Swimmers, Snorkelers and Fish

This post is part of a series called Spring Cleaning where I asked you, the reader, if there was anything you wanted to know, but never asked about me or my family. Today's question was asked by Sandra77:

Is Spain now home for you, April and Alleke? Do you think you'll return to the US to live? Would you live in other cities in Europe? I'm curious about whether Americans who are not retirees really make the switch to permanent living outside of the U.S.


Alleke at the pool last summer

Living in a foreign country often feels like that game we would play at the pool as kids where we would try to see how long we could hold our breath under water. Mostly we played to see who could last the longest, but also because it was fascinating to be under water where everything looked and sounded differently.

Using water as my analogy, I feel like when it comes to living in a foreign country there are three kinds of people: swimmers, snorkelers, and fish.

Swimmers (holding your breath)
As kids at the pool, we had to come up for air at some point. It was inevitable. In my experience, most people who live abroad are holding their breath. They want to see how long they can last. They come to see the world from a different angle, and they study or work temporary jobs so they can experience the local culture. Most eventually return home to be closer to friends and family or pursue a career.

Snorkelers (sucking air through a tube)
Others, like us, are snorkeling. We found jobs at home that sent us to work in a foreign country. In our case, April and I work for an international church called Oasis Madrid, and as such, were hired by an international non-profit organization that pays us from home. This is a viable means of living in a foreign country, but it's fragile. If anything happens to that snorkel tube, we need to come up for air. Exchange rates and permission to work in a foreign country can change. Plus, most international organizations and companies, like the military, expect their employees to move every couple years, making it difficult to settle down somewhere and integrate. April and I love our jobs, and plan to keep them, but if we wanted to stay in Spain and change careers, it would be very difficult because we found our jobs at home, not here. Our education and experience from home don't translate very well.

Fish (breathing water)
To live in a foreign country permanently means to completely reinvent yourself. In other words, if you want to breath under water, you have to learn to be a fish. I haven't met very many fish, and by that I mean I haven't met many non-European couples who have moved to Spain, found Spanish jobs, and plan to stay. After a year or two, most people decide it's not worth the trouble, and they realize they don't want to be fish. They miss their families, or the familiarity of their own culture, or they realize they could get a better job at home.

Let's face it, those from the foreign country will almost always be more qualified for most jobs. They speak the language, they intuitively know how things work, and they have a base of friends and family who support them. Learning to be a fish is not simply a matter of putting in enough time and effort, it means countless people going out of their way to listen to you fumble along in a language that's not your own, rent you a room or an apartment when they don't know much about you or your culture, and give you a job when others are more qualified. It can happen, but it's a slow process.

All this to say...
Sandra, all of this may be more than you wanted to know, and I'm not sure I even have any answers to your actual questions. What I do know is I didn't expect April and I to be some of the few internationals I know who still live in Spain. I really don't know why we stayed, and they left. Many of them seemed more fit for Spain than us, and what makes it even more bizarre is we liked living in the US and we love our families, so it's not like we didn't give up a lot to move here.

I suppose we stay because a) we are a part of a very close-knit group of people in our church who care about us, which makes us feel like we belong here, b) we believe our jobs are important and help make Spain a better place, which gives us a purpose for being here beyond just seeing the world from another perspective, and c) Spain (specifically Madrid, and even more specifically our neighborhood) challenges us to be the kind of people we want to be. So, we feel like Spain helps us to be better people.

Continue with this series by reading my answer to Valerie's question:

My husband and I are being transferred to Spain this summer and we have two small boys (2 1/2 & 1). I was just wondering if you had any suggestions for a daily schedule for toddlers? I planned on slowly transitioning my boys into a Spanish time frame for things before we arrived. Read my answer...

In the Shadow of the Olive Tree

"I'll put on some music," I said. I got up from the table and walked over to the stereo. Meanwhile, April asked for everyone's plates and served lasagna while they talked about the upcoming Spanish elections.

I flipped through our CDs, found a favorite, and put it in the CD player. It wasn't until after I found my seat at the table and picked up my fork and knife that I noticed April grinning at me from across the table...and why.

We were listening to In the Shadow of the Olive Tree: 29 nursery rhymes for kids.

More on In the Shadow of the Olive Tree...

...and if you don't know already, find out who won the Spanish elections...

We have keys to our new apartment

This morning we signed the contract on our new apartment. Here's Alleke taking measurements in her new bedroom.

Columbus

That way, my son by tinou bao.

Alleke stood at the front door and pointed. I couldn't help but notice her resemblance to the monument of Christopher Columbus in Barcelona pointing the way to the Americas. Ironically, the statue points in the wrong direction (towards Italy, not the New World), which gave me an idea.

I had planned on taking Alleke down to the playground a little later, but now I wanted to see where she would take me. She would lead, and I would follow.

I grabbed my keys off the table and opened the door. Alleke raced over to the elevator and waited for me to push the button. When the doors opened on the ground floor, she dangled from my hand as we took the steps. I yanked at the heavy wooden door until it opened, and Alleke ran out into the street.

She was nearly at the corner before I got hold of her hand, like grabbing a dog by the collar. Actually, it was a lot like walking a dog. She would stop to look at something like a cigarette butt on the sidewalk, then prance along ahead of me, never once in a straight line of course, but always back and forth like she was hiking up a mountain.

