FAQs: La Vida Española

Lots of questions came in, so I might do another round on Friday - if you still have any questions, feel free to comment or email!  Today I'm focusing on questions that specifically relate to my program, how I got here, and how I made friends once I did (answer: I hoodwinked them all). If you're not actively planning on moving to Spain, you might want to skip to tomorrow's post, since some of these questions get a little technical, but if you're in the market then come on in!

How did you find teaching positions in Spain? My husband and I are both teachers in Charleston, SC and have been toying with the idea of teaching abroad for the past two years. Any helpful suggestions would be appreciated!!

DO IT!  As long as you're willing to put up with a few paperwork hassles (see: last question in this post), it's totally doable. I am here with a program directly through the Spanish government.  The only requirements are a Bachelor's degree in anything, and an "intermediate level of Spanish", which they don't test you for and which you'll want to hop on anyway if you're planning on coming to Spain. And the paperwork hassles are worth it!  For more information on my program, check out the official site here and a very helpful discussion forum here.  The application season is during the winter for the following fall, so all you have to do is make up your mind and submit your documents on time and you could be on your way to Spain!

What did you do to meet Spaniards? Did you walk up to them in the street? What kind of things would you say when you're first meeting them? Did you join clubs or go to meetings or make friends with coworkers, or what?

Great question!  Okay, first, to all the shy people out there: you'll have to stop being shy for a little while.  Give your extroverted, booty-shakin' inner self a pep talk and let her take over your body for the year.  You won't meet anybody sitting at home.  Second, do a search for Facebook groups in your town that hold intercambio groups (people come together to practice speaking languages to each other) and go frequently. If anybody seems particularly cool, ask them out for coffee or tapas and make friends.  Third, take a class or play a sport.  The Mister plays basketball a couple times a week at the local courts, and we've met a lot of people through that.  Fourth, find a place to volunteer.  You'll have extra time, and you'll make some cool friends. Fifth, and I know the temptation to resist is strong, but don't live with other foreigners (unless, like me, you happened to be married to one, in which case I'll let it slide).  There are a lot of people that have had fabulous experiences living with expats, but I think for a lot of people it can isolate you in a non-Spanish bubble.  

I am wondering if you can give some insight into how much we should plan on paying for utilities every month? I have been able to estimate costs for rent, but I am trying to budget for utilities and am not sure how much I should be figuring for. 

Here in Málaga, where nobody has heat or air conditioning, we spend about 70 euros a month on utilities, including internet.   Keep in mind that we're in a studio, and that could change somewhere else in a trickier climate or if you get a posh place with a dryer!

I'm teaching in Campanillas, Malaga. Would you recommend commuting from the city or trying to find a place right in Campanillas? Also, do you think it would be feasible/a good idea to buy some sort of transportation like a motor-scooter or something to get around?

Yay, you'll love Málaga!  You should be fine living anywhere in the area, since some of the inter-city buses go up there. You'll probably prefer to live somewhere a little more central and then take the bus to work. My feeling is that you won't need anything for transportation except a bus pass and your two feet (they will be sore the first few weeks if my experience is any indication!).

How much money should an Auxiliar initially bring to Spain? 

You should have enough money to pay for a hostel for a few nights while you look for a place to live, pay first month's rent plus a security deposit (typically a month's rent) and living expenses for a month.  In Málaga, rent can run anywhere between 180 and 300 euros a month, and living expenses (includes food, going out, etc.) will probably be in the 100 to 200 euro range.  All told I wouldn't come without having access to anything less than 1000 euros, but I like to be on the safe side.  Some people over the years have reported not getting paid until December, but I haven't heard any stories that are that bad this year.  

Also, were you always paid on time by the Junta?

 Ha ha ha.  Hee hee.  Ho ho. (okay, I'll stop).  No, I did not always get paid on time.  In fact, I don't think I ever got paid on time, not even once.  I was totally at the mercy of the secretary at my school who processed the payroll.  One month she was sick, and, well, that was that.  I didn't get paid until the month was almost over. With that said, The Mister's school paid him on time, and I think most of my friends schools did too.  Like so much else in Spain, it totally depends on where you are and how lucky you get!

