Kathy Goes Global: Qui no s’arrisca no pisca

¡Hola a todos! I've officially finished week two of being a working woman in Barcelona. So exciting!! I'll tell you all about it in a second, but first I wanted to mention something that I forgot to put in my previous post!
This is a rather lengthy entry... sorry I'm not sorry :-)

A little over a week ago I had the chance to go and see Lo Imposible (in English it's called "The Impossible"; click here if you have no idea what I'm talking about). I actually went to the premiere of the movie. My boss at work had received an email for free entrance to the premiere so not only was I one of the first ones to see the movie, but it was also free! Ha check me out! I went to the movie with Mario, a fellow coworker, and we both walked out of the theatre after the movie in a state of shock. What an amazing movie. It was also probably one of the hardest movies I've ever watched. For lack of a better word it was just gut-wrenching at times. The special effects were awesome, and it hit home even more because the movie is based on a true story. It was a super powerful movie to say no more. You should all go and see it. Unfortunately, you'll have to wait until December when it comes out in the States. Did I mention that they dub everything here? I mean EVERYTHING. I gave myself a pat on the back for watching the entire movie dubbed in Spanish without any subtitles and understanding the entire thing. Get it Kath!!

So onto mi trabajo! Officially two weeks in and going strong. I feel like I'm finally starting to get my feet firm on the ground. It is definitely a different environment from what I am used to, but at the same time it's a nice change for a short period of time. After all, I wanted an experience that was new and different from the norm because I've really ever only been exposed to one workplace, which I happen to love! I have a position with a small startup firm here in Barcelona, so the information I am going to give is rather limited being that they are still in the process of "starting up". Currently the company has a team of four people, not including myself and Mario, who was brought on to work on their marketing strategy. They also have a team of outside advisors that they hold meetings with for feedback and suggestions every quarter. My overall duties include helping the business find investors, particularly in the U.S. as well as figuring out a way to financially maximize the flow of money internally. In simpler terms, every company has a system where they keep track of where all of their money is going. My job is to help them figure out the best system that best suits the company's needs to do this. I've also been working on different revenue models for the company. They are still in the process of figuring out the best way to charge customers, so I have been looking at different options in this area to find the best option. This may seem not so complicated, but it is actually quite complicated. When first starting a business, there is always a fine line between balancing revenue and gaining clients. Maximizing revenue in the very beginning could lead to the inability to sustain clients in the long run, whereas gaining a large clientele in the beginning usually doesn't provide much revenue. It typically involves free trials to convince people of your product so you can get your foot in the door. There has to be a balance in order for the business to get off its feet and hit the ground running. Still with me?

Ok, pues seguimos. I've enjoyed doing the bookkeeping so far too. Anyone who has done bookkeeping before is probably shaking their head right now thinking I'm off my rocker. While that may in part be true, it's been rather interesting because all of the receipts I am inputting into our files are in different languages. Most have been in Spanish, which a mi me gusta mucho, but many receipts have also been in Swedish and Dutch. The few days where I was doing the bookkeeping I was living on Google Translate. I actually started to pick up the language a bit, and by that I mean if you handed me a receipt I'd be able to tell you which phrase says "Total, Change, and Thanks for shopping with us!". It seems as though this would be an easy task, translating a receipt, but it was surprisingly difficult to find the total price and amount paid. Good thing I work with language guru's. Out of the team of four people that I mentioned previously, I work with two of them on a daily basis, and both of them speak so many different languages. I have no idea how they keep them all straight, but it's awesome that they can communicate with such ease with so many different people. For instance, Bart is from Holland so his first language is Dutch. He also speaks English, Spanish, French, and German. I can't remember, but he might even speak Swedish as well. Rebecca on the other hand is from Sweden. She speaks seven languages, including English, Spanish, and Catalan. Toss Mario in the mix who is bilingual with Spanish and English. MADRE MIA. What a crowd! Almost puts me and my Spanish to shame! Kidding, but I think it's very cool to be working with people that are just so good with so many different languages. When I say good, I mean these people really are good at speaking all of those languages!!

