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.

Holiday week

Sorry I haven't written lately, but there's been so much going on it's hard to squeeze in a moment to think, much less keep up with correspondences.

I've been reading a lot. There's only so much Spanish "I recognize the film or format but don't understand much of anything" TV I can watch before my attention span wanes and it's either time for bed or a new distraction. I could probably watch Netflix in Spanish with English subtitles. Or in English with Spanish subtitles? Which one would help? On the recommendation of a pop culture blog which after these titles I now trust implicitly, I've been reading the Duncan Kincaid series by Deborah Crombie, Min Jin Lee - Pachinko, Sally Rooney - Beautiful World Where Are You, Claire North - Touch. The Libby app is liberating.

A couple hours this morning of the first rain. Along with lots of wind. It blew over the plants on the balcony. They're fake, but full of real soil to be swept up but not of the edge lest the dogs leaving their messes below receive a surprise from above as unpleasant as the ones they deposit.

The long, last, brief, wild dash to the new year has begun with last week's first holiday week. A shortened week of work with wandering focus and then back to regular weeks while still the focus wanders, thoughts scatter until the final couple of empty weeks pregnant with expectation and meaning. I think about what celebrating in my new home will look like. How will I choose to mark the moments? Will I? Stripped bare of the standard, treasured options for gathering with family or friends, does those missing increase the poignancy? If the obligations and traditions are absent, does the meaning shine through?

My HM invited me to join their Thanksgiving to be celebrated on Friday as all the other guests would be working Thursday and Friday. So Thursday we Americans went for drinks and sushi. 

(I forgot how unmoored it can feel here on these American holidays. Everyone going about the typical routine whilst I wander freely, not competing with everyone else over the same groceries or space.) 

They knew where to go for sushi and it turned out I'd seen a place for drinks that they hadn't so street cred tipped in my favor. The drinks place is two full walls of retail wines with a lengthy, broad communal table down the center for drinks and talks. Dark, elegant, comfortable. The sushi was familiar - rolls, edamame - and kept bringing up thoughts of the dinner in "A Christmas Story". All of it walkable. All of it - good food, good friends, overindulgence, thankfulness - Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving Friday, sunny, chilly, quintessentially fall. I started the day with a holiday appetite priming ride past castles, vineyards with rusted gold leaves and ongoing incredulity that I call this my local loop. Oh the places you'll go. Having seen the first turning of leaves in Utah and now hearing stories of snow covered canyons I feel the frequent but never often enough sensation of awe for the roads I am gifted to ride and rue the all to frequent resistant attitude to get out there. 

Showered and fed (volo's coffee, avocado, egg and blistered tomatoes on toast, a slice of carrot cake, holiday-level moderation), I made a visit to my future apartment and its current resident to talk about furnishings. He's South African and semi-retired and moving to Valencia after two years in Sitges. He has a lot of household items he doesn't want to bring and I have no household items to bring. We're a perfect pair. We talked about moving countries, proper care for the plants he's leaving and I'm inevitably going to kill, and settled on a price for a furnished flat. I don't know exactly what will be there when I arrive though. I've started filling an Ikea cart and hopefully will be able to empty most of it.

Visit, social and practical, complete, I walked back home intent on lounging, feeling a bit bereft realizing I hadn't had any chips or football yet. Is this Thanksgiving or heresy? Back at my apartment I realized I was due at my host's house in St Pere de Ribes, too far to walk. So, another adventure - the bus! All the local buses start their runs from in front of the train station. I knew the number, L2, the departure time, 16.10 and I thought I knew where I'd find the bus. Standing in the area, a bus arrives at the right time but it's a 72. A popular 72. I've seen the L2 around town. Like the L1 and L3 it's small and blue. I've seen these as well. It's big and white. I don't know the difference. But this one isn't small and blue. It's big and white. Everyone in the area begins to board. It's a few minutes yet until I expect my blue L2 so I stand back. It's time for my L2 but 72 is in the way. Taking a longer look at the stops flashing by on the front of the bus I see "S P Ribes" spin by. This is my bus! Probably! It's beyond my ability to check. But that's my destination and this is my time. So I board. What could go wrong! I wave my phone across the payment scanner and a big red X flashes. That went wrong. Flustered. The driver says something that I don't understand. I think I see a passenger point at a scanner behind me. Of course, wrong scanner. Duh! I flash my phone across this one and a big red X flashes. That went wrong. Flusterederer. The driver says something more that I don't understand buy I think I hear "efectivo" which I know means "cash". And he's pointing at a tray next to his driving booth. I have to pay with cash! I brought cash just for this purpose! He points at an icon that shows a ticket and 2.40euros. I have that! I put 3.00euros on the tray. He prints the ticket but doesn't hand it to me. He points at the 2.40 and says something. Probably says it very slowly and clearly. I have no idea. Flustererest. Since he's not handing me the ticket or change I assume he's saying exact change only. I don't have exact change. I tell him that, hoping he'll just give me the ticket and keep the difference. By now, the passengers already on the bus are throwing fruit at me and starting to light torches because I'm making them late. (They aren't. This is all in my flustered, anxious, silly mind.) The bus driver points at the total again and then at my coins. My two 1.00euro coins. I'm .40cents short. I add another euro. He hands me my ticket and change and we set off on time.

