Residency

It has been many days since I've written a blog. Let's just say there's been a lot going on in our little world. This week we've been sorting through our residency requirements with the immigration attorneys we hired back in September.

After the long process with the Consulate and relocation, we just didn't have it in us to navigate through the residency requirements on our own. When you move to Spain, you have 30 days to apply for residency. So while we all have our visas, they are only good for 90 days. This is geared to give you enough time to obtain a residency card.

Hiring Help

John didn't tell me about the residency process until we were a few days out from leaving Austin. I thought it was funny that he didn't tell me, but, as he guessed, it was a good thing he didn't. Had I known we had another process to go through after the visa process, I probably would have called it a day and moved in with my family.

Given what we've been through this week, hiring a firm to help us was by far the best money we've spent this year. They filled out all the required forms, made us an appointment and navigated the on site conversations.

We seemed to have a lot coming at us this week. I received a jury duty summons at the end of last week, so I began contacting them on Tuesday. We also received correspondence from one of the local fútbol organizations, inviting Nick to try out on Tuesday night.

John's been attending meetups, we've both been homesteading, (making our place a home), and we also went to enroll in Spanish classes on Monday.

The Bin

Part of the homesteading progress included finally picking up our bin from DHL last Friday. We decided to ship shoes, textbooks, microscopes, and physical therapy items to save on suitcase space. Had we known the difficulty we'd encounter in doing so, we probably wouldn't have shipped them.

When delivery stalled, we were asked to meet with customs in person and self certify our goods. This also meant we needed to pay an import tax.

Getting to DHL was not easy. While we made it to the airport via subway pretty easily, navigating the airport back roads was not going to happen on foot.

We found a really nice taxi driver, though and she helped us the rest of the way. She also helped us communicate with people as most of them did not speak English. This was amazing of her because she didn't speak English either. It took us four hours and a 60 euro taxi ride to get the bin home. It was a tough Friday morning.

A Hard Week

By Tuesday of this week, I decided that it had indeed been a very intense week. It seemed the challenges of Friday followed us into this week. Yikes!

I know I have mentioned hard weeks a lot during this move, but I assure you not all days or all weeks are this hard. You just usually hear about the hard ones because, well, isn't writing all about expression? And as you can tell, I normally write just after the hard days subside.

Remember Where You've Been

I remember to write after we've overcome a hurdle or a challenge because I don't want to forget some of the challenges we've faced. It is easy to remember the good times, like WE LIVE IN SPAIN!

Beyond all the awesome meals and adventures, there are challenges and I want to honor the challenges we face because, after all, we are writing this blog so others can do what we've done without as many surprises.

We also want people to have some perspective on what it takes emotionally, physically and mentally to handle a significant life change like this. It's totally worth it, but not always easy.

Back to Residency

We learned Monday that we needed to get color photos for our residency application.

We ended up taking Nick to get his done Monday afternoon after he finished school. John and I decided to take our pictures on the way home from the language school that morning since we were out already and I was having a good hair day.

Harhr

Side bar. Let's talk about hair, (hahr), for a minute. Good hair days have been few and far between for me here. I can't seem to go as many days without washing my hair. In Austin, I was going 4-6 days without shampooing my hair but here I have to wash my hair at least every other day.

Getting our pictures taken on a good hair day made the rest of the week seem manageable. Little wins make for kinder weeks. :-)

Residency Appointment

Okay, back to residency. This morning we had our residency appointment. Our attorney met us at the government office and we waited in a fairly long line for our turn. We had an appointment, but we ended up waiting in the wrong area so we missed our appointment slots.

We didn't have to wait too long, though, and today's appointment seemed much easier than the one we had on Tuesday. Prior to submitting our forms today, we had to go and get what is called an empadronamiento. What this basically means is that we had to report to the census office and "declare" we lived here.

Getting the empadronamiento was a bit involved as we had to get a more "official" lease for our residence. We rented our place using AirBNB. Let's just say that Barcelona and AirBNB are still finding their way with short term rental agreements here.

