Paris, city of light

Paris is part of my new life in London. Once a month I have to go to the capital of France because of business travels.

I’ve kept always good memories of Paris. It was the destination of the trip that we organized when we passed the third course of my degree. It is the place when I met for the last time a good friend. And now it is part of my new life here.

On the other hand, I didn’t have a good feeling of French people in general before moving here because of the typical competition between neighbours. In my subconscious was the fact that my parent house was burnt during the French invasion in the XIX century, we discovered this by doing some improvements some years ago when we knock down a wall and we could saw how some burn rests still remained. In addition I got quite upset when I read all the damages that they caused in Burgos at that time. Still if you go to the “Monasterio de San Pedro de Cardeña” you can see how the French soldiers damaged the faces of the sculptures because in their leaving they didn’t have time to devastated everything. And look, this is the worst part: In this sacking, they desecrated the tomb of the most important hero in the Spanish history: “El Cid”. Fortunately, a French man gathered his rest scattered on the ground, he kept in a little box and that’s why after the war they were found in a house near the Cathedral. God bless you, my friend.

But that is history. We can not judge people nowadays because of the acts done by their ancestors, it is ridiculous. So in the end I’ve changed my concept about France and even I was supporting them last weekend during the 6 nation’s championship. It can be also because a French company pays for salary me every month!

Travelling is a good thing to leave chore for some time. The trip to Paris is easy, only 2.15 hours via high speed train. I took the train early in the morning. Some workers like but also I could see in my couch two couple in their mid forties drinking champagne (an obsession in London as I've mentioned some times) and with the look of people that are travelling for pleasure. Sure they were going shopping or just to spend 2 days doing tourism.

Paris is one the most beautiful cities in the world. Only walking down its streets is a unique experience. Each time I go, I try to visit a different area after work. I go usually to the same hotel, it is located in Montparnasse, the famous painters’ quarter. This time I was very lucky, my room is on the 19th floor, with an amuzing view.

I decided to go for dinner to a close restaurant that is in Catalognia square. I felt at home, what a Spanish name! It was Monday and still it was almost full at 8, a good signal of its quality. Besides me, there were two couples of business men and a group of Asian people enjoying the French goodness.

When I took the metro I noticed once more their good wearing style, they have a very good taste and you can realize why they are the capital of fashion. The mixture of races is almost like in London but less international. It is like if people in Paris assumed very quickly that they are living in Paris they have to look like French whereas in London there is more a feeling of staying temporarily without loosing their identity. I could hear some Spanish speakers, we are around everywhere. In only 20 minutes I got to the “champs elysees”. Despite the fact that it was Monday, the street was crowed of people at 22.00. I can not be surprised when it said that more than 500,000 people are here every day. The avenue is lined with cinemas, boutiques, restaurants, tearooms and café terraces. At last, the Arc de Triomphe, standing at the centre of the Place Charles de Gaulle.

I came back to the hotel at 22.45. I go to the bar with my laptop to browse on internet taking advantage of the free WIFI. There are many people, I think when you travel for business, somepeople feel a little alone being out of home and they look for a warmer atmosphere out ot the hotel room. Even It seems like if a woman who is in a table in front of me is looking at me?? No, I'm kidding! But be careful because in these kind of hotels, full of business men, I've seen more than once a sort of "professional women" around...I decided to go to my room and I still had time to watch TV, in fact, I came just on time to watch the debate between Rajoy and Zapatero. I hope it was useful for our future!

My back was next day in the afternoon. In the train the same image as the day before. Some workers like me, with the faces looking like very tired and a group of people, this time in their thirties, with a lot of shopping bags from luxurious brands. It is clear that there a lot of rich people in London!

B Bar and the mascarade party

It has been a quiet weekend in the end. One of the best things has been to stay in bed until late and to have a “Spanish breakfast” with tomato, olive oil and even real ham. And of course a good coffee, I can not do without it. It looks like very good, doesn’t it?

The weather is becoming better in London, it is warm and even during the majority of weekend sunny. The spring is coming. The bad thing is that I have to go to bed earlier as it is difficult no to be woken up with the light early in the morning. I my bedroom in Madrid I could manage a complete dark but here it is not possible with only curtains, and bearing in mind that my window looks out at the east, why here don’t they use blinds? If I could do up something in my apartment I would start with this.

