I arrived in Barcelona a week ago (in the famous Spanish novel our hero arrives there just before the end of his story, but (hopefully) it’s toward the beginning of mine!). Spent a nice four-day weekend with my “Dulcinea” (something DQ never managed). Tuesday was the first día laborable that I was here, so I went to work, too, at my current “job” — which is to introduce myself to the various bureaucracies of Spain and Catalunya.
On Tuesday (with Dulcinea back at work), I wanted to start things off properly, so of course I went for a haircut (one of the things that eluded me in my last busy weeks in Montreal). I hoped to avoid any communication problems, and especially the 80s-style “hockey hair” (aka “coupe Longueuil” aka “corte futbolista” — everyone has their name for it); also, the dreadlocks and other favourites of misguided Catalan and Spanish youths.
I managed to get a reasonable (and pleasantly mullet-free) cut at a salon just up the hill, a mere block from my new home. The hairdresser’s husband, it so turned out, was from Canada; no less, from Edmonton! She’d even visited his family there (and (sorry, but), hated it)…Dulcinea tells me the hairdresser is actually separated now (she didn’t mention this to me), so perhaps that adds to the bad associations? Anyhow, this seemed a pretty unlikely coincidence, since there are very few Canadians (let alone Edmontonians) here, especially in this neighbourhood.
I then went to try to open a bank account (something that continued all week, until I finally gave up for now). I discovered (should have remembered, since it has happened to me before) that the numbers on two sides of the street don’t necessarily “align”. I was on Diagonal, looking for number 538. I was on the odd side of the street, around 300-something, so I kept walking and walking as the number slowly grew. Another thing is that a block doesn’t guarantee you a fixed increase in street numbers, such as by 100. Instead, it was quite a hike and I was still far from 500. I decided to cross, and discovered that I’d overshot! I was now at 602, so I imagined it would be a short walk back…instead, it was quite another hike back to (more or less) where I’d started. I think this phenomenon is especially common on the big streets, like Diagonal, Passeig de Gràcia and so on.
In the end, I was lucky that the bank was still open, since it was now after 14h, and most other banks were closed for the day. After a 15- to 20-minute wait, the ING man told me I couldn’t open a “current” (what we’d call a “chequing”) account because I don’t have a job right now — they only had “nómina” accounts (into which your paycheque is deposited). So I tried Deutsche Bank (also open), and after considerable confusion and freaking out the security guard with my apparent loitering in the massive open lobby, I was told more or less the same thing: that I should try with one of the more “local” banks, such as La Caixa or Caixa Catalunya. No success there — the only real progress for the day was a fresh haircut and also a set of “carné”-sized photos I had taken for the TIE application (Tarjeta de Identificación de Extranjeros, aka foreigners’ identity card).
On Wednesday, Dulcinea took the day off work to go with me to get empadronado (registered with the Municipal Registry). This is a key first step to almost every other game in town. Because I am not renting or buying a place right now, and because I don’t have any (water, gas, electric) bills with my name on them that prove my address, she had to come with me to certify that I was living at the same address. This all went remarkably well — and in a beautiful community building that had something in common, design-wise, with the Alhambra. We took a number, sat amongst a crowd of forty or so in a bright hall and watched the red quickly numbers tick up to mine. In total, we waited maybe 30 minutes (como mucho), then we were in and chatting with a friendly administrative woman. There were no problems. She told me it was very important to go to the medical centre to get a health care card (la tarjeta sanitaria from CatSalut, the debt-laden Catalan health agency). I was a bit surprised, since I’d understood I’d not be covered by the public health system for now, since I’ve never worked in Spain and so was not registered (nor could I register) with the Social Security administration. In fact, I had to show proof of private insurance in order to get my visa, and I understood that this requirement would not change once I was in the country. More on this mystery later (though it’s only more mysterious to me — and to everyone I ask about it — at the moment).
After that, we took the bus to the health centre just off Maragall, and at the front desk (after a short wait among old folks getting drugs or cups for their urine samples) were told to go to the third floor and ask for the card there. Up we went (via the stairs, being the healthy folk that we are) and were helped right away by a nice girl who gave me a sheet explaining the three things one needs to get the health card. Two of them I had (passport or identity card, plus proof of empadronamiento, which I had hot off the press), but the third was lacking: a registration number from the Social Security administration. I asked if I could still get this number if I weren’t working, and she said, “yes, they’ll still give you a number you can use for this.” Fair enough (though again, I was surprised, from what I’d heard before). But the place to get this number was a fair ways away, and we had yet to fulfill our main objective for the day: a visit to the Oficina de Extranjeros (Foreigners’ Office) down on Marquès de l’Argentera near Barceloneta, in order to fulfill the obligations for my residence permit and card.
I had a printout telling me I had to go within 30 days of my arrival in Spain (so far so good, since it had been only 5 days so far). It indicated I had to go on a Wednesday, between 12h and 14h, and that no appointment woulld be needed. Hmmm…can you tell we planned ahead? (Yes, it was Wednesday, and just after 11h, so off we went.)
[to be continued]