Some Advice About Working in Valencia, Spain

I got this email the other day as a result of some other writing I did on the web and spent so long answering I thought I may as well post the general content here, minus the personal info. It’s a bit off topic for this blog but I think it’s of general interest… so here comes the email…

Boy where do I start? I live in the US. I recently studied abroad in Austria, and was fortunate enough to visit Spain, and my 3 closest friends from the trip all live in Valencia, so I am trying to go there for the summer. I currently have a couple contacts from Valencia working on things for me, attempting to find me a job with a lawyers office, or a teaching job. I currently do not speak Spanish, so I am having a hard time finding something in Valencia. I would work in Barcelona or Madrid, but really prefer Valencia. I’m looking for something Business related, but am obviously having a tough time. My friend gave me your article, I read it, so I thought I would ask for your help/advice since you’ve successfully relocated to Valencia. He suggested living with a family who is interested in having a native English speaker in the house to cut down on living costs for me. Do you have any suggestions or advice? Do you have any contacts that could maybe help me find something? Again I prefer something within the business world, but if you still have contacts with teaching, I wouldn’t mind doing that. I understand the job market is rough in Spain, but what do you think about the possibility of me living with a family to cut down on costs, and working with my friend for free, but then also having a part time job to have some pocket money. I look forward to hearing from you!

My Response

Living with a Spanish family would be ideal if you can make it happen because you will then learn Spanish more quickly. Just being in the country will not cause you to learn the language in and of itself. Additionally accommodation with a family might be quite reasonable as you suggest.

However how exactly to set that up I don’t know. The Spanish people don’t seem greatly imaginative to me so I’m not sure how you would “sell” them this idea, or in fact locate people or families to talk to. One good site is angloinfo.com, it’s quite helpful and there are some forums where you can ask questions.

I heard from someone that he visited a bunch of temping agencies and a couple of them apologised as soon as he walked in and said they didn’t have any work at all!! Nevertheless I would try and locate a recruiter here using google or Páginas Amarillas, especially if you have a specific skill like law. You might be able to talk to them and gauge the market. I contacted a recruiter and she spoke English which was good.

Working for free might be good if you have to speak some Spanish as part of that. Real estate is fairly dead right now… anything connected with construction and housing is. My advice is come with some money because it takes a while to find your feet. Book a return flight that can be rescheduled in case everything goes wrong and you run out of money, and then just come and give it a shot! There are a lot of depressing people around with no job who talk about crisis, but you don’t have to be one of them, ignore them and stay positive and see what happens.

You might well be able to get a teaching job around June/July but be aware that in August Valencia is a ghost town and extremely difficult to find work. Check with your friend whether he even opens his office during that time. Where is his office (approx)?

Other than that there are lots more opportunities for English-based work in Barcelona/Madrid, but in Barcelona they mainly speak Catalan which is a different language, though they understand Spanish you shouldn’t go there if your primary purpose is learning Spanish. Make sure when you are here that you intensively focus on trying to speak Spanish as much as possible, then no matter what happens you can later say that it was worth it because you learned a lot of Spanish!

Unfortunately I don’t have any contacts as such. I recommend Abla lenguas escuela de idiomas Valencia and can only suggest you send your CV to them and the rest of the schools and tell them when you’re coming. They will probably not reply but don’t worry. You could ring up some of the other schools and ask when their classes run… they have kind of “courses” whereas AL is just totally flexible to the student because it’s one to one. Check also infojobs and other Spanish job sites, just search the word “English” and see what comes up because there tend to be jobs posted in English and you will catch them all because they generally contain a phrase like “you must be able to speak English”. I think a site called justlanded or something carries English jobs in Barcelona too… good luck.

The Preterito Imperfecto (pasado) Tense

The preterito imperfecto is an important and common tense which you should definitely learn.

Yep, it’s time for some technical grammar issues.  There are three basic past tenses in Spanish, preterito perfecto, preterito indefinido, and preterito imperfecto.  That is the order I learned them in too.  To draw a basic English equivalent you might say perfecto = “I have done it”, indefinido = “I did it” and imperfecto = “I was doing it”.  However that comparison is, umm, fairly generalised and not totally correct.

The thing I want to point out today is that preterito imperfecto is actually very important and often used in casual conversation.  I learned these tenses in the order written above and thought the first two forms seemed to cover everything and this third form was just sort of the occassional extra.  However I’ve come to the personal conclusion that you need imperfecto very frequently, for example “I was at the shops, it was really hot and I was in a rush and then someone gave me a leaflet.”  In this sentence everything except the last words would be in the imperfecto form.  When you tell stories, a lot of it uses imperfecto – all the descriptive bits.  So you should put some effort in to learn this tense correctly, and if in doubt about which past tense to use, just use it!

The good news is that it’s easy to learn.  You more or less just add aba to verbs ending in –ar and ia to verbs ending in –ir or –er.  The ir/er forms are identical.  Here’s an example: tenir (to have) = tenia (I had or he/she/it had), tenias (you had).  Trabajar = trabajaba (I worked or he/she/it worked).  I won’t go through all the forms now because there’s plenty of that on the internet and from memory I’ll probably get it wrong anyway.  Now the especially good news with this form is that there are only three irregular verbs, every other verb follows the same pattern (I think they are ser, ver, and ir (??)).  Unlike the preterito indefinido where there are a bunch of irregular forms to master!