Living in the future

Yesterday, 17 November, was my friend's birthday. She lives in Utah. The birthday is about a month before mine. We're the same age except when we're not. Most years they spend the month reminding me to respect my elders, listen to the wisdom of my elders, bossing me around and I spend the month asking what it's like to be so OLD. This year, I woke up around 7 and I realized, it was already their birthday but it wasn't. Having already arrived in the future I realized I could let them know I'd seen the future and it was safe, bright and waiting patiently for them to arrive and thrive.

I'm living just a little bit in the future of my friends. This is amazing. Like the rider first in the paceline I must point out the potholes, the obstacles, the bumps. Like the hiker first on the trail I clear the cobwebs, scare the beasts away and see the vistas first that lie at the top of the hill and just around the corner.

I started finding my strength and endurance on the bike this week. I started finding new roads this week. I climbed an 8% 2km hill to Castell d'Olèrdola, became lost on the gravel roads around Olivella, admitted the coffee at my post-ride cafe wasn't that good, mistakenly, and possibly illegally, rode on a highway trying to figure out how to ride to another cafe, discovered the direct, local route after deciding this cafe would be my new cafe for post-ride coffee.

Is this burying the lede? I have a Spanish bank account with a Spanish bancomat card with my name on it. And a Spanish apartment with a signed form promising not to launder money. And a WhatsApp number for a Spanish tutor. Is there anything I can't do!?! 

(I can do none of these things. Christelle, Enric, Natalja, Merche did it all.)

Christelle made an appointment Monday morning at the bank. We had to wait for a bit for our appointment. There are apparently so many Americans in this town that when two Americans wandered in before I arrived, our contact assumed they were his Americans and took them into his office. I was his American. These two were innocent interlopers. When he realized he'd been duped he threw them, quite rightly, out on their American ears, offered us a coffee, and thirty pleasant minutes later I had an account, two banking apps, a PIN, a quote for renter's insurance and the contact information for my own personal banker. Today, I received a notification that I could pick-up my bancomat card so I walked over to the branch and ten pleasant minutes later I had another card to store in my wallet. The branch is a ten minute walk from my current, temporary apartment. Convenient! Wait! It's a one minute walk from ... my new apartment!

(How's that for a transition sentence?)

Late last week we submitted our interest in one of the apartments we'd visited. Submitting my interest included providing copies of my passport, visa, employment contract (I didn't know I had one, but I do have one and my work HR (actual HR not Spain HR) manifested it, three months of pay stubs and a personal essay (seriously) introducing myself to my potential future landlord. If someone sent me all of that, I'd take it as bible that they were interested. Naive. That was merely the start of the flirtation. A mere batting of the unibrow. If I wanted to be the sole suitor. Exclusive. I'd have to show a bit of skin. M-O-N-E-Y. The first action my sparkly new bank account was to send a "reservation fee" (a serious one) to the apartment's agent. Now the lights are low, there's heat and color in the cheeks, the wine is sweating in the ice bucket and I've laughed just a bit too long and loudly at something or other. We're waiting for the final contract to be translated into English (required by law in Spain apparently), then I send another gob of money and I move the first weekend in December.

And we all know what that means, right? I'll have a Spanish lease agreement and address which means my lawyer can finalize my application for my Foreigner's ID card for my appointment at the end of December.

There is joy in this journey.

Making progress is progress

 Don't sweat the small stuff they say. But what is small and what is big? It all feels big these days, so I spent the week sweating. Maybe because it was in the 70s and I finally had the energy and momentum to ride. And also because maybe the stuff just wasn't getting done.

And then today I realized it was. And it's not a checklist to battle. Or a list of chores to cross off. It's adjusting. It's a call-back to when I moved to Italy. I forgot how big of an adjustment that was. Culture shock. Uncertain in nearly every situation and encounter. Self-created anxiety. Internally rehearing how to ask for more water or a croissant. I'm not wired to do these things with aplomb. It feels more like a-bomb. Can I rewire my tendencies? Little bits, little steps. It's making a new life. As my HM said it's uncomfortable outside your comfort zone. But growing pains are only uncomfortable until a moment comes when you realize you don't ache and you're taller and can reach the cookies on the high shelf and no one can stop you. I'm reaching for the cookies.