What documents are needed when we apply for the NIE once we get there? More specifically, my consulate does not require the medical certificate to have an apostille, but I got the impression through the manual that the program gives us that the NIE application requires the medical certificate to have the apostille. Any insight? 

There are two forces at work here, one is the NIE (Foreigner Identification Number) and the TIE (Foreigner Residency Card).  First, you have to show up at the Foreigner's Office (Extranjería) in your province where you will receive your NIE, oftentimes written on a post-it note to make you feel extra worried.  This is ONLY the number.  They didn't take any documentation from me for this, though I would bring it anyway, and did it based on the student visa.  Next, you take that number plus your documentation to the Police Station (Comisaría) of your province where you apply for the TIE.  This place required some documentation.  Basically, bring the originals of everything that you used to apply for the visa, as well as copies of everything, EVERYTHING.  When I applied for my TIE, they didn't care one bit about the medical form or the FBI background check.  Unfortunately in Spain though, they love to be inconsistent about things like this and eat auxiliars for breakfast.  Just because the person at my desk didn't require those forms doesn't mean the person at the desk sitting next to me didn't have to produce them.  As for your apostille question, I only had the background check apostilled, not the medical certificate.  If you're in doubt however, get the medical certificate notarized and head down to your state's Secretary of State's services office to get it apostilled.  For any further questions on this, I would go to the Facebook groups or expatcafe.

FAQ: Another round!

Every once in a while I get emails from readers and friends asking about something specific related to my time here in Spain.  The pace has been ramping up lately, and so I think it's about that time of the year again:  FAQ season.

Leave a comment on this post, or send me an email (link in the sidebar) with any and all questions about Spain, Spanish, Spaniards, and Spanish cucumbers. Or photography or writing or my little sister's odd hatred of the word "moist". Or, you know, Einstein's General Theory of Relativity and how it relates to ripples in the fabric of space-time caused by dense materials traveling forward in straight lines around large bodies of mass. I mean, I'm not saying I'll have the answer to any of these things, but I'm game to try.

Your Questions Parte Dos

Part 2!


How is the language barrier?
Once we got past the twin hurdles of finding an apartment and getting our foreign resident papers at the Spanish consulate, the language barrier has been not too bad at all.  We speak decent Spanish at this point and it's getting better every day, and I'm at the point where if I don't know how to say a word, I can talk my way around it like in that game Taboo. I was trying to say the word for "spread" the other day, and I didn't know it, so I just said "you know, that word for when you put the butter on bread with a knife". And they knew exactly what I was talking about.


What's the best part about living there versus visiting?
It's easy to love a place after being there for a week, or ten days.  But I don't think you really can start getting the feel for a place until you've been there at least a month.  There are experiences available to a resident that wouldn't really be possible for a tourist, because you have to speak Spanish and know some locals. I love being able to really dive into this town, and find favorite restaurants and tapas places, and local basketball courts and to have my baker and my market.  Also, I love the language, and so the ability to really immerse myself in Spanish for a long period of time is pretty awesome in my book.


What would surprise me most about Spaniards?
You know, one thing that I think is surprising is that Spaniards are not nearly as homogenous and as swarthy as we think they are. I used to think of Spaniards as looking more Mediterranean, with olive complexions and brown hair across the board.  Not so.  I have students that are brown haired of course, but I also have a fair amount of blondes, and and curly redheads, and Spaniards of Asian and African descent.  There are Spaniards with freckles, and blue eyes, and this surprised me a little bit.  It's still a little weird hearing a little blonde-haired green-eyed kiddo unleash a string of fluent Castilian Spanish, but I'm getting used to it.