Spanish Classes – To Take or Not to Take?

Following on from the last post about a new language school comes the question of whether or not it is worth getting lessons at all?  A good question and in the end it depends on you.

Outside Spain

If you’re not in Spain or a Spanish-speaking country then you’re not going to have much chance to learn outside lessons, unless you know someone who speaks Spanish. So you probably need to take lessons or get some audio CDs and try to maintain motivation.

If you’re in Spain, then it really depends on how you learn.

Learning in Language Classes

Some people learn well in language classes – they study, remember, they can maintain their attention levels.  It’s really mostly about whether you are able to pay keen attention in the class and desire to learn.  If so, the classes will benefit you.  If you’re the type of person who gets tired, then don’t bother. In my opinion if you can handle and afford it, it’s great to lay the foundation in Spanish classes because when you go to a country you’re pretty much stuck for saying anything until you have the basics.  Once you know enough, then you can learn on the street, at least to communicate.  At this point you can go through a stage where your Spanish will advance just from speaking and getting on with life.

On to Perfection

Eventually though, in an eerie full-circle kind of way, you’ll come to a point that if you really want to speak properly, somewhat like the natives, then you’ve only got two options.  Either take some lessons, or study grammar AND have friends that are happy to correct your mistakes (most people don’t bother).

I must admit I’ve not been in Spain long enough to experience this – but I’m just commenting on what I’ve noticed in people that I’ve seen learn English and other foreign languages.

New Spanish School in Barcelona

A bit of news for keen Spanish learners living in the North East of the country: this week Abla Lenguas opened a new Spanish language school in Barcelona. They will exclusively teach private classes there, following the same pattern as they have in Valencia.

Abla Lenguas was only founded in 2007 but quickly made their mark on the Valencian language school market by shunning the traditional group-learning method and teaching intensive spanish courses in private classes only. They mainly teach English to Spaniards but are a genuine language school teaching French, German, Italian, Portuguese and Chinese.

Their prices are kept very reasonable considering they teach private classes, in fact the prices are virtually on a par with group-based language schools. I suppose this is possible because they don’t have the big organisational overhead and bureaucracy of schools like Berlitz.

Check out the school and report back here with comments on your experience!

No Fear! Try and Learn on the Spot

One thing I’ve noticed is that there is no replacement for really having to use a phrase or word which you want to learn.  You can do exercises, you can try to commit it to memory, and these things will give you some success.  However there’s just nothing like standing there in front of someone and trying to remember that word you need to express yourself!  And if you manage to remember and say it – then it sort of gets seared into your memory.

Interestingly I find that even if I can’t remember a word, simply being in a situation where I’m trying to remember it helps a lot.  For example, let’s say your standing in the bakery trying to order wholemeal bread.  Before you give up trying to remember the word for “wholemeal” and just point at the item (= the lazy way), stand there and rack your brains a bit longer.  For some reason just the act of racking your brains trying to find the word causes you to remember the word better when you do find out what it is.  I think it’s something like lifting weights… the body recognises it is unable or barely able to complete the task and therefore increases its capacity to complete the task.  In the case of lifting weights, the body builds more muscles in this area.  In the case of learning languages, the body somehow increases the brainpower in this area; but don’t ask me how that works!

Even if you don’t immediately find out what a word is, knowing that you need it is also helpful.  If you think “what is the word for ‘too much’?” at regular intervals, for example every day or two you wonder but you never manage to look it up or find out, then when you do finally hear it, it will stick in your brain.  It’s incredible how the brain works.

So the moral is: put the effort in to rack your brain and see if you can remember a word or grammatical construct before just asking someone or looking it up again.  Even if you don’t remember it this time, the process will help you to remember the next time.

Post-it Notes to Learn Vocabulary

For a long time I thought with languages it’s all about “have a go” and worry about trying to memorise vocabulary later. I’m now beginning to realise that vocab is really quite important, because you can’t exactly practise the new verb form you learned if you can’t fill in the rest of the sentence with the right nouns etc!

One thing I’ve heard is quite good to get going around the house is to write out the names of various objects on post-it notes and stick them around the house on the relevant object itself – e.g. stick an armarios de cocina note on your kitchen cupboard!

Learning to Think in a New Language

There is a saying that you have to learn to think in the language which you would like to learn.  Once you think in the target language then you know you are pretty good.  People say it as if you get to a certain level and then it just suddenly happens in an instant – you start thinking in the new language.

A Gradual Process

However I once heard a language expert talking about this and I must say I agree more with what he said, which was that learning to think in a language is a progressive process which starts from day one.  For example, I can say “si”, “no” and other simple words in Spanish without thinking “yes” and then “translating” this concept into Spanish in my head.  However if I wanted to say “I just finished writing a blog post” then I would have to consciously translate the phrase.  Over time you become familiar with phrases and they gradually become things you can say without thinking.  So, over time, you do indeed learn to think in a new language but I reckon it is definitely a gradual process.

Learn Languages by Speaking Them

To learn languages you need to speak those languages as often as possible.  One trick is finding people who are prepared to speak to you (where you don’t feel to embarrassed to give it a go!).  This can be harder than it at first appears – most get embarrased trying to speak foreign languages with others.

Leave your tips for finding “candidates” that you are comfortable to speak to in the comments section!