Lode

Hi,

I'm new on this forum so please feel free to criticize if this is the wrong approach...

Anyways, I am a Finnish-English girl, 21 years old and I study biochemistry at the Technical University of Munich, Germany. I'm looking for any kind of job for the summer (August-October), to improve my Spanish. I've sent dozens of applications to biotech companies, but I think it's more unlikely I find anything there...

I've been taking care of kids for years (14 months up), worked at the biochemistry lab at my uni, done office work in different businesses, sold beer at concerts/sports events and also tried telephone marketing. I speak fluent English, German and Finnish (I get by with Swedish too), and some Spanish. I'm willing to give anything a chance, and I'm a quick learner, so if you have any ideas...

Thanks, hoping to hear from you soon!

Lotta

Emma-Louise

Hi,

Could you secure a job before you leave? Maybe through one of the travel companies.....if you could secure a job as a holiday rep, maybe a childrens rep, then you are also provided with accomodation etc...
Does Finland have any major travel companies?
Although it may be too late for that option now...

The problem is that the easiest places to get work i.e. the costas are also the places where it is difficult to intergrate with the Spanish community!
However Marbella centre is normally an exception to that rule...

Good luck!

Emma-Louise

Quick thought - how about one of the gaming companies in Gibraltar? they always pay well for bilingual staff....

cricketman

not sure that would be the best place to learn Spanish. You're better off being a waiter in Madrid.

Carol&John

How about working as a children's rep at a holiday camp? Eurocamp springs to mind.

steviedeluxe

If you have no desire to be a long-term teacher of English, may be worth investigating Vaughn Systems. If you google them you'll find interesting viewpoints pro and contra.
If you were someone investigating teaching English long term, the normal route is to take a TEFL or TESOL course, then go somewhere like Madrid where there's normally lots of jobs going - however this dies away in summer, and August is particularly bad. You may need "experience of teaching" on your cv to give you an advantage in getting the first job - I'll leave that to your imagination on how to achieve that!
Other types of job? Try looking on infojobs.net and search on ingles (or whatever your speciality is in Spanish).

Good luck!

PS Be careful if you find a job in Barcelona - you may find yourself learning Catalan and not Spanish; not necessarily a bad thing, but you need to know not all places there will use Spanish as the main language.

scampicat

How about being a WWOOF (Willing Worker On Organic Farms)?

http://ruralvolunteers.org/WHOSTS/

Although I think you only get food and accommodation (no payment).

steviedeluxe

Just had an idea. With your language skills, why not apply to the language schools and offer to work on commission only basis touting for work? (you can of course offer admin skills and/or work as intern)

A list of some of the language schools in Madrid at this link:

Madrid language schools

Again, there's far less work in summer in Madrid, but in term time some language schools pay folk to hand out fliers. Not strictly legal, and you won't earn a fortune, but if you look northern European and can speak English you may have an advantage. I've known Brits earn money putting fliers on car windscreens - again a bit dodgy, but you may fancy it. Lastly - what about approaching those open top bus companies. I know a lot just use recordings nowadays, but may be worthwhile? (maybe others have experience of this)