Friday I was invited to a birthday from a colleague from the office, but I was really tired after all the week and as no one from the office intended to go I didn’t feel confident enough to socialize with unknown English people. I was lazy; I have to do away with these fears, next time I’ll not miss the chance to meet new English people. I rented a film called: “Love, Honour & Obey” typically English, it was only ok, and the script for me was overdone and silly.
On Saturday I stayed at home during the day, putting things in order, reading one of the best books I’ve ever read: “Tuesdays with Morrie” (Ji, thanks for your recommendation!) and watching TV. At 6 my phone rang “Yes, of course, I’ll be there at B Bar at 7.30”. I didn’t want to discard this chance to have fun. My Belgian mates had reserved a table in another trendy place: B Bar. In fact the plan included also a private party at the same place after dinner.

I have to take back my remarks concerning the quality of the restaurants in London. B Bar was more ok, a menu for 35 Pounds that included three courses + coffee. Well, the problem is if you order 5 bottles of wines for 6 people…., it reminded me the dinners that I used to have in Madrid with my friends, … then the budget can rise dramatically and my friends like to drink too much! It could be my fault; I chose a Monteviejo Festivo 2004, Malbec, from Argentina that was excellent. By the way, I went to some interesting places last weeks: “Cocoon”, a Japanese restaurant in Regent Street that in average was 8/10, really good, and “Asia de Cuba”, in Soho, a fushion between Caribean and Asian food. The atmosphere was very special, the courses are very large but the quality is not great and I guess it is a little overpriced. The last one has been “Busabba”, a Thai very close to my house; don’t miss here a Thai pad. Great value for money! I’m getting into Asian food in general, the offer is much bigger here than in Madrid.

After the dinner the masquerade party was supposed to be downstairs. Some people dressed up masques, I was afraid at the beginning that we could end up with the same situation as in the famous film “Eyes wide shut” but fortunately everything it was quieter. There were not so many people but it was fun. Even I run into some colleagues from the office, I realized that London is not so big and as well as in Madrid people are in the same networks and go out for the same places. I went to home at 2.30 h, not so late but this morning I was really tired again!

It hasn’t been a special weekend at all, again part of my new routine. I think next week I’m going to try to make the most of my time by visiting more places during the day and attending more cultural events. I want to squeeze every minute here and the problem of going out at night is that we consume too much energies and in the end not always is worth it. I can not get away with it to be active the following day, so I’ll change my plan for next weekend. It is Sunday evening; it is already dark in London and a new week is waiting for me in London.

Drinking beers with my new CEO

I’m working at an international company with offices in several countries around Europe and even other continents like Africa. There is an International area in the Group that centralizes some activities where I’m working for, although in terms of Human Resources I belong to the affiliate in UK. My role is to coordinate some activities concerning the launching of new products in different countries, so far, UK and France.

Some months ago, a new CEO was announced for our affiliate in UK. He comes from the same industry although he has been working on several fields. His fortune is huge, I guess, several hundreds of pounds, so that he could afford to stay without working anymore, in fact he wasn’t working some months ago, but he believed that this new project was a very interesting challenge and he was after this new job. That’s what he said during an interview that was published on a famous newspaper some weeks ago.

Last week all of the employees based on our office at Paddington, we were invited to have drinks at 6pm onwards by him, he wanted to be presented. It was exciting as for me that was the first official event with my colleagues from the office.

I stayed in my desk until 6.30. In Spain if you are called to be at 6, you have to go at least half an hour later. But when I went downstairs almost we were run out of drinks! I had a beer to feel more British. I liked these kinds of events. People have different objectives. One of my friends told us, “we should approach that group of girls”, it means, “he wanted to warm his relation with the typical girl with who normally you can only exchange some sentences every day in the office like “hello, how are you doing?” and this way, to move forward to the next step that might be to go to the pub. Other colleague told me “we should say hello to our manager”. It means, “Let’s flatter our boss, the annual review is coming”. And other didn’t stop looking at a colleague that owned us a document “I’m going to tell something to Roman”, that means “you can not answer my emails but now you are not going to escape”.

