There and back again

Book title, album title, song title, cafe name, satellite launch mission(!) title, blog title - lots of adventures and ventures sharing the same, lovely name.

 

For me, February brought me to SLC and back to Sitges again, to Barcelona and back to Sitges again, and to Vilanova and back to Sitges again. So many kilometers stuffed inside a short, little month.

 

Started the month with a week spent in SLC for an all-hands company meeting.

 

Highlight: finally meeting in-person every member of my team. Terrific individuals online and even more wonderful in real life.

 

Low-light: ordering delivery from my favorite pizza and wings place and the food never arriving because their system was down. Next trip! 

 

Spent the week getting up, getting ready, going to an office, working and interacting, coming back to the hotel and repeating. Not terribly original to say at this point but it's still the truth that it's hard to come to grips with the idea that as tiring and unusual as it felt, this was normalcy for the overwhelming majority of my working life. Making the adjustment in real-time to a remote work culture was all encompassing and then it was just - normal - and living a vivid reminder of what used to be normal reinforced how adaptable we can be, how much we might forget (good and bad), how remembering can be good, and what feels right, wrong, normal, hard, unusual, etc. now might have been unimaginable in the past and very possibly might evolve or not be that way in the future. All we have is now.

 

Lost a weekend to lost luggage and jet lag on the return trip, both more an annoyance than a problem. The luggage arrived on the last flight that same day from Paris, and we were reunited after a very long wait in the Barcelona baggage claim area. I was delayed a couple of hours at CdG which gave me extra time to find a baguette sandwich and a pastry which I enjoyed tremendously.

 

The week after I returned, I had to go to Barcelona for a doctor's appointment. The lead to the story being I had to purchase private insurance as part of my visa application and now I am using it. I booked the appointment with the necessary specialist via an app in English, I selected one who spoke English, and upon arriving at the clinic I checked in on-line and received on-line directions to the examination room and went and waited without bothering anyone. Private indeed. 

 

I also remembered once again that Barcelona is only 40 minutes away and I should go more often, and every time I go, I seem to walk by a different cafe or restaurant that looks like it could be the coolest cafe or restaurant I've been to yet. And the novelty will never wear off that one of Gaudi's iconic houses is the landmark for where to catch my return train. But it must be the right one because I went to the other one this time and there wasn't an option for a regional train headed south anywhere to be found.

So then this week roughly forty-five days have passed since I applied for my foreigner's ID card (TIE) and my lawyer let me know my "lote" had come up and she had secured an appointment for me to go back again and pick it up. Back on the train, six minutes south to Vilanova, fifteen minute walk to the station, five minute wait, two fingerprints, and now I have a Spanish ID card. I can stay. At least until October. Good enough for now. All we have is now.

The things you'll see

Word from los estados unidos (EE.UU) is that it's officially the biggest snow season in 20 years. I haven't skied in the past three seasons so I can't claim to be missing anything, but it feels like I'm missing something.

Not so much a writer's block as a writer's blasé. I've been reading and reading and reading. The five book Jackson Brodie series "Case Histories" by Kate Atkinson was outstanding. All fiction. "Novels gave you a completely false idea about life, they told lies and they implied there were endings when in reality there were no endings, everything just went on and on and on." I wish some of the novels I've read recently went on and on and on.

Christmas came and went. Then New Year's. Then Three Kings/Epiphany. And then the holidays were over and the rush, noise and thrum of everything restarting and starting back up again cranked in and in about ten days I'll be on a plane back to Utah for a week for work and then February is half over and that's basically the year done. Christmas is overshadowed by Epiphany and so it was quiet. I had Christmas lunch by the sea in the sun and a yule log for dessert. All of it? Perhaps. There was a delightful dinner at friends of friends for New Years featuring pad thai and cava. A loud parade and Three Kings cake for the last of the three.

Went to Barcelona between New Year's and Three Kings Day and the Epiphany is the bigger of those big three and the street lights were beautiful, and the city was bursting and all of us were walking and shopping and drinking and talking and my oh my there were a lot of us all trying to find our place in the same shared space. We had lunch at a British feeling pub serving breakfast. I went in one sportswear store and the ninth floor was a lovely, empty cafe with views of the city and the eight floors below were shoes, shirts, pants, shoes, bikes, shoes, shirts, hats, people, people, people. Upupupupupupdowndowndowndown on escalators. Ineedsomeairnow! And a coffee.

I got my first haircut last month from a Polish man named Emil. He works out of his flat which is next door to a very nice brewery. I tried a couple of the brewery's beers at a beer and cheese festival. I enjoyed their West Coast IPA which they were rightly proud of until they heard I was from the west coast and then they turned a bit shy. But no need. It's great. At a festival or at a bar. We share the same Spanish teacher. Emil and I, not the brewery and me. But I don't think my Spanish teach and I share them same barber. I need another haircut, but I haven't heard back from Emil. 

