Daniel is Spanish from Cadiz who arrived in London last October. Although he has a job in a restaurant, he doesn’t feel at all satisfied in ‘such a big’ city and he is thinking about moving back to Spain in the future.
Javier Duque
Ha didn’t leave Spain because he or his family were going through a difficult economic situation. He left simply to finish his studies. He didn’t give it a second thought: “The Company where I was doing an internship didn’t hire me so I decided to leave”.
But his studies are not only the ones he needed for the internship: Daniel has a Diploma in Business Studies and a BA in Marketing, as well as a Master in Marketing and Tourism Destination Management.
It was during his master’s years that he did an internship at a travel agency, which, after he finished the trial period, didn’t employ him. “They told me that they were happy with me and I was doing great. I had high hopes to continue but…”
Welcome to the club, Daniel! This Cadizian has just experienced the situation of many young people in Spain: get an unpaid internship and once the contract has finished, they don’t renew it.
He has arrived in England with a job-offer secured only verbally, as he had a friend who worked in a restaurant in London who told him that they were looking for staff. Daniel landed, went to the interview and got the job.
Although it may seem as if it was very easy, it wasn’t and isn’t. He lived first in a room-share; they even had to share the bed, too. “But it was a double bed” he adds.
Daniel got on well with his friend despite the lack of space.
So he didn’t have to become one more occupant of a house in which – They told him – there was a free room, which was his ‘Plan B’ in case he had to get out of the other side of the bed.
Why so much hassle to find a flat? Because he arrived here with little money. “500 euros that my parents gave me and some of my own was all I had, approximately £650 altogether.”
Probably not a lot of money for going to the UK, especially to London. But Daniel is proud of being independent all this time and not having had to ask for even a euro from his parents. With the money he earned he could go out and have a good time. “Very limited, because it is expensive going out at night: what takes more time is travelling in the city but now I go out less often because my best friend went back to Spain and now I am short of friends.”
Work environment
He feels fine at his job, although this is not what he was planning to do while he was at university. “They are nice to me, but I have to work long hours and this is not why I have studied”.
His colleagues are of different nationalities: Polish, Filipino, Indian, Spanish…but not English. Well, yes ‘the boss’. And they are good people’. He emphasizes that in spite of waiting not being his career, the job has its bright side: ‘You’re entitled to your holidays, incentives…But it also has its bad side…sometimes very unpleasant.’ Just a few days ago he experienced something that can be branded as ‘racist’. Two English women wanted to use some vouchers when it came to paying. ‘I told them that I couldn’t accept the vouchers, as they were already expired’.
One of the ladies- they had already had two bottles of wine-started to tell him that he didn’t know anything and insulted him. ‘They asked me to call for my manager, who told me that I was bad mannered, and that she can tell me whatever she wants, because she speaks English.’
This was the second time that something like this happened to Daniel.
‘Right after arriving I had an incident with a client, but thanks to my English, I never realized. Anyway, Daniel says that these were two extreme cases, as there are ‘lots of English customers and they are all polite’.
As for his future, he sees it in Spain. ‘London is too big for me. Now I am living a different life experience and am learning English. But I miss my family and my friends. I will go back…if I don’t find a job in the career I trained for ’.
(Translated by Csilla Forrai) – Photos: Pixabay
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