In the meantime I was very curios to see new super boss. At 7 he appeared, dress up very casual and he started the speech. Very simple, very close, I enjoyed a lot. It was a combination of strategic marketing lesson plus an amount of motivation. No more than 30 minutes.

Drinks continued but some people started to leave the canteen, today we had Arsenal and Manchester playing champions league. I didn’t care about it, I was very happy yesterday because of Liverpool’s performance. Torres was again crucial in the victory by forcing a red card. I stayed talking with a Polish friend who has a girlfriend from Burgos, that is a good link, isn’t? And we saw how our CEO still was with us. His attitude was like if he was a colleague more and we could see him talking with everybody. We couldn’t miss this chance and we introduced ourselves: I’m Rodrigo, from Spain. I was a little embarrassed because of my bad English but he was really nice with us, without stop talking and very natural. What a difference compared to the top management in Spain! I may have been bad lucky and I’ve been working in Spain only for two companies but I really appreciate the attitude of this gay.

Before saying good bye, he stopped a woman who was passing in front of us as he recognized her as one of the people that raised some questions in public after his speech. In fact she asked him about his favourite film. He answered “The Italian Job” because of his passion for racing cars. It was very fun because she was a little drunk, I couldn’t understand what she was telling us and this time I guess it was not only because of my bad English!. That’s a different culture, I thought, I couldn’t imagine the CEO I had in Spain standing a conversation with a drunk worker. After 30 minutes of amused conversation, we put out our beers, we left them and I came to my beloved apartment in Kendal Street. We were not putt off him.

The back to home from the office is nice, I walk during 10 minutes inside typical English houses, and always is a good time to relax and think about the things that happened during the day at the office. Today I started with two annoying conferences call. But I ended up with a smile.

Welcome to the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew,

Last two weeks are being extremely sunny in London and I wanted to make the most of it by going outside.

Kew gardens is one of London’s treasures. You can explore different regions of the world and see some of planet’s rarest plants, as well as mango tres, giant palms, banana trees and more. It is in the East of London normally, about 40 minutes from the City centre.

Unfortunately I didn’t see everything last Saturday because of a failure in the Tube. The line from Hammersmith to Kew Gardens was suspended and my special visitor (thanks for your patient!) and I were trapped in a bus in a traffic jump. It took us to get to the gardens from Victoria Station almost 2 hours, what a disaster! But it was beyond our control. It has been the first time that I’ve gone out of the city centre and I’ve learnt that as well as in Madrid, here during the weekends the highways can be a chaos. We got to the place at 2.45 and it closed at 4.15. My recommendation is to go there at earliest at possible and to plan to spend at least 3 hours.

In the end it was very worth it. I don't remember such a beauty Botanic Garden like this. I haven’t seen so far many British gardens but I guess this a good example of England’s green and pleasant countryside. We had time to go through the famous Palm house where we could admire plants from all around the world. When you walk through their humid tropical rainforests, you can discover how we can depend on the plants that inhabit these parts of the world. In the basement there is a small but excellent tropical acuarium.

Outside, the landscape is amazing. The mix of different colours, type of plants, glass houses, lakes and historical buildings has a bearing on the beauty of this place. We enjoyed a lot by strolling.

Another reason to come now is the fact that Kew Gardens is hosting until April a landmark open-air exhibition of 28 large-scale sculptures by the acclaimed artist Henry Moore. We didn’t pay so much attention on this but we could realized how the sculptures complemented the landscape and I think it can be very interesting to see it from the other side, that is, to see how the changing light affect the sculptures throughouth the seasons.

Given that we are in winter, we couldn’t see so many seasonal flowers but at least we found the area around the Victoria Plaza transformed by a stunning Crocus carpet. Here, hundreds of thousands of purple and white flowers appeared to create a magnificent burst of colour. And also we could admire some Narcissus along the Broad Walk that links the Orangery to the Palm House.

We had to run to be on time at the exit since we wanted to spend until the last minute and we finalized the visit when at the Lion Gaten at 4.20, very closed to a beautiful Pagoda, the most distinctive landmark.

Sometimes when you visit a place, and you left it, you see at your back and you think, I’ll come back once more. This was the case.