We have a long term rental through a registered company which makes things a lot easier for us. But just to be sure we didn't have any issues with residency, we obtained a lease agreement from our landlord on Tuesday morning. Everyone has been so helpful.

The Tuesday afternoon appointment at the census office was a bit scary and we ended up not having all the documentation we needed in order to get Nick's document. Thank goodness one of the law firm assistants accompanied us because the first person we spoke with did not speak any English and we needed to make a follow up appointment.

We were able to make an appointment for an 1 and 1/2 later and proceeded to get back on the subway to retrieve the document we left at home. Ah, all the trips back and forth really got to me.

Traveling by Foot

I've learned it's not so much the riding on the subway that gets to you but rather the physical challenge lies within the endless tunnels and the stairs and the steep stairs, oh the stairs and the more stairs...lol.

And once you get to the street level, there is more walking to your destination. John usually tells me it is a block but it seems to be more like 3-4 blocks of walking. I wonder if he tells me that so I don't just plop myself on the street and hail a taxi...

What I have also learned is it is all about wearing the right shoes. In the right shoes, all of this movement is not too big of a deal. I have two pair of shoes that fall into this category.

But this day, we decided to dress nicely for our appointment so by the time I got home my feet were beyond tired. The shoes that I considered to be some of my most comfortable walking shoes in Austin didn't seem up to the task. They probably shouldn't have been shipped in the bin. Ah, the bin incident of 2017.

I definitely look forward to buying some shoes more suitable to my pedestrian lifestyle.

Okay, so my feet hurt. And, I was sweating. I've been told it is unseasonably warm here. Of course it is, we are here.

With that said, we have realized the fabrics our clothes are made of tend to be a bit thicker than the fabrics here so they take longer to dry in the milder weather, the temperature range varies only about 5-8 degrees daily, and they don't seem to be as breathable as they could be.

Success

We did get the empadronamientos for everyone on Tuesday. Progress. That is our new saying here. We simply say, "Progress." Our taxi cab driver last Friday kept saying it whenever we made a little progress with DHL or the airport people. It made us laugh so we've adopted it as our family mantra this week.

By the time we returned home from the census office we were spent. We had to navigate the second appointment all by ourselves and there is still nothing more uneasy for me than trying to communicate with someone who doesn't share a common language. I've gotta learn Spanish.

All the effort was worth it, we had everything we needed for the residency appointment today.

And we got some good news on Tuesday evening. Nick tried out for a goalie position on a team. He was accepted and assigned to a team. He will be practicing on Tuesdays and Thursdays, with games on Friday evenings. Things seemed to be looking up. I was really tired that night, too much excitement for one day, I guess. We also had a tough conversation with the director at the futbol organization, he didn't speak English and we didn't have my passport on me. We intend to get Nick all squared away documentation-wise on Friday.

Documentation

As you can see, this post has a lot to do with documentation and communication. Basic conversations about enrolling your kid in soccer or how much your groceries cost at the store are difficult. I recommend that you hire someone to help you whenever possible with the big stuff because the little stuff is hard enough. And with residency cards at stake, you definitely don't want to misunderstand a requirement.

And with everything so new, it can be a lot on the nervous system. We take short, easy conversations for granted when we share a common language with someone. Here I feel accomplished if I can hear the phrase, "Para llevar." LOL

So while the big things like residency card processes are foreign, so are every day living situations. It takes some getting used to, for sure. Different weather, different ways of commuting and a lot more contact with the environment make for an interesting adjustment period.

Approved

To wrap up today's rap session, we have been approved for residency and should be able to pick up our cards in 30 days. PROGRESS. We have a nifty piece of paper that says we have accomplished this step.

Today is an important day. We get to celebrate the completion of a year long project. Yep, it took us over a year to get here.

We are at home in Spain, equipped with residency cards that don't expire until next October. We can now get on with daily living and immersing ourselves in the culture and the languages of this beautiful area.

Now, where does one buy some comfortable shoes?