Home Sweet Home

Well, at least for a week. I'm off to Beijing on Saturday.

As you read (or didn't...) in the last blog, I was out in Madrid, Spain for an annual business meeting last week. Normally held in Copenhagen, this year the planning group decided to move it to a different country we have significant presence in and chose Spain. I was elated when I heard of it, and couldn't wait to get out there. Now, after returning, all I can say is it lived up to all my expectations and then some.

Upon arriving, the first thing that struck me different than all the other countries I've visited was that English was not embedded as a strong secondary language. My whole international travel history has been to Denmark, where everyone is fluent in English, and Amsterdam as of late where again, most people spoke at least rudimentary English. However, even in the capital, the normal citizen does not understand but a few words of our native tounge, making it difficult to get around if you don't know Spanish. Fortunately, I do. Well, at least I did 15 years ago. I studied 5 years in middle/high school, and then another 3 years in college. I used to be fluent for all practical purposes, but have since let it slip into obscurity and have forgotten almost all of it...or at least I thought I did. Fortunately for me, after a day or two, it started coming back, and it was a blast to be there and know enough to feel like I wasn't lost and totally alone.

The next thing that hit me was how bloody late the country runs! Dinner at 6PM? No way! Restaurants don't even open until 8:30PM, and if you show up then they look at you funny. Most of our evenings started at 9 or 9:30, with dinner running until midnight. Then it was back to the bar, or on one night to the nightclub around the corner, until 3 or 4 in the morning. Needless to say, having that type of a night and then the expectation to be funcational for a 9AM start wasn't fun to live through. But, I drank more Johnny Walker Blue Label than I care to admit (killed one bottle on the bar, and made it half way though the second)...fortunately on HQs tab most of the time...and had just a shit ton of fun with the group out there.

Last bit I'll leave you with is a quick tale of our evening last Thursday evening. After a bus tour around the city, complete with a portion of our group getting separated and lost in the walking streets downtown, we head over to Parque del Retiro (Madrid's Central Park) and into a place called Florida Park - think Tavern On The Green. There we're treated to a wonderful show of classic flamenco dancing which, amoung other things, made me quickly realize flamenco is not something I will learn anytime soon....my feet just don't move that fast.  Tango just jumped to the top of the list.  While I wasn't technically supposed to take video, my new camera doesn't look like it can/should, so here's a clip from the evening for your enjoyment!

All in all was a wonderful trip, and now makes me start to give really strong consideration to looking into a 6-month job swap with my counterpart responsible for Spain and Portugal.