Living & working in Spain - Particularly the Costa Brava and Catalonia

Yesterday I had a day out in Girona with the video camera. I filmed the human castles that the Catalan people are so fond of. It really is amazing though. I saw them go 9 people high with the castles and there was only one tumble of all the castles completed.

The most amazing was the castel that is part built from the top and them they lift all of that castle up a couple of layers. A lot of hands and plenty of strength to do that.

I edited the video this morning and honestly my video skill need some work badly, there is a bit of camera shake as the tripod wasn't high enough to get above the heads to get a good view. I kept the cam on the tripod though and steadied it a bit by using the pendulum effect work on it. I did get some good photos of one of the castles though with the SLR and I have made that into a slide show. It is OK to do things not too well so long as you realise the problems and learn from it. I had about 20 - 30 minutes of footage and have it edited down to five minutes.

Have to say though that it is nail biting stuff to watch as they send up to the top the smallest of children. The castles do go quite high and you wouldn't want to be up there looking down.

I hope to get the video published later today onto BravaChat. I will post an update when it is done.

Last year I wanted to end an account with Telefonica and it took me months and they charged me more money and I had to get intervention help from the local consumer centre.
I said I would do all I could to avoid Telefonica following that, including looking a WiMax as a possible solution to get rid of Telefonica completely. The local WiMax company turned out to be a bunch of lying toads that couldn't trusted so I steered clear of that option. The said one speed on the brochure then told me a different speed when I talked with them and fianlly we measured the speed on an existing installation in a neighbours house which was slower than the other quoted speeds. This WiMax people even quoted two or three different prices to confuse us more.

I digressed there but after all of the hating of Telefonica, I want an iphone and the only way to do that without jailbreaking the iphone is to go with Telefonica Movistar.
I was looking for one in July when they were supposed to be available in the local shop with no luck, and to date the still have not seen one in stock there.

I tried Girona the nearest city last week and they had had them but were out of stock and then this week I was passing the shop I called in and they said they had some. Woo hoooo. So I waited in a queue for 20 minutes then spent another 20 minutes while the young girl struggled with the computer to get it started. No luck and she asked me to come back after the 3 hour lunch time.

I went back at 5pm and spent an hour in there. My phone number went Ok and then when she tried to move my wife's number on the new account too, the problems started again. In the end we couldn't complete the paperwork and I still will have to wait another four days to get my hands on the new toy. I would have to wait for Vodafone to pass the number across anyway. If we had known that their computer was not going to play ball then I wouldn't have needed to stay waiting in the shop for so long.

I did see that there were other customers still being dealt with that entered the shop at the same time as we went in. I have to wonder how they can do business when they need to spend so long with each customer with all of the Spanish Red Tape.

That was supposed to be a quick posting but ended up a bit of a rant....

I have been living here in Spain for the last five and half years and enjoying it. I have been fortunate by having a Spanish wife and not had the bothers that some people have in buying property here. I have a web site which is about trading on Betfair, I review systems and strategies and sell the software that help people to trade. I don't condone gambling and inform as much as possible about how to trade on the prices and not get burned.

I really like the under 2.5 goals market on Betfair and have something that works pretty well and I have been reviewing the Football Cash Generator product recently and not doing well with it. Thank goodness for paper trading for testing systems.

For me the success is in the selling of the software, such as BetAngel and BetIE. More than that I have built the site so that I have a good amount of traffic going through it and I am able to sell advertising to get a bit of income. The site is Wizardgol Betfair Trader Blog and Podcast. I have produced 37 podcasts both audio and video and had downloads of over 36,000 overall, according to my stats.

I also have a site dedicated to selling photographs and illustrations via the Micro Stock sites. It is also possible to sell video, flash, animation and even sound inthe same way. If you are a creative sort then have a look at Spondicious Photography for information about how to go about doing the micro stock business. I cover how to submit work I discuss the various microstock sites and talk about the technical details of producing the illustrations in CS3 Illustrator.

Spondicious Podcast 04 is on iTunes

In this podcast I talk about how good micro stock is for earnings when you stop adding new images. When you want to or need to take some time off from uploading. Feeding the beast is the phrase coined on Lee Torrens Blog - Microstock Diaries.

I talk about HDR photography and I have included some small tips and tricks to help you along with the stock photography business.

Lastly I have put in a request for funny stories that you might have regards being a photographer or whatever. I will post funny stories in a Podcast and in return I will put a link to your website and of course you can include a plug in the audio too.

Enjoy the Spondicious Podcast number four

BravaChat is the latest of my websites and is all about living here in Catalonia and the Costa Brava. There will be a heavy emphasis on the Podcasting both audio and video and there is one interview posted on the site, one interview in the process of being edited and already 5 more interviews lined up.

Next week I will be shooting footage of the Girona Festival and I am really looking forward to the human castles. Last time I saw it I was biting off all the finger nails while watching the small children being sent up to the top of the tower. I think the one I saw that was the highest went to eight people high. Ten people high is the record I think. A dangerous Catalan pastime well worth seeing. The other catalan event I partial to is the Correfoc where the devils run through the town with fireworks swinging above their heads. The last one I saw they had fire breathers also spitting fire in the air. The drums and the Catalan wind instruments are great too, builds up the whole atmosphere. Brilliant stuff.

Looking forward to meeting more ex pats online. I am from Sutton Coldfield near Birmingham and I spent twelve years in Ireland before coming here. Any more Brummies here ? Even Aston Villa supporters ??

I can't put any links in here yet but if you google Wizardgold or Spondicious you will get me and The BravaChat  Podcast is searchable on iTunes

Interview with Peter of MyGironaSpain.com

Today I went for a trip to Girona to meet with Peter Foremski of the web site MyGironaSpain and after a cup of tea, which always makes an interview run more smoothly, we got down to making a recording. I was using the Zoom H2 audio recorder which allows me to make recordings without having to carry a computer around with me.

Peter was also telling me about another web site his wife Debra has called LittleLanguageLearners with English books for all ages, Girona based but serving the whole of Spain & U.K www.LittleLanguageLearners.co.uk

 Interview with Peter Foremski: Hide Player | Play in Popup | Download

Peter Foremski

This first podcast is an introduction to the site and about me the host and producer of the BravaChat Blog and Podcast.

Hi there my name is David Allen and I have put up the BravaChat site to be a place for interaction for residents of Costa Brava and a little further south too down as far as Valencia even. In fact all of Catalonia is included, even the French part.

We will be out and about reporting on the things that happen in this area. For example later this month there is the festival time in Girona and I really would like to see the human castles again. They are just heart stopping to watch.

I will be interviewing residents and getting the lowdown on what it is like living here. Jobs businesses, relaxing, socialising and anything else that comes up and looks interesting.

If you have got to this site and you would like to advertise on it I am offering Free Advertising for the first six months of operation of the site. Get in contact with me using the comments below. I would love to come and interview you and get to know you and your business. I want to make the interviews available as a podcast, either in a video or audio format and with links to your website and an advertisment.

Leave a comment and I will be happy to get back to you and get a dialogue going.

Let me know if you want to be interviewed and have your business spotlighted in a Podcast. I can record the interview from Skype.