She tired quickly, so I scooped her up in my arms. She was the captain, and now I was the ship.

"Where do we go now?" I asked at the next corner, wondering if she actually knew where she was going, or if she always pointed at what was in front of her.

She pointed to my right.

I smiled as we turned the corner and began walking down towards the playground. At every corner I asked her the way, and every time she assured me it was straight ahead. When we got to the square with the playground at the other end, she unbuckled herself from my arms like a seat belt and dashed off across the cobblestones, scattering pigeons.

I caught up with her again, this time chatting with an elderly woman who wanted to know her name and asked if her hair was really that blonde or if it was dyed that way by her parents. Alleke politely answered all her questions, but in a language neither I nor the elderly woman were familiar with.

In the end, Alleke didn't make it to the playground. Instead, she climbed up on a park bench and watched dogs chase rubber balls. I suppose that's what explorers do. They chart their course, but if they find something else more interesting along the way (say the Americas, instead of a shortcut to India), they're willing to recognize that the process of discovery is always more important than the final destination.

Alleke (16-18m)

Watch this slideshow in fullscreen.

Flash Slideshow

Alleke's complete photo albums:
16-18m | 13-15m | 10-12m | 7-9m | 3-6m | 0-2m

Guitar Case

I was sitting on the couch playing guitar when I heard the bathroom door open. Alleke scampered into the room looking for music like kids after an ice cream truck. She had escaped her bath in her birthday suit, which made my music her victory song as she giggled and galloped circles around the room.

Much later after Alleke had exhausted herself with spinning in circles, she crawled into my guitar case with a blanket and closed her eyes.

I strummed a lullaby.

It wasn't until after she sat up, got out, and began running around again that I noticed the little puddle in the bottom of my case.

Déjà vu

Déjà vu is the strange feeling that you've been here before, even in new situations. Last year at this time we moved back to Madrid, found an apartment, and moved in. I can't help but think we're repeating history this year, even though we've never been here before.

We found a new apartment over the weekend and will be moving in at the end of March. We spent most of last week negotiating a new contract with our landlords, but as soon as we settled on something, our new apartment came on the market, and it was everything we wanted, so we took it.

Here are a few things I like about this particular apartment:

250€ less per month
By far the main reason we like this apartment better than our current one is because of the price tag. We need the money for basic things like groceries, but April keeps dreaming of the trip we'll take to Greece with all the money we have now.

It's 8 streets away
We are moving to a new apartment, but not a new neighborhood. I've discovered that our neighborhood matters more to us than our apartment, which means we'll still be able to drop in on our friends, play at our favorite playground, and shop at the stores we know.

Playgrounds
3 playgrounds = lots of kids for Alleke to play with. All three playgrounds are within a five minute walk, and two of them are the best I've seen in the city center.

Market
I love buying fresh fruits and vegetables from local vendors. Our new apartment is closer to a food market that I started going to a few months ago. In comparison to the other markets, it has a larger selection of foods from around the world and has lower prices.

Grocery stores
Only a few grocery stores are located in the city center, which means it's always a hassle to get groceries. As a result, we've ordered our groceries online for the last four years. Our favorite grocery store, Mercadona, doesn't deliver to our current address, but will deliver to our new one. We will be eating better next month, my friends.

70 m2 (750 ft2)
Our new apartment is smaller than our current one. I'm sure our European friends will think it's spacious, but coming from a super-sized nation, we're still tempted to think bigger is better. April and I are both looking forward to the challenge of living smaller and more simply (in other words, we'll be giving things away and throwing them out as we pack).

Walking
We will be close to three metro lines, but even more importantly, we will still be within walking distance of most things we do. I prefer to live my life at a walking pace because I get exercise, I can stop and chat with people, and I'm not burning gasoline.

Anyway, we haven't signed the contract yet, but if all goes well, we will be moving in at the end of the month. Here's some photos:

Watch this slideshow in fullscreen.

Flash Slideshow

Alleke's complete photo albums:
13-15m | 10-12m | 7-9m | 3-6m | 0-2m

Stolen Property

Every morning I remind Alleke to put her blankie in her bed. This morning, however, when I mentioned her blankie, she began to cry.

"Blankie," she blurted, sobbing into the floor.

I walked over and picked her up.

"Where is your blankie?" I asked, scanning the room.

I carried Alleke around the house, and we hunted for her blankie. We checked her bed, and the toy cupboard, and under the couch cushions until eventually we stopped in front of the door to our bedroom, out of ideas.

I thought through the situation, looking for the missing link. The only difference between this morning and every other morning was that it was a Saturday and April was in our bedroom sleeping in.

I grinned.

I set Alleke down and cracked open the door to the bedroom. Alleke ran in ahead of me. She stopped at the edge of the bed and pointed. There, sound asleep, was her mom, curled up like a kitten around her blankie.

Watch a video of Alleke putting her blankie in her bed...

Mt. Everest

Alleke climbs to the summit.


Play video on Vimeo.

Why Spain?

I was recently interviewed by The Father Life magazine. One of the big questions we talked about was why have April and I decided to raise Alleke in Spain? If you're curious to know my answer, head over to The Father Life and read the interview.