Gonzalo Fernandez-Victorio, Spaniard, developer and father of twins.
From November 2012 living in London.
This blog is no longer updated. Visit my new blog at https://gonzalo.f-v.es
Almost nobody expects that Spain will meet its commitment around budget deficit for 2012.
Well. I want to say, that, regarding central government, I do think they are going to hit the target. There are others components of the budget deficit (regional and local government, and social security agency). And I don't know how do they go. But the target for the central government is 38bn euros, and the data for the twelve month period ending in November is 44bn, down from 76bn in July.
Limitations of the chart (not quite proficient using Google Docs). No legend. Green line is target, red is cash flow data and blue accounting data. Bear in mind that the y-axis does not start in zero, and x-axis show days but should be monthly data.
Anyway, I find it pretty impressive. I've seen it since August and still can't believe it.
Below you can see the ad that in my opinion will end up being be the most popular video in Spain this Christmas
It depicts Fofito (a clown very well known in Spain) with other well known comedians, actors and even journalists, sending parcels to "important people": from Angela Merkel and IMF to Moody's and Standard&Poor's. In those parcels, Fofito sends, bundled with "cold meat" (that's what makes the company that prepared the ad), some sort of Curriculum Vitae of Spain, telling those "important organizations", why Spain should be respected.
The ad is quite moving, because it mixes Spanish popular culture, jokes (i.e. considering Felix Baumgartner as Spaniard) with drama (i.e. elder people are paying the bills for their unemployed children and grandchildren).
Even the background melody is "Suspiros de España", which could be translated like something like "Sighs of Spain". Spain suffers. Spain sighs.
I find it very interesting from a pure "getting to know what think many people in Spain", however.
Many people in Spain do not understand the root of their problems. In fact, for many people in Spain, their problems are motivated by those "sort of villains": Angela Merkel, IMF, rating agencies and "markets". Nobody has explained them neither the root of their problems, nor the path to get out of them. When I was coming to London (to work for one of those villains), some people looked at me as if I was a traitor.
And many people do not connect the dots. They don't understand that their problems have many roots, but some of them are exactly those things they feel proud of. That every local authority in Spain wanted to have their airport, high speed railway, and university. Because those things were an easy sell to their voters, and because those things left money in many pockets (corruption).
And they blame the people could help.
Yes. In my opinion there are things happening in Spain to be proud of. Some of them appear in the video but from a wrong perspective.
Today I rented a car for a few hours. I used to drive in Spain, but I hadn't driven since I came to London. I wanted to practice in not too stressful conditions before my family comes to visit me. Also I needed to buy some furniture.
There are two problems for a Spanish driver in the UK (actually for most drivers from outside of the UK).
First. Cars have the steering wheel on the right hand side of the car, while outside the UK(overseas as they say) the steering wheel is on the left.
Second, people drive on the left of the road while in many other countries is on the right.
You probably knew that.
Now, my experience.
On one hand, things a knew I had to pay attention, and have not been too problematic: Remember to go clockwise when you enter a roundabout. Remember to go to the left hand side when you turn to and enter in a new street.
On the other, things that I knew, but that have been more difficult to manage. I know the gear stick is on the left, but my 20 years of manual car driving experience kept telling me the stick is on the right. No, no, no. On the right is only the door. No tips on that, but I guess it is a matter of practice. Another thing quite difficult is to not be too close to the left side of the road. My tip is to be aware of this problem and force oneself to be close to the right side of your path.
Anyway, no big issues (and the ones were more because of driving a diesel car). Safe at home at 2pm. Siesta (one day I'll write about it), and evening assembling a new table and chair.
When I started this blog, I had a goal. I needed to practice my English, because I wanted to go abroad. Months (or even years) later, more reasons appeared. First, I discovered that writing about solutions to job related problems could give people a way to solve their own problems more easily. Later on, I realized it could also be a way to show that I wasn't a newcomer while looking for a position abroad. But practicing my English kept being the main reason.
On 1st November I came to live to United Kingdom. I got a position for a company in London. I know people in that company read this, and I don't want to look too "creep", but the company is not stressful, and people are quite nice and are really trying to make me feel fully integrated. I'm not at all there, but once I get over the communication barrier, I feel I will be really part of it.
So I'm living abroad and I don't expect to be looking for a different job in the near/medium term. I should say that some of the original goals are completed.
However, I do need to keep improving my English. Probably more talking than writing or listening. But also writing and listening. And, because of that, this blog still could have a mission. But I don't know what to write about.
The most obvious topics could be about my life here in London. Unfortunately, I have started a blog in Spanish to keep my family on the loop.
Also I fear sometimes I could offend people with my comments.
A short example. People here tend to ask me about my opinion of London. I used to not answer ("I've only been here a few weeks dadada"). On Monday, a colleague (who wasn't born in the UK, but have been here for long time) asked me the same question, and this time I answered quite honestly. I think is a city focused on living and not in tourism. I mean, I know it has vibrant cultural life, and obviously it has many places to visit. But it is not a "charming" tourist based city. From his feedback (I'm not at all good at receiving non obvious tips in English) I got the impression I don't have a clue, so I played down.