One Sunday back in December I went for a walk and strolled by the Bad Burro. It's a bar. The Bad Burro Bar = a bad ass bar. Tada! When I walked past I noticed the bartender drinking a pint and that's just the kind of bar I like so in I went. The bar is smaller than my living room and owned by a group of friends, all from England. As I drank my first, just me and the bartender, the place started filling up with a continent's worth of relocated folks who all seemed to know each other and definitely didn't know me. Italy. Scotland. England. Portugal. Spain. Ireland. Brazil. All represented. All there for Sunday Roast and somehow I was judged an acceptable sort and assumed to be staying to eat. We were more than a dozen for dinner, it arrived a couple hours late, served one plate at a time from a kitchen at a secret location, but we had empty stomachs, a bar, stories and grudges to tied us over. Dinner was delicious and allegedly they were all friends but the closer we got to dinner and the further we got from kicking off with pre-dinner drinks the more past grievances were aired. Terrific times.

I've begun Spanish lessons. There are two different "to be" verbs. My long dormant Italian is ascendant. Italian is not Spanish. The overlap helps a bit with memorizing and patterns but not at all with pronunciation or like speaking actual Spanish. I meet with my teacher Monday mornings in person at her apartment along with another student, a retired American. And then we meet one on one for an hour over zoom on Wednesdays. On Mondays I go early to a cafe, have breakfast and do my homework and studying last minute. Just like real school. On Wednesdays I spend an hour immersed in another language and immediately after it ends I start work. I'm so confused. I haven't decided yet if I'm going to be good at this.

I found a food delivery app. I work nights. I can't go out for dinner during the week. But dinner can go out for me. It's great. There's a minimal delivery fee and I tip the delivery guy. It's always a guy. That's it. No service fees. No convenience fees. And the food is always delivered a couple minutes ahead of the expected time. I love it. I'm going to order Thai food tonight.

I found molten chocolate cakes at the supermarket. Two of them for two euros. Ten minutes in the oven. Melty and molten. That's neat. I eat them with gelato. That's helado in Spanish.

I'm going to Utah for work in early February. Technically, that's my first trip but I'm not counting it. So, I booked my first trip. To explore. To be a tourist. End of March. Malaga. Costa del Sol. Andalusia. Andalusia is reputed to be Spain's hidden gem. Less crowded. Better food. Less expensive. Says who? What do I know though? I thought it was an island. I wonder if I'll be able to Africa if I squint?

Get out there

"It's time to really live; to fully inhabit the situation you happen to be in now."

 I've been trying to make sense of what living here is making me feel.

I'm proud, satisfied that I made it through the process and moved here. I'm happy, excited that I live here, although those don't feel quite big enough. Those are the labels of accomplishment. Goals achieved. To-dos crossed off a list. I've had far less difficulty labeling the sensations related to wanting to move to and live in Spain than the emotions related to the being here. Labeling those has proved far more elusive which has been surprising and unsettling.

 I, wrongly it would seem, assumed I would be awash in the excitement, the thrill, the thrall of "being in Europe." But it occurred to me Sunday afternoon, when I was absent-mindedly staring out my bedroom window with no plans, means to make plans beyond myself, or any definitive desire to do anything specific that this too was what it was like to be in Europe. And not an altogether uncommon state.

On the one hand, that's a pretty common state. Life isn't all racing laps. A lot of it is on pit lane, in the garage or under caution.

On the other hand, if it's not all racing laps, then, having made this move, am I wasting laps? Do this! Do that? Go here? Go there! Try! Explore! Experience! Get out there! It's a trap of my own creation. It's the same options as anywhere isn't it? Only the vocabulary has changed? And the furniture. As I said, it's a trap I fashion myself. Oh, everything's amazing. I went to Barcelona yesterday. I'm headed to Paris for a long weekend. I had this incredible dinner last night. I'm possessed with dumbfounded disbelief if the paragraphs aren't full of these sentences. I live an IG life in my head.

Which when solving the equation of recent thoughts equals disoriented being my state of being. And it's fatiguing. Trying. Bemusing. Natural. Nestled within a conversation with a woman I met recently was the admonition to really feel the emotion. Settle deeply with it. Let it promote change and growth. Distracted by the wine and her accent, I missed the message in the moment, but it surfaced in the sobriety and solitude of a rainy afternoon. Withdraw or stretch out? Protect or be vulnerable to experience?

"We suffer more often in imagination than in reality."     

Café — Voló

Post-ride Breakfast at Voló: Shakshuka and coffee

 

 

What's the tweet cliché? "Shakshuka. That's it. That's the post."
 

Fraud

In the process of opening my bank account and finalizing the lease for my apartment I've signed multiple documents attesting that my accounts, the funds in them and the rental payments are not and will not be for the purpose of laundering money. First the obvious. If I was intent on laundering money, would signing a document deter me? "I've piles of dirty money desperate for cleaning, but now I've signed this I guess it's back to smuggling it about in my shampoo bottles like everyone else." 