I'm slipping into my routine working nights to align with mountain time back in the States. Spend the day sweating and the nights swearing. And Zooming. It's an exercise in learning to let go knowing some things will inevitably crop up in the wee (whee?) hours after I've signed off, but it's also accepting that delay isn't catastrophic and I'm far less essential than my ego would like me to believe.

Riding is ecstatic. Fitness is non-existent. Stamina is a mirage. Smooth, playful roads. Sane, courteous cars. The occasional castle. Delightfully absurd. I'm still recovering enough strength to string together days of riding. Ride one day. Maybe two. Feel wiped out for a day. Try again. Patience. Acceptance. Is this a small thing? It's certainly not the only thing. That I found a cafe near my apartment with sublime coffee and a charming patio and a server with enthusiastic English who already recognizes me is the buttercream frosting on my sheet cake.

Two successes. Progress. Auto-pay setup for my phone contract. Don't have to think about that. A recurring $10 ticket with Renfe, the train company, for unlimited rides in the Barcelona area through the end of the year. One round trip is $12 so everything after that first one is courtesy of my new hosts. What a generous deal.

What about the big stuff? Making progress. Feeling relieved.

Clementine, my relocation specialist, arranged appointments to start viewing rental apartments. We looked at five options today. For now, my feet are my primary method of transportation so that reduces the potential geography and increases the cost as I want to be within a "reasonable" distance from the train station, shops, etcetera. Because Sitges is a popular tourist destination, most apartments are short-term rentals so they can maximize prices and revenue during the summer season. But Clementine refuses to be deterred and her positive enthusiasm is delightful. Of the five, one is a candidate for me. Two (2) terraces. Minutes from the center but in a calmer zone. Incredible light. We begin negotiations while contemplating any new options next week.

Remember, a lease agreement is one of the key blocks to assembling all the required information for my Foreigner's ID application. And the other?

A bank account.

And I have an appointment for Monday to open one. At a branch minutes from my door.

The blocks coming together. Pieces of a new life taking shape. Let's start learning some Spanish though, shall we?

Last Lost Week

After I made the decision to move to Spain, I spent a lot of time thinking about what life would be like. I spent much more time thinking about what specifically I had to accomplish to be able to move, but occasionally, when a hurdle was hurdled or a milestone passed, I would think about the actual living. I never thought I'd spend the first week largely in bed, sick, horribly, miserably, stupidly sick. But that's how it went.

The pharmacy was finally open on Wednesday after a long (long) weekend closed for Tuesday's All Saint's Day national holiday. Medicine, sleep, jet lag, sleep, reading (Claire North: The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August, outstanding), medicine. I finally left my apartment today for more than a quick trip for groceries. Visited a bakery for impulse buying a sandwich (have to get my strength back) and pastries, and a cursory exploration of the neighborhood. Tonight I try for a pizza. Unless, by the time restaurants open at 8, I'm at the end of my strength reserves. And then it's toast and tea for me.

It wasn't a completely lost week though. I bought a new SIM and now have a Spanish number and service. What I get for what I pay here is incredible compared to the absurdity that was my ATT plan. Additionally, I am blessed with an incredible Helpful Mentor (HM) who lives nearby and they have been helping me organize and believe I can accomplish the convoluted list of resettling tasks adventures(!) I'll need to do to settle in here. In Italy, I had an employer who handled most things on my behalf (lucky) and an office full of splendid coworkers eager to fill in the gap as I floundered. Here, I have me (shockingly useless) and my HM. HM introduced me to a lawyer to facilitate my Residency Card/Foreigner's ID/TIE and a relocation specialist to help me find an apartment. 

The lawyer has already secured an appointment with the police (allegedly frustratingly hard to get), visited them in person to confirm the appointment and required forms, initiated the forms, and sent me a very reasonable invoice. She's incredible. She is also helping me with opening a Spanish bank account. This is KEY. It seems the bank account is the essential variable for acquiring my ID, apartment and over the long-term, pizza.

You see, to sign a lease, I need a Spanish bank account. Because I don't have my national ID yet, I have to first open a non-resident's account. With that, I can sign a lease for a permanent address. With THAT, I can switch to a resident's account. And with THOSE, my lawyer can complete the required forms so I can get my ID and stay in the country, use my healthcare, and I'm sure, do many other necessary things. And you think I'd be able to figure ANY of that out myself?

So, next week, I start looking at apartments with my relocation specialist, meet with a banker to open a bank account, and perhaps more importantly, RIDE MY BIKE, start looking for a cafe to be a regular in until I move, eat someone's cooking besides my own, and find a Spanish teacher.