My dear
Neia has become an emigrant - she's gonna leave beautiful Lisbon to go on a call-centre work adventure in Barcelona.
And I think, while I eat my Food Doctor's Natural Dried Fruit Mix (virtually fat free, natural source of energy and rich in antioxidants),
why have we all left the country?
It's a fact that Lisbon is beautiful, full of history and culture, nice people and great food, but there are very few interesting and well-payed jobs. The country is in the middle of a depression, and although it's very easy to find a shite-y job in catering or retail (ridiculously payed) if you aim high on looking for something, you'll only be disappointed.
I left Lisbon to Barcelona in December 2001 - I quit my well-payed job as a Software Engineer and went to the "Ciutat Comtal" with a big desire for adventure.
I was always the perfect and well-behaved son and worker, still living with my parents at 25, so besides getting a real kick out of my decision being such a huge shock to everyone, I really needed to do something different, a real 360 degree turn.
It actually turned out to be 360 degrees, because I got to Barcelona and started working in the same thing, taking an hour to get to work as before, and even if I had more freedom, more responsibility in terms of having to take care of myself, I got myself in the same place I was in Lisbon.
After a year working for the worst company ever - it's called
Gesab so that you know and spread bad publicity - I spent a few more months in Barcelona not doing anything and decided to go to London. Here I am now and enjoying it a lot.
A little bit of history now, as we look back into the path of my friends who took off from Lisbon in search of a place under the sun.
Our emigrant adventure starts with
Filipe who left to Barcelona early 2000 (I think), and then
Ricardo followed him (and we broke up because of that - thank you mr Filipe indeed). They all went to work for the marvelous and exciting (not) world of the call centres - work they were doing in Lisbon but for much less money that they were getting in Barcelona.
After a few months,
Claudia followed the boyz. In the meanwhile,
Luis Massive was coming and going to London as the seasons do - now I want it now I don't - now he does and is my flatmate.
Jenna the same thing always coming and going from place to place, now London, then Mozambique, now San Francisco (are you there now?).
Christine and
Susana are in London for almost more than 2 years now, studying and working.
Nowadays, apart from my close friends from Uni, who are all still in Portugal, and
Pedro Rosinha we have all deserted our country.
So,
do we feel better abroad with different language and culture and of course different people around us than in our own country, where we have our references, our first belongings, our families and friends?
I would say so, otherwise we would've got back long ago. I mean, we're not in a different continent, a flight back takes less 2 hours or less. It's not an underdeveloped country we're talking about either - if we actually didn't feel alright where we are now, it wouldn't be that difficult to get back and adapt.
We know that no matter what we will never become "one of them" - a local - because of the "invaded" country's subconscient resistance to the unexpected and different.
The language barriers are a problem - we are not able to maintain an interesting and reasoning conversation at the same level we would do so in our own language. Of course we are understood and understand almost everything, and if we want to compare ourselves with the worst then yes we are much better than some locals when it comes to the ability of expression, but it's very difficult to become one of the best.
In fact you never feel 100% welcomed.
Come to think of it, do I really want to be "one of them"? Not really. I like it here a lot, but I like to think I still have my
'tuga roots very much intact.
The main problem I see and feel now, is as time goes by, we are becoming as much outsiders back home as we are here.
