traffic lights along long strips of the main roads and forget about anything else. Many restaurants are closed and a bunch of food stores are losing their stocks.
I was just told that the power is expected to be out for god knows how long ( "4 days, one week, who knows?" said with a very spanish shrug).
Luckily my metro line is still going strong. (and we are still one house out of 20 in my new hood that have power!!!
I dont have to get up so early after all which is also good news. And we have hot water after 4 days without, which is freakin awesome! Just finished a great dinner consisting of thin pieces of pork meat wrapped around good cheese and dipped in egg and bread crumbs acompanied by a freakin awesome mozarella/tomato sallad (todays word is albahaca).
Pretty good day come to think of it :)
Power is still out in reasonably large chunks of the city, no traffic lights along long strips of the main roads and forget about anything else. Many restaurants are closed and a bunch of food stores are losing their stocks.
I was just told that the power is expected to be out for god knows how long ( "4 days, one week, who knows?" said with a very spanish shrug).
Luckily my metro line is still going strong. (and we are still one house out of 20 in my new hood that have power!!!
I dont have to get up so early after all which is also good news. And we have hot water after 4 days without, which is freakin awesome! Just finished a great dinner consisting of thin pieces of pork meat wrapped around good cheese and dipped in egg and bread crumbs acompanied by a freakin awesome mozarella/tomato sallad (todays word is albahaca).
Pretty good day come to think of it :)
måndag 23 juli 2007
Another day in paradise
Well, not really; but i now have that stupid old song in my head and did not want to suffer alone.
I was thinking that today i would write more about my first three weeks in Spain. Seems to me like the first time is the one most worth documenting in order to remember what you thought was strange at first.
But today has been to busy to write any long exposé over 3 intense weeks.
I went to work at a nice late time (slept until 8) and had breakfast on the way (a cafeteria on the corner charges 2 euro for my morning baguette and expresso). Then work for 9 hours (lunch doesnt count as work here so its 10 to 7, 8 to 5 etc) and finally got home at around 20:30.
On the way home i noticed that a traffic light was broken but didnt really think about it. Came home, talked to my flatmates, made dinner etc. Managed to get through a visit of the actual gasman (he was very rude btw) and then share a bottle of wine with one of the flatmates before i realised that outside was unusually dark.... Or well, i wouldnt have thought about it if my flatmates had not told me truth be told.
Anyway, seems today has been a totally chaotic day with huge power failures all oer town. Since this morning with some metro lines standing still for hours! And i noticed at about 23:00.
Went out for a stroll through a dark Barcelona (our house was like one of three houses within a 5 block radius with power, and no i have no idea who this can be possible). It was very nice in some strange way to see the city in the dark like this. Random streetlights worked, one out of 10 traffic lights as well, random apartemnts here and there where illuminated. I walked for maybe 20 minutes and struggled to find some logical pattern in what lights where on and which where out. I did not find one.
The highlight for me was coming to a dark roundabout where Diagonal meets Passeigh de Gracia (i am guessing how to spell this here, i have made a point of not using any kind of spell checker for this blog); the whole thing was dark with 4 policemen struggling to regulate traffic through some of the cities busier streets.
It looked great.
Now its time for me to get some sleep. Late morning tomorrow again, then on Wednesday i start at 6am. This means getting up at 4:30 since its to early to catch metro or bus, so i have to get up extra early to acount for travel times getting 35 minutes longer since i have to walk everywhere except for the long train ride.
good night :)
I was thinking that today i would write more about my first three weeks in Spain. Seems to me like the first time is the one most worth documenting in order to remember what you thought was strange at first.
But today has been to busy to write any long exposé over 3 intense weeks.
I went to work at a nice late time (slept until 8) and had breakfast on the way (a cafeteria on the corner charges 2 euro for my morning baguette and expresso). Then work for 9 hours (lunch doesnt count as work here so its 10 to 7, 8 to 5 etc) and finally got home at around 20:30.
