Fifty-Fifty

Two things have happened today that have made me realise (even more) how much I love England.

The first was listening to a conversation with one of the Polish guys who work in my office. He was saying he is going back to Poland in a few days to buy a plot of land to build his house. When asked: “So, you’re planning to leave us and go back to Poland?”, his answer was a massive “Of course”.

I wasn’t surprised to hear myself thinking aloud “Of course he won’t stay. He’s just come to this country to get rich* and bugger off”. I wasn’t surprised because in very little time I’ve become very protective of England (despite being an immigrant myself). And all these cases of foreigners who come to the country to work for a pittance, live in infrahuman conditions and then after a few years go back to their own homecountries, where they can exchange their savings in pound sterling for their lower valued own currency, well, it annoys me a lot. I find it very unfair.
But I not only get annoyed at the Polish (who are the most obvious, but not the only ones!). I also feel embarrased at some Spaniards’ behaviours. Obviously the political/economical situation in Spain is bad. Worse than it has been in years. And I don’t blame the people who want to make the best of themselves and try to prospere abroad. But you have to be a bit more humble and respect the society that has accepted you and given you a chance!

I read in the Spaniards forum all these cases of people despising and looking down on England, or Scotland, or Ireland, or whatever country they live in. ALWAYS comparing it to Spain. And it annoys me. Hell, it does. You only find a few cases of people who actually realise that they have to be grateful. “Don’t quarrel with your bread and butter”…

That was the second reason that made me realise today how much I love this country. I found myself very worked up over one of those posts in the forum where someone said that, actually, a study said that life in Spain is better, much better than in the UK. So how come everybody is desperate to leave Spain? I ask…
What really drives me up the wall is that the only figures in that study in which Spain was higher than the UK were “hours of sun per year” and “holiday allowance per year”. The rest of the figures (overall salary, working hours per week, education spending, etc) clearly favoured the UK! I’m sorry, but “quality of life” comes with much more than more hours of sunshine…

I’m not feeling very “inline” with my fellow countrymen at the moment. It’s not that I don’t feel Spanish, it’s just that I don’t agree with most of their way of seeing things. Actually, because of the forum, I’ve been doing more and more “Spanish” things lately, like cooking Spanish food and listening to lots of Spanish music. However, my nationality does not define me.

Today I’m feeling 50-50.