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Interview
1 March 2015 2.00 h

Love at first sight

Rebecca Smith Every Friday afternoon on El Punt Avui TV Nicole has a 20 minute chat with an English speaking expatriate who lives in Catalonia. Here is the conversation with Rebecca Smith.
Wel­come Re­becca, a very British sound­ing name, where are you orig­i­nally from?
I am from Don­caster in York­shire, in the North East of Eng­land. It has an in­dus­trial back­ground but once you get out into the coun­try­side it is green and beau­ti­ful.
And now you live in Cat­alo­nia, where abouts?
I live right in the city cen­tre of Barcelona. And have been here for about ten years now.
How did you dis­cover Cat­alo­nia?
I guess you could say Cat­alo­nia dis­cov­ered me! Once I left uni­ver­sity I lived and worked in New York for a good num­ber of years. I met my hus­band there, but we were get­ting in­creas­ingly frus­trated with the rat race and we were look­ing for a way out. An op­por­tu­nity came my way, so we jumped at it but it meant a re­lo­ca­tion back to York­shire. So we were in York­shire for a year and his par­ents were on hol­i­day from Amer­ica in Spain. As it was easy from the UK for us to go and see them in Spain, we went and met them in Barcelona. Had a great week­end, stayed in a nice hotel, in the best part of town.
Was it love at first sight?!
Yes it was!! We were ab­solutely spoilt with the ex­pe­ri­ence! And then on the third morn­ing we both got up, looked at each other and said – ‘Are you think­ing what I am think­ing?'
Re­ally? One week­end, that is all it took for you to make you want to live here!
Yes, but we de­cided, let's not be fool­ish about this. Let's come back, stay in the worst part of town, not do the fancy ver­sion of Barcelona, let's do the every­day ver­sion. So the first time we ex­pe­ri­enced the high­lights and then the sec­ond time we ex­pe­ri­enced every­day life. And we still loved it and thought, this is the place. There is some­thing about it, it got under our skin.
Your busi­ness runs from home, so it was easy for you to move from the UK to Barcelona?
Ex­actly, yes. We help British cus­tomers buy their gas and elec­tric­ity. We run it all on­line. So we just needed a place with high-speed in­ter­net con­nec­tion.
Three months of the year you hop over to Maine?
We have a slice of Amer­ica every sum­mer. It is a com­plete change, I feel like I have a dou­ble ex­is­tence. Here it is city life, I barely use my car. But when we go to Maine, it is in the mid­dle of nowhere. There are prob­a­bly more wild an­i­mals than neigh­bours. I feel very for­tu­nate to have both as­pects in my life.
You are a very keen sports­woman...Iron­man is your thing. It is being here that started it all for you?
For the last five or six years, yes. Oh yes, Barcelona is def­i­nitely to blame! I have al­ways been sporty, but in Eng­land it is hockey, net­ball, ten­nis that are the clas­sic sports. When I came to Barcelona I joined a run­ning group. It was a great way to meet peo­ple and get to know lo­cals. So I learnt my Span­ish and Cata­lan while run­ning. Some of my first words were all about in­ter­vals and train­ing!
So what fu­elled the long dis­tance rac­ing for you?
I watched a friend do a triathlon here and I think she came last in her very first race but she had the biggest smile on her face. I thought if she feels like that cross­ing the line maybe it is some­thing I should try.
Was your first triathlon here?
Yes, in the di­rec­tion of Sit­ges. I was not fast, it was not pretty! And I fin­ished to­wards the back of the group. I re­mem­ber stop­ping for water and they had run out so they of­fered me a bot­tle of wine! I thought, this sport is great! All my friends from the run­ning group were look­ing for new chal­lenges, so we all de­cided to try it to­gether.
Every year you and your hus­band do an Iron­man. Which was the last one your did?
We com­peted in the Iron­man in Nice at the be­gin­