On the way home i noticed that a traffic light was broken but didnt really think about it. Came home, talked to my flatmates, made dinner etc. Managed to get through a visit of the actual gasman (he was very rude btw) and then share a bottle of wine with one of the flatmates before i realised that outside was unusually dark.... Or well, i wouldnt have thought about it if my flatmates had not told me truth be told.
Anyway, seems today has been a totally chaotic day with huge power failures all oer town. Since this morning with some metro lines standing still for hours! And i noticed at about 23:00.
Went out for a stroll through a dark Barcelona (our house was like one of three houses within a 5 block radius with power, and no i have no idea who this can be possible). It was very nice in some strange way to see the city in the dark like this. Random streetlights worked, one out of 10 traffic lights as well, random apartemnts here and there where illuminated. I walked for maybe 20 minutes and struggled to find some logical pattern in what lights where on and which where out. I did not find one.
The highlight for me was coming to a dark roundabout where Diagonal meets Passeigh de Gracia (i am guessing how to spell this here, i have made a point of not using any kind of spell checker for this blog); the whole thing was dark with 4 policemen struggling to regulate traffic through some of the cities busier streets.
It looked great.
Now its time for me to get some sleep. Late morning tomorrow again, then on Wednesday i start at 6am. This means getting up at 4:30 since its to early to catch metro or bus, so i have to get up extra early to acount for travel times getting 35 minutes longer since i have to walk everywhere except for the long train ride.
good night :)
söndag 22 juli 2007
Round one
Ok,
this might seem pretty pretentious to some, and of course totally uninteresting to most; but at long last i have my own blog. And whats worse, its in english! With two "native" languages you would think i might opt for one of those. But i realised that if i start writing in Swedish or in German only one half of the people i care about will be able to read the damn thing.
I resisted the urge to blog for a long time, knowing that i would never have the energy to keep it going for more than a few weeks at best. Now however i feel like i might have the motivation to keep writing. This blog is in no way meant to be some kind of interesting social commentary and i hope not to many people will actually read it. Its just a way for a guy who just moved to another country to let his family and friends know how he is doing.
Now that that is out of the way i guess its time to actually recap what has happened so far.
It started in the end of May, i had a reasonably cozy job in Stockholm (where most of my childhood friends live these days) but felt like i was getting a bit to complacent, which in turn made me border on boredom from time to time.
The dream of living in a different country has been with me for a long time, and i started to feel that if i didnt do something drastic soon i would never manage to make it come true. Which is why i put my CV on some websites that specialise in non swedish jobs. I had not really made any decision about moving or anything, it was more of a spur of the moment thing. One evening i just put my CV out there to "see what kind of jobs are around".
Well, it took about two weeks before i got an offer from a French company that needed more people in Barcelona. I was quite startled since i hadn't really thought that i would be moving within the next couple of years, if ever. But when the chance came like this i couldn't really say no without admitting to myself that i had become to old, lazy and complacent to ever turn my life into the adventure i always thought it was supposed to be.
So i accepted and told them i would start working in Barcelona one month later.
Now, i was obviously aware of the fact that in Spain the majority of people do in fact speak Spanish. A language i know nothing of or about. I also knew that in Barcelona things are even a little bit worse since people also talk Catalan, which means you really have to learn two languages if you hope to ever communicate freely with people.
Before i accepted i also did some research on normal wages and other work related regulations etc. This was not a great moment for me since i soon realised i would have to take a severe pay cut and a little bit less holidays in Spain.
And still i accepted.
It is somewhat difficult for me to explain why i did this. Its not a bad but not a great career move. I make a lot less money in a city that has higher rents and otherwise similar costs to what im used to. And I moved to a country where the typicall store owner makes your average french dude look like a triple doctor of linguistics with English as his speciality.
There are of course also a lot of good sides to it. The weather for one; what people here curse as a bad day would have people in Sweden gather in the parks to take advantage of the weather. The city itself; Barcelona is fabled for its amazing atmosphere, architecture, night clubs and other things.
I could make this list very long indeed, but in the end it was not the thought of a better life in Barcelona that made me move. I am not here because i think in Barcelona i will find happiness for life. Rather what i liked was the idea of 'adventure', of getting to know not only a new place but myself as well.