I hope I don't bore you all with this next topic, but it made me excited so I'm going to talk about it. This past week I saw my first Financial Statements (Balance Sheet and Income Statement) Spanish style! Woot woot!! Half of you probably don't even know what they consist of and the other half probably doesn't care, pero ni importa. I loved having the experience. Does that make me a nerd? Ni importa tampoco. I have a meeting with the company's accountant on Monday, so I am looking forward to really picking his brain to learn more about the Spanish accounting system. It's been an awesome experience learning from these Financial Statements because not only am I learning the Spanish accounting vocabulary that I have been dying to learn, but I'm also seeing the differences between Spanish accounting and U.S. accounting. Again, have to throw my thank you to the CPA exam out there one more time. Oh how I love that exam so dearly. Not.

Outside of work I've been continuing to do intercambios as often as possible. I had a really fun time this past Monday at the language exchange that I go to every Monday. I got seated at an awesome table with very interesting people who were all very impressed with my Spanish, and that always makes you feel good! This past Wednesday, Xavi (pronounced "Sabi") and I had a very interesting political and sports related conversation in Spanish and English! Xavi and I have agreed to meet every Wednesday until I leave. It's been fun getting to know him and his normal routine and lifestyle here, and as always it's been very good practice for the both of us language-wise. I also had the chance to Skype with Ivonne last night, the wonderful woman I stayed with in Argentina whom I miss very much so! Her daughter lives in Barcelona, and hopefully I will have the chance to meet her in the next couple of weeks. I think that would be a really cool experience!! It's such a small world too. I actually live two blocks away from where Ivonne's daughter and son used to live here. During our conversation last night we spent most of our time talking about different things to see in Barcelona! And also how I can't wait to go back and visit Buenos Aires again! It's funny to me, that the more I am here in Barcelona, the more I seem to like it. However, I am still completamente enamorada de Buenos Aires, so it's hard to compare anything to the experience I had in South America.

The weather has been very mild here. Actually, most people I see are starting to bundle up, but I still find that its rather hot. It's been in the 70's everyday, and sometimes it's a little chilly in the morning, but it's been so humid more than anything. The past two weeks have had great weather during the week and then rain on the weekends. Totally putting a damper on my plans, but I've managed to sneak out each time when it hasn't been raining on the weekend. Go me! Today I went for a long walk. I mean LONG. I walked for almost 3 hours, stopping every now and then of course. I finally visited el Arc de Triumf, which is a pretty major point in the city. I also went to el Mercat de Mercats. Translation: the market of markets. THE market of markets. It was awesome. A huge showcase of tapas and other food, and wine and champagne. I bought a ticket that was good to redeem for four tapas. I had patatas bravas, a variation of tortilla española, croquetas, and I forget the last one. Haha oops. All typical dishes of Barcelona (and Spain really). Patatas bravas are basically spicy potatoes. They are very tasty. Tortilla española is a combination of eggs, potatoes, onions, olive oil, and salt. It kinda looks like an omelette. The one that I had today was made with sweet potatoes. Again, delicious. Croquetas are an interesting concoction as well. My explanation probably won't do them justice so you can read about them here. They are very delicious too. I also bought a freshly squeezed juice that was a mix of strawberry and mango. Oh, and I also had chocolate-covered pineapple. I ate so much delicious food today!

When I got home today I realized that I had walked through almost the entire neighborhood of barrio gótico. Se llama el Gotic acá. I'll let my pictures do the explaining, but it is a very cool neighborhood. You'll rarely find cars driving through it. That's mainly because cars barely fit on the streets, that's how narrow they are. It's like a huge labyrinth. A maze that you can easily get lost in. Surprisingly, I was able to keep my sense of direction. Who knew that would ever happen here?! Successful day on the whole. I'm looking forward to exploring my neighborhood tomorrow (Gracia). Hopefully the rain will hold off!

Have you figured out what the title of this post means? Primero, have you figured out that it's not Spanish? Say hello to Catalan. As similar as it is to Spanish, you can also see how different it can be at times. Want to venture a guess what it means? Yea, me neither. It means if you don't take risks in life you will never succeed. You win some and you lose some, but never without trying! Fun fact of the day (only for you Brother Goo).

¡Hasta la próxima!