TV

TV is part of the culture of each country. In Spain I used to watch only films, news and sports.

During my staying in London, I’ve discovered that some sports like pool are more popular than I thought,

I’ve noticed the English passion for the gardens,

I’ve realized the obsession for finding a home, (“location, location”)

For finding a good place to live in Spain or other sunny country or simply to go for holiday,

There are a lot of English TV series and American films. Foreign films are not dubbed. So far I’ve only seen one Spanish film shown on TV. That’s a sample of the “incredible” commercial success of modern Spanish films. Fortunately for them, some subsidies are coming from the government. At least I try to promote as much as I can Alejandro Amenabar’s films, the only Spanish Director that I really like. I felt happy when I found last week in a Library “Open your Eyes” one of my favourite films.

The fact that cooking is on fashion. Jamie Olivier is really famous here. My manager is very clever, I like to listen to his comments and the other day he told me when we were having lunch: “cooking here is becoming very fashionable because everybody wants to show that they are able to do something on themselves. This is something new with cooking but the concept DIY – do it yourself, has been always present in English life. If I dare you to do something, you should be ready and able to do it!”

I haven’t seen so many programs about celebrities, that is really a good sign.

And there is a good offer of scientific programs above all on BBC. I don’t usually spend a lot of time watching TV but today I made the most of my evening by watching an interesting one regarding how we make decisions. It has to do with the fact that even though we seem to make decisions based on rational analysis, it is not true and our non rational part of our brain plays a very important role. The program concluded that we have to take into account that:

- We can be manipulated very easily. They gave the example of how to have a cold or a hot drink with somebody can make a difference at the time of getting an opinion about that person. If a have a coffee with a person, it is likely that I’m going to have a warmer impression about that person than if I have a cold coke. So, if you want to engage with somebody at work for example, don’t invite him or her to a bottle of water but better to a coffee.

- We have a nasty tendency to dress up bad decisions as great ones. In this case, an experiment was shown where a person offered to the volunteers to choose between two pictures of people. The volunteer chose one, but at that moment, the person who was running the experiment, like a magician, swapped the picture, liked it was a card, to give the other one. In 80% of the cases, the volunteers didn’t realize about this change and when they were asked for justifying their decision, they found a lot of arguments. The thing is, even when they could be a little confused, they preferred to find arguments to support their initial (they thought) decision instead of showing in public that they were changing their mind.

- Finally we should follow our intuition. Another experiment supported this statement. It consisted of volunteers that were visioning a sequence of pictures. Unexpectedly, they were able to predict the nice pictures and the disgusting ones. It was measured from the brain signals emitted that showed that before a nice picture was shown, the person was emitting the signal that corresponded to this kind of images. It was like if human beings would have the ability to predict the future and we could make decisions based on something beyond present. Strange, but it is a fact.

I was thinking after the program if I made the right decision when I moved here and why I did. I don’t think I was manipulated, I don’t believe I’ve being tried to dress up my decision (or maybe yes and that's whay I'm writing about some topics in this blog) and maybe I could predict part of the future…Anyway, I enjoyed the program a lot and I’m going to watch a little more TV. But forgive me if the next program that I plan to watch is not very intellectual: “Bolton – Atletico Madrid”. I hope I’ll enjoy a lot, do you know what I mean?

Back to routine

Sunday, 03-02, 12:00

It has passed a long time ago since I published my last post. I’ve spent one holiday week in Spain and by the way it was really cool: six nights in “Formigal” (Pyrenees), 1 night in Madrid and 1 night in Roa. There is a saying: “you can not see the mountain from the top”. Sometimes to have a clear and objective idea or knowledge about something you have to get away from it and to watch it from the distance. That’s what is happening with Spain and all that I left there and even with the new things that I’ve discovered recently.

I think I haven’t done anything very “special” in London in January. What do I mean for “special”? Is it because I already feel at home and living here is not a novelty anymore?

I’ll tell what has happened this week as an example of my new routine. Work at the office is getting better. My desk is already cluttered with my stuff. My English is still rubbish but at least I can hold a conference call with native English during 2 hours (as this Friday, it was too long!) without so stress as I had at the beginning. Still I don’t fell very confident and I’m sure that I don’t understand the nuances of some expressions but at least I can get by and I can endure this.