Spain is a nice middle way, its a part of the EU and a fairly safe choice. But its not like moving to Austria or maybe the UK where i already know a bunch of people and the language. Its an experiment to see if living abroad is something i can really do. If all goes well maybe i will try something a bit more exotic next time; always did want to give Asia or south America a try...
So where was i?
Ah, yes. I got a job offer that i did not expect and felt like i had to accept it or be a wimp for the rest of my life.
This meant that i had a fairly intense month before i left Sweden. I already had a busy schedule until i was supposed to go on vacation near the end of June. Now i also had to settle everything from cancelling phone lines etc to saying good bye to everyone of my friends. To make it all a bit more interesting we also had two break-ins at work which made my month truly insane.
So those weeks went by very quickly. On Friday i left Sweden for Germany. Had a very nice family reuinon style party there on Saturday (Martina, Martin i will write SOON i promise). I might have gotten somewhat intoxicated, which made flying to Barcelona on Sunday a bit more tiring than it should have been.
The company paid for a hotel at least, but getting there was a bit of an adventure with my cab driver stopping at 3 separate gas stations asking for directions. This was after i gave him the notes with the adress, written instruction in spanish on how to get there and a map with a big dot where the hotel is at.
Anyway, i knew that there would be at least one more person starting work on Monday with me. So i asked in the reception if they knew anything about the other people working for my company. Instead of some vague rumours i got seven peoples nationality and room number! So i started knocking on doors. I met Stefan first, a well organised German guy who already knew how to get to where we had to go next morning. After a quick chat i let him get back to bed and went down to the lounge for a quick pizza.
Here i met Jonas (Swede) and Aurelien (French), i am not sure anymore but maybe Denis (French) was with us also. We went out for a beer or three and talked about what was going to happen at our first day of work. The morning after we had to go to the social security office to get our numbers and then go to company premises for "training".
Having no idea about the job i would be doing i was a bit excited about the start of the training. But we managed to meet everyone in the morning and ended up travelling 7 strong to the social office and consequently work. The first day consisted of us signing a lot of papers. It was truly astonishing to see what kind of paperwork comes from working with an american company. I seriously had to put my signature on more than 30 separate documents that day. (and this was before the proper contract, which we had to sign in 7 separate copies the week after).
Anyway, things speeded up after that. I got some basic work training and started getting to know the other guys a little bit during the next week. I stayed at the hotel for 10 days before moving into my current home (more on that some other time).
I have now been in Spain for 3 weeks and am of course still more tourist than actual inhabitant. But im working on it. I have a place to live, work is ok and the city truly is amazing. But i really have to stop writing now and will tell more about the last couple of weeks another day...
this might seem pretty pretentious to some, and of course totally uninteresting to most; but at long last i have my own blog. And whats worse, its in english! With two "native" languages you would think i might opt for one of those. But i realised that if i start writing in Swedish or in German only one half of the people i care about will be able to read the damn thing.
I resisted the urge to blog for a long time, knowing that i would never have the energy to keep it going for more than a few weeks at best. Now however i feel like i might have the motivation to keep writing. This blog is in no way meant to be some kind of interesting social commentary and i hope not to many people will actually read it. Its just a way for a guy who just moved to another country to let his family and friends know how he is doing.
Now that that is out of the way i guess its time to actually recap what has happened so far.
It started in the end of May, i had a reasonably cozy job in Stockholm (where most of my childhood friends live these days) but felt like i was getting a bit to complacent, which in turn made me border on boredom from time to time.
The dream of living in a different country has been with me for a long time, and i started to feel that if i didnt do something drastic soon i would never manage to make it come true. Which is why i put my CV on some websites that specialise in non swedish jobs. I had not really made any decision about moving or anything, it was more of a spur of the moment thing. One evening i just put my CV out there to "see what kind of jobs are around".
Well, it took about two weeks before i got an offer from a French company that needed more people in Barcelona. I was quite startled since i hadn't really thought that i would be moving within the next couple of years, if ever. But when the chance came like this i couldn't really say no without admitting to myself that i had become to old, lazy and complacent to ever turn my life into the adventure i always thought it was supposed to be.
