| In April 2006, I moved from Vancouver, Canada, to Madrid, Spain. I took
two years extended leave from my employers to study for an MBA with Instituto de
Impresa and to learn Spanish. I have always wanted to live in a
non-English speaking country and to learn to speak another language fluently.
I can get by in French but usually to the irritation of the French and have a
smattering of words in Italian, German and Russian. But, at the time of
writing, could not speak another language properly. I had also always
wanted to do an MBA so by taking this somewhat brave step - to spend two years
not working - will help me to achieve at least two of my lifetime
ambitions.
The following is a collection of notes I have taken from the day I arrived in
what is proving to be one of most fabulous cities I have ever had the pleasure
of spending any time in. The Spanish are a wonderful, vibrant people, who
are not afraid of colour, either literally or figuratively speaking. The
lifestyle here is rich and focussed on enjoying life, celebrating friends and
family - even though a vast amount of time is spent talking about them!!
The Spanish work to live and in fact, a recent survey showed, would prefer to
earn a bit less and have more leisure time. They dress to kill, and not
only look expensive but are very very sexy. Delicious.
Life here is already providing huge volumes of material for me to write about
and I am loving it!
|
