Drafting pints of beer as if I’d never done anything else...

Hola!
Since last time a lot of things have happened. First Jolita started working in a restaurant with the main responsibility for the ice creams, and then I started working in an English bar last Friday. And Fiona joined us here in Torrevieja. I have watched a lot of educational tv-shows on SVT and spent all my free time on the balcony where I can see the sea. Who would have thought this a few weeks ago?

So yeah, one week and a little more has passed by here in Torrevieja and both me and Jolita have jobs. It is rather funny really, the fact that she, who has a lot of experience in bars, is working with ice cream, and me, who has been working with smoothies – almost ice cream – is working in a bar… Oh well, I gotta learn properly sometime. And isn’t an English bar a good place to start?

My boss is English and apart from her I am working with her daughter and a Chilean guy. It has been going all right so far. I think I can become relatively good at the job. Most of the customers are English, some are Irish and very few Spanish. There are a lot of regulars that I am supposed to talk to. I don’t know, I guess I am more Swedish than I thought, doing small talk with people I have nothing in common with is not one of my strengths. I can be polite and nice in a normal way but I am not too good at talking about nothing and feel I don’t know these people good enough to start telling them my life story. The worst thing is that the regulars have all been introduced to me and remember my name while I am completely confused as to which English lady is Dolly and which English man is John…

It’s fun though and on Saturday one man asked me how my second day was and then continued to ask how long in fact I had been in Torrevieja. When I replied one week today, he said "and already you’re drafting a pint like you’ve never been doing anything else!". That was nice. Otherwise Saturday evening was hell. I was working first a couple of hours in the afternoon and then from 18-03. I came home with so much pain in so many places on my body that I exhausted stumbled into bed and decided that I was going to sleep many, many hours. Normally the bar isn’t open that late, but we don’t close until people go… Welcome to Spain – you’ll never get thrown out of a bar here!

Apart from working I’ve spent a huge amount of my first wages on a shopping spree and is spending a lot of my time at home on the balcony. Even late at night it is nice to sit out there and just enjoy the still rather warm evening.

I’ll be back soon with more information.
Hasta luego!
/k