steviedeluxe

It may be jest, but celebrating because someone of a certain nationality is murdered, seems in poor taste to me. There again, why should I care? According to her posts she gets plenty of negative karma in real life - overcharged left, right and centre. Even the council apparently charges her double (or more) what others pay. In fact, I feel sorry for her, living in a country she hates so much.

Mitzyboy

End of round 1 eh?

licinius

I moved abroad because I'm sick of being messed with. I have a philosophy of live & let live, you don't interfere with me & I won't interfere with you. But you can't live like that in Britain. There is always some jobsworth eyeballing you hoping that you're going to drop litter or park in the wrong space. Some waster copper out to achive his daily quota of stopped motorists. You get warning letters from the council threatening fines for putting your dustbin out too early, in fact you get threatening letters from just about anyone with warnings about absolutely anything!

The UK breeds anger, it breeds resentment, what happened to all the community spirit & togetherness we hear so much about during the Blitz? Can you really imagine putting your kids on a train & asking some country bumpkin to look after them indefinitely??? How about someone knocking at your door & asking you to look after some strange kids from the East End? It just wouldn't happen today would it? How many people would try suing the RAF for damages if a Spitfire pilot was shot down & landed on their greenhouse?

That takes me to life in Spain, where the police are police, if you break the law then you're well & truely in trouble, but if you mind your own business then you have nothing to fear from anyone. I'm relaxed since moving abroad, nobody messes with me, I can just live my life in my own little comfort zone. I won't show the George Cross in Spain as I did in the UK not will I wear an England football shirt, again as I would in the UK. This is out of respect for the natives. If you are so proud of your national flag that you feel the need to fly it on your house, then why did you leave in the first place? Do us all a favour & go back!

I don't speak much Spanish & most of my friends are British, but I feel rude, ignorant & embarrassed asking a Spanisrd to speak English to help me. I was never very good at languages but I will pick it up eventually.

In summary; Life is good in Spain, life is **** in Britain!

HBG

Come on Mitz, we all love you.

It’s not easy to move countries, even if you’ve just arrived with just a suitcase in Beniidorm. We came over with as much as we could fit in a large Granada and came to Denia, a neutral place because I had come from Benidorm and she had come from Barcelona.

That was 13 years ago next Wednesday. That we are still here is nothing short of a miracle. However, before that, we had both lived in Spain for many years.

We love it and can only imagine going home in chains.

jackytoo

Lucinious, I agree with a lot of what you say about petty regulations but on the other side of the coin does it not bother you when you drive around and see rubbish dumped everywhere. We took visitors to Ronda and stopped at a viewing point on the way back and I felt embarrassed beause I had taken them there, the layby was one huge tip. This is just one example, every lake and beauty spot (?) is the same, bottles floating in the water, empty cans and worse!!

The Police don't bother me in Spain , neither do they in the UK or the USA

HBG

Why the **** should they.

jackytoo

Exactly I was just responding to this!

HBG

As it has just happened again, I feel that this might be an appropriate place to tell of it.

My wife is an interpreter for which she is paid, but we also do voluntary work for expat charities. A common and horrible scenario is the phone call from an expat stranger to ask us to contact the hospital to check on the condition of a spouse who has been admitted earlier.

I can usually tell from my wife’s face that it’s time to get the car keys. Then we are at some old person’s door to tell them the bad news. Of course it doesn’t stop there. We have to explain that repatriation costs £15,000, and a simple Spanish cremation costs £3,500.

Then it’s off to the hospital and then the tanatorio, and many phone calls need to be made to arrange everything. This is for people we’ve never seen before and we don’t get paid (not that we would want to be).

The people concerned are often totally helpless and can’t even speak enough Spanish to call a taxi.

agoreira

Ditto here, never had a problem with the police in UK, my only "brush" with them was a speeding fine, but as I was doing 96mph on the motorway, I had no complaint! But then I've never had of any of these warning letters that we all are supposed to receive, nor do I know of any friends, relations or neighbours that have either.

agoreira

No problems here either. I'm pretty certain I "know" this poster from 2 other Spanish forums, so know the background, and whilst they call a spade a spade, I value their opinions much higher than some of the more fanciful stuff posted.

Mitzyboy

Strangely, even though she doesnt have a very good opinion of me, I too take on board what she says even if I dont agree with it a lot of the time.

Anyway, back to the subject ... and hopefully the OP might venture back to tell if some of the comments have been of any use to them

licinius

You've never been within 3 miles of a football ground on matchday then?

HBG

I can't think of a football ground I haven't been to. I've even been to Cold Blow Lane with my West Ham colours, several times.

licinius

Can't have visted many lower league grounds with West Ham. I can't remember exactly when Cold Blow Lane closed down (late 80's - early 90's) but in fairness policing at football was considerably less aggressive & hostile back then.

Anyway back to the OP my point stands, you can live & let live in Spain but you can't in Britain. Maybe some of the posters above left the UK before the onset of the fines culture.

Mitzyboy

Well ... thats not my experience of the UK, and no I havent lost touch with the place. I still own a home there and go back fairly regularly.

Theres silly fines & regulations in Spain as well you know .
Every country has its own set of challenges & problems.