Here in UK, the famous TV series in Spain (Camera café) would not be successful as it is impossible to find a person near the vending machine more than the time required to come the coffee out to bring it to their desks. That’s why I have my daily coffee at 9.15 just when I come in the office or after lunch as for me there is no coffee without a chat and at that moment it is easier to manage company to sit down in the canteen for a while. I usually have lunch two or three days a week with my colleagues from my department and the rest are for to meet some friends from the office, most of them from the Spanish Community. I have a very good atmosphere with my colleagues. London is incredibly open and you feel at home after 2 weeks living here. In some way it reminds me Madrid. I don’t spend more than one hour for the lunch time but at 6.30 as the most I leave the office. It is a good deal. The last new is the football team that some colleagues have launched called the “Orange Galacticos”. They asked me several times to join them to have a “Primera Division” representative but I have to admit that I haven’t played football for the last 10 years!

I’ve got used to working here. The main difference is the fact that I have to take care of a lot of details, everything has to be planned in advance and it is not possible to use short cuts. But on the other hand it is nice to go to the office knowing that you are not going to have suddenly a crisis. That disorganization is part of the Spanish culture although I have to state that things here are easier as there are more resources for everything.

Here Wednesdays have replaced Thursday as the weekly day to go out for dinner. As usual I did it with my Belgium and Dutch friends. We had an invitation to go to a Scandinavian party in Kings Road so we tried to find a restaurant near there. We were adventurous and we came into “The Bluebird”. A very trendy place very suitable for the “Loaners” (people from Chelsea, it comes from the “Loane Square” that is in the middle of the neighbourhood, as my nice friend Sophie explained to me yesterday). Nice style, very posh, good service and … crap food, nothing special at all. People must pay to be seen instead of for having nice food I thought. The worst thing was the bill, extremely expensive although it is true that we ordered also “some” cocktails and “digestive liquors”. Anyway, it is likely that I come back but never for dinner, just for a drink. Afterwards we went to the club “Raffles”. We found the same atmosphere as in Bluebird: very modern, good style but the drinks were incredibly expensive and the people we met there they seemed to be for posing. And we didn’t meet any Scandinavian person at all! Most of them they were sit down and drinking champagne. I thought, does everybody like champagne as the only thing to drink? I have to admit that the place was glamorous but a little boring. We were nearly to leave it without having any drink but in the end we decided to stay. Fortunately I was the most responsible one and I left it around 1 whereas my friends stayed there more time… I could notice next morning in the office!

Saturday afternoon, I was having a very nice lunch in front of the Saint Paul’s Cathedral in Café Rouge with a good company. We had a very nice conversation addressing subjects such as the actuality concerning Media companies in UK and Spain, policy (general elections are coming in Spain), work and life in general. I’m very keen on having these quiet chats during the weekends, with a good café late or lunch and if I make the most of it by exploring London it is perfect.

Saturday night, I went to have dinner to Lonsdale. It is without any doubt the most visited place by me during the weekends since I moved here. There is very good music, prices are reasonable and people are nice. It is the typical place in Notting Hill. I like the style of people here, mixing formal clothes with informal ones. I didn’t want to look different and I wore a formal coat with jeans, and a beard of 7 days! We were 2 Belgian, one French man, one French woman and I. At the end of the dinner one Scottish man and another French girl joined us. We ordered some wine, Pinot Noir from California and 2 bottles from Chile to start and Blue label Johnny Walker to end... The dinner was ok and ten times better than Bluebird as my Belgium friend didn’t stop saying. He revealed me where his obsession for food and wine come from. The thing is in Belgium it is very popular to have gastronomic weekends for all the family. So from their childhood they are educated to be very picky with the food. I’m sure it is part of the Spanish legacy. As time goes on I’m more convinced about the fact that Spaniards take after Belgian. I was hoping to leave home very early but at the end it was 11 when I left.

So I haven't known new places. Today, the typical things that you can expect from a Sunday: put in order my apartment, reading the newspaper, cooking, gym, watching “the match of the day” on TV (Torres scored yesterday again!) and Skyping … So do I have a new routine? I think so. Madrid is over for the moment…