Nonetheless, my honest face, pure intentions and shaky signature apparently weren't sufficient to keep my first international wire from being flagged for fraud. My American self sent my Spanish self my American money last Wednesday as my Spanish self needed European money before Monday as it had to be in the management company's account before I could sign the lease, with the signing schedule for Monday afternoon.

With no sign of the funds in my account Friday morning, and a politely panicked agent asking if I could send payment confirmation or they'd simply have to move the appointment, I set about locating my missing shampoo bottles. I could either call my bank's Toll Free number (only good in the U.S.) or call collect (only good if I could figure out how to ring an English speaking Spanish operator and request an international collect call). 

I have Google Voice for exactly this contingency! All the expat blogs helpfully advised porting a U.S. number to GV before switching to local phone service. I did that! I was quite pleased with myself! I've been receiving regular texts to my U.S. number from other U.S. numbers. I haven't made or received any calls, and upon dialing the Toll Free number I realized I wouldn't be making one now. Many, many help articles, Reddit threads and YouTube videos later I located the very (to me) obscure setting in the GV app to allow calls on WiFi instead of a cellular carrier. Never have I been happier to interact with an automated message AI and then placed on extended hold.

Not too much later I'm being told my account has indeed been locked and my wire held on suspicion of fraud and did I happen to receive an email from XXXX? I did receive that email. It looked like a phishing email - it came from an address with no mention of my bank. Included no mention of my bank in the email or footer. And cheerfully invited me to open an attachment or click on a link. Hahaha! I'm no phish. Classic phishing email! I'm much too smart to fall for that. Except it wasn't and when I didn't they didn't. I might be no phish. But I am a dummy. We worked through verifying that I am me and once done, my funds were released via an immediate transfer and before I could say thank you I received a notification that my Spanish self was looking just a bit more well off. And a few minutes after that my Spanish self was feeling just a bit less well off.

But as of yesterday, Monday morning, payments have been made. Rents have been paid. Contracts have been signed. The utility bills are in my name. Internet is being setup on Friday morning. I receive the keys and move in Saturday afternoon.

Just a couple stepping stones to go to cross the residency river. Securing my padrón and registering with the police to apply for my Residency/Foreigner's ID/TIE card. I register my address using my official lease at the Sitges Town Hall (my padrón) on 12 December. As previously recounted, I register with the police on 28 December, submit fingerprints and proof of insurance and, having already met with the attorney who is handling this process, the other necessary forms and instructions that she's prepared on my behalf. Just about all that's left are those appointments and to pay the bills and I'll be an official, long-term resident of Spain in good standing.

With all this going on, one might (incorrectly as it turns out) think I've missed Thanksgiving dinner. No! I'd boarded the bus, fumbled my way through buying a ticket and was anxiously riding the route (I hoped) to S P Ribes. As the minutes passed, the bus followed a familiar and expected route and it soon became astonishingly clear I was going to arrive where and when I'd planned. Brilliant! (I knew it all along. Ain't no thing.)

I stopped in a store on the way to my friends' house for wine (to share) and a couple bags of Nutella biscuits (for hoarding and personal consumption). I know less than nothing about Spanish wines. So, my foolproof approach, a bottle of each color, of the most populous varietal, in the middle of the price range of what's on offer, with a "classy" label and a DO designation.

American Thanksgiving was beautifully, satisfyingly international - the food, the folks, the festivities. Four couples including the hosts, five children, one dog, me. A Spanish couple, he a race car driving instructor, she a graduate student in orthodontics. A Dutch/Puerto Rican couple - she a professor at a university in Barcelona, he the Southern Europe GM for Tony's Chocolates (they, recent 11-year residents of Portland living just a handful of blocks from where my brother currently lives). A French/Spanish couple - she a yoga instructor, he doing business development in Spain for an American company based in Buffalo. Their daughter a 3-year old marvel. Mom speaks to her in French. Or English. Dad speaks to her in Spanish. Or English. She replies in English. Or Spanish. Or French. At various points during the evening there was Spanish, French and English being spoken around the table concurrently. Even a brief moment of Italian.

Spanish snacks to start (olives, cured meats, cheese), a delay to the roast being finished (no turkey, no problem, and the meat taking longer to cook than planned, traditional), round the table with what we're thankful for - beautiful, competitive, poignant - before eating, and then a table heaving with food familiar, comforting and delicious: roast beef, glazed carrots, roasted sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, dressing, THE GREEN BEAN CASSEROLE, kale salad, a pasta course and then pies, pumpkin, pecan, apple. Too full to accept the generous offer to take something home and still full but filled with regret at the not accepting the next morning.

The stranger in the group, I spent far too much time answering questions about myself. I learned I share a birthday with Peter and we've plans to meet for dinner to celebrate ourselves when everyone else forgets.