Villalba is about a 25 minute bus ride outside of Madrid. It is also the home of Luci, one of my team mates. Her family was super generous and let us have our team retreat and business planning there. We were in Villalba for about 8 days. The first half was spent getting to know each other, team building and talking about general topics such as flat rules. We also spent that time setting some of our goals for the year. We then spent the second half of the week fully planning out our year - as a team and individually. (The picture is of the team finally reunited and in Luci's SWEET garden/backyard)
Luci's house is so nice. Very European but it has a beautiful garden/backyard with a huge deck that we had lots of meals on. There is also a swimming pool really close by. A couple of the nights, Luci's brother Martin set up the projector and a make shift screen on the deck so we could watch movies outside at night. It was a great way to beat the heat and SUPER COOL! Also, Luci's family are the best cooks in the world. i'm pretty sure we all gained 5 kgs because of all the really good food we ate the whole week (including a fabulous Argentinian bbq!). P.s. Sarita - you were right..Luci's dad's BBQ sauce was AMAZING... could eat that stuff with a spoon
Canada day was during our retreat, so we made pancakes! See, i brought some syrup from Canada, but didn't realize that Canada day would be while we were away. Good thing is that Luci's family is full of world travelers and they had bisquick and maple syrup (things you cant get in Spain) so we broke out the crepe maker and made chocolate chip pancakes for Canada day!
After coming back from Villalba around 6pm, we promptly started cleaning. The kitchen was first. One word to describe the experience - cockroaches. Exactly. Not the huge ones like in India..these were more mini, but when 70-100 were attacked and killed...it gets over whelming nonetheless. Since there were cockroaches and i hate them with a passion, i decided to unpack instead and leave the cockroach extermination to the professionals (luci, stella, cynthia and sylvia). I am happy to say that I am fully unpacked and all that's left is some organizing with my roommate sylvia.
Some cultural differences:
- Light switches on the outside: In Canada, the light switches for rooms are in the inside of the room. In Spain, on some rooms (especially bathrooms), the light switch is on the outside of the room. Not weird, not better..just different. My question is...what if a not so nice person came by and turned the lights off on you (because its on the outside) while you are on the can? potentially uncomfortable situation if you cant find the toilet paper...
- Meal times: in Spain, breakfast is around 9, lunch around 2 and dinner around 9. (also, work hours are generally 10-7). Very different than breakfast at 730, lunch at 12 and dinner at 5 or 6.
Some other quick notes. The temperature has been a balmy 30 degrees. This was oppressive while in Villalba when we had the shade in the garden and the swimming pool - i really don't want to imagine what its going to be like when the pollution and craziness of Madrid adds to the 30 something degrees we will have.
3 comment(s) to... “first days in spain”
3 opinions:
Ntithya! It comforts me to hear that you have been having a miserable time and that you decided to return to Edmonton. Just tell me when you need me to get you from the airport. (Haha can you blame me for trying? Glad to hear things are going super! Besos!) :D
You know in an old apartment of mine the lightswitch WAS actually on the outside and it just so happen that i was on the can one day.... my grandma - actually a really nice person, but just a little deaf and could not hear me screaming when the incident happened... did turn off the lights on me. I never was the same again, sniffle hehe.
I know this is a bit delayed but glad to hear you made it safety and the retreat went well! Denmark also had the outside-of-the-door light switches but thankfully, as you know, everyone everywhere is scared of me so no one would dare switch one off on me! Very cute team photo! Ewwwww cockroaches, I saw my first one when I was in India, and I probably would have been the same as you, leaving the extermination up to the pros ;-)
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