So i accepted and told them i would start working in Barcelona one month later.
Now, i was obviously aware of the fact that in Spain the majority of people do in fact speak Spanish. A language i know nothing of or about. I also knew that in Barcelona things are even a little bit worse since people also talk Catalan, which means you really have to learn two languages if you hope to ever communicate freely with people.
Before i accepted i also did some research on normal wages and other work related regulations etc. This was not a great moment for me since i soon realised i would have to take a severe pay cut and a little bit less holidays in Spain.
And still i accepted.
It is somewhat difficult for me to explain why i did this. Its not a bad but not a great career move. I make a lot less money in a city that has higher rents and otherwise similar costs to what im used to. And I moved to a country where the typicall store owner makes your average french dude look like a triple doctor of linguistics with English as his speciality.
There are of course also a lot of good sides to it. The weather for one; what people here curse as a bad day would have people in Sweden gather in the parks to take advantage of the weather. The city itself; Barcelona is fabled for its amazing atmosphere, architecture, night clubs and other things.
I could make this list very long indeed, but in the end it was not the thought of a better life in Barcelona that made me move. I am not here because i think in Barcelona i will find happiness for life. Rather what i liked was the idea of 'adventure', of getting to know not only a new place but myself as well.
Spain is a nice middle way, its a part of the EU and a fairly safe choice. But its not like moving to Austria or maybe the UK where i already know a bunch of people and the language. Its an experiment to see if living abroad is something i can really do. If all goes well maybe i will try something a bit more exotic next time; always did want to give Asia or south America a try...
So where was i?
Ah, yes. I got a job offer that i did not expect and felt like i had to accept it or be a wimp for the rest of my life.
This meant that i had a fairly intense month before i left Sweden. I already had a busy schedule until i was supposed to go on vacation near the end of June. Now i also had to settle everything from cancelling phone lines etc to saying good bye to everyone of my friends. To make it all a bit more interesting we also had two break-ins at work which made my month truly insane.
So those weeks went by very quickly. On Friday i left Sweden for Germany. Had a very nice family reuinon style party there on Saturday (Martina, Martin i will write SOON i promise). I might have gotten somewhat intoxicated, which made flying to Barcelona on Sunday a bit more tiring than it should have been.
The company paid for a hotel at least, but getting there was a bit of an adventure with my cab driver stopping at 3 separate gas stations asking for directions. This was after i gave him the notes with the adress, written instruction in spanish on how to get there and a map with a big dot where the hotel is at.
Anyway, i knew that there would be at least one more person starting work on Monday with me. So i asked in the reception if they knew anything about the other people working for my company. Instead of some vague rumours i got seven peoples nationality and room number! So i started knocking on doors. I met Stefan first, a well organised German guy who already knew how to get to where we had to go next morning. After a quick chat i let him get back to bed and went down to the lounge for a quick pizza.
Here i met Jonas (Swede) and Aurelien (French), i am not sure anymore but maybe Denis (French) was with us also. We went out for a beer or three and talked about what was going to happen at our first day of work. The morning after we had to go to the social security office to get our numbers and then go to company premises for "training".
Having no idea about the job i would be doing i was a bit excited about the start of the training. But we managed to meet everyone in the morning and ended up travelling 7 strong to the social office and consequently work. The first day consisted of us signing a lot of papers. It was truly astonishing to see what kind of paperwork comes from working with an american company. I seriously had to put my signature on more than 30 separate documents that day. (and this was before the proper contract, which we had to sign in 7 separate copies the week after).
Anyway, things speeded up after that. I got some basic work training and started getting to know the other guys a little bit during the next week. I stayed at the hotel for 10 days before moving into my current home (more on that some other time).
I have now been in Spain for 3 weeks and am of course still more tourist than actual inhabitant. But im working on it. I have a place to live, work is ok and the city truly is amazing. But i really have to stop writing now and will tell more about the last couple of weeks another day...
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