What foods are you most excited to have daily access to in Spain? 
I think I've mentioned it before, but, geez louise, the olives here are worthy of a parade. The bread here is also freshly baked and always good.  And - you're going to have to trust me on this one - berenjenas con miel - fried eggplant crisps drizzled in honey or molasses.  They are SO good. If I could pull off the whole kissing-my-fingers-like-an-Italian-chef thing, I totally would.


Has The Mister got a new guitar yet? 
The Mister is hoping to find one inexpensively, which means that he will probably get a guitar around the time Lindsay Lohan takes her convent vows. Le sigh.


Have you started learning flamenco yet?
Not yet! But my friend Claire let me know of a class around town, so watch out Shakira, these hips don't lie either.


Did YOU pass the Legolas dork test?
Are you kidding? I love those movies. Of course I failed.

Questions and Answers, Part Uno

Q; What do you eat?  A: This.

Alrighty! Well last week I asked you all to throw your questions my way, and you did! Part I here, Part II coming tomorrow.  I think I answered them all.



What's your typical day like? 
Wake up around 8ish.  Still pitch black outside.  Daylight Savings Time, pretty please come soon.  Roll out of bed, get dressed, grab a piece of fruit or some pan de leche (a sweet bread) to eat on my way to the bus stop. I take the bus to school, which takes about 25 minutes.  I don't mind the ride - I either listen to Spanish podcasts or, if  can snag a copy, I read the daily paper that's free on the bus.

My day can go one of two ways.  I split time between two schools - two days at one school, two days at the other.  These schools are sort of like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - the angel and devil.  If I'm at the good school, the next few hours fly by as I play with kids and try to chat them up in English.  If I go to the other school, the next few hours drag as I clean out supply closets, correct the teacher's pitiful English, and speak almost exclusively Spanish to the children because otherwise they don't understand a word I say.

After school I come home, maybe stopping at the market on the way, and start making lunch. This is the big meal of the day, and we usually eat it between 2 and 3.  So I'll make pasta, or soup, or anything you can reasonably make on a stove.  Then, siesta until 5 or so.


After that, we either: run errands, play basketball, walk on the beach, hang out with friends, read books, walk in the park, and so on and so forth.  A very light dinner around 9, if we eat one at all.  Sometimes we'll go out for tapas around 7 or so, and we have a little tapas place on the beach that is small and friendly and cheap - a good combination.  A little of this, a little of that.  Then we sack out around 11 or so, sometimes later.


How do you get to work? 
I walk 5 minutes to the bus stop, and then catch a bus for about 25 minutes.  Then another  5 minutes on that end to walk to school. In general for getting around town, we walk everywhere. Already a 45-minute walk isn't feeling particularly long.  But for longer distances, the bus works wonders.  Once we figured the dang thing out.


Do you really eat dinner at 9pm? 
Yes, really.  Small breakfast at 9ish, Big lunch at 2ish, then dinner is around 9 and usually consists of the following: wine, crackers, cheese, chorizo (Spanish sausage), fruit, and olives. Very light, nothing prepared.  Restaurants here don't even open for lunch until 2, and then they close from 4:30 until the dinner crowd comes at 8 or 9. So if you're hungry at 6:30 like a good American, you're totally out of luck. Luckily it's pretty easy to get adjusted to the new time schedule, and after the first week my stomach was used to it.  Now I love it!


Is it as beautiful as I think it is? 
Yes, yes yes.  And no, a little bit.  Yes because this is the south of Spain, and the green hills slope into the sky-colored Mediterranean, and the sun shines on the white stucco houses, and horse's hooves clatter on the cobblestones. Yes because there are pomegranate trees heavy with fruit, and the fragrance of jasmine floats from the trees, and yes because there is a cathedral and a castle that look comfy and care-worn from the centuries of rain and sunshine.  And no, a little bit too, because in Europe there are still dumpsters, and seedy parts of town, and ugly graffiti on concrete tunnel walls. It is lovely, but it's a real place, and it has its charm and its scars, just like everything else.