my life in
far far away
SPAIN
For Rachel Wright living abroad was an opportunity not to be missed. Even with two kids,
no language knowledge and no income. How does she cope with this adventurous challenge?
Within 6 months of being married, Brandon and
I had an amazing experience living in Belgium for an
internship. We knew then that we wanted to give our
future children the opportunity to live abroad as well.
Five years and two children later we both had some
ambitions for our future. Brandon dreamed of going
back to school to earn his Masters and we both felt
it was time to move abroad again. So we took a leap
of faith, combined the two ambitions and did it. It was
a scary process for sure. Moving to Spain with two kids
and no income, while Brandon went to school. Even
writing it sounds crazy but it has been incredible!
We’ve decided on Spain for a few reasons:
1. Brandon speaks Spanish and it would be a great
place for him to practice and 'keep up' his second
language. 2. We found a great school here 3. Our
children (& I) would have the opportunity to pick up
a second language, one that would be very useful
back home in the United States.
The meal schedule has been the biggest surprise
for us. Think of the daily schedule in the States and
move it forward by two hours. For example, lunch is
served from 2-4pm, and dinner doesn’t start until 8
or 9pm. Everything is later. Bedtime is midnight and
the start of the day isn’t until 10am.
The biggest obstacle when moving here was
not being able to communicate. Although I have
picked up some Spanish the majority of people speak
Catalan first and then Castilian (Spanish) second.
The biggest myth is that bull fighting is popular. In our
region it is actually banned and it seems that more
and more Spaniards are questioning the ethics
of the activity. Also, I have yet to met a Spaniard that
has actually been to a bull fight. I’m starting to get an
impression that it currently is a solely tourist attraction.
My funniest experience with the locals was when
being at home alone with an internet installation guy
that only spoke Spanish. We had a lovely 5 hour
game of charades. Seriously, we communicated
through hand signals and it took 5 full hours to install
our internet. Apparently, I need to practice my
charades skills!
As of right now, I feel like I have a great mix of
friends. Luckily for us, we knew some people that lived
in Barcelona prior to coming here and they introduced us to some really wonderful people. It is quite
interesting though, how we foreigners seem to find
each other. We hear each other speaking something
other than Spanish to our kids and have an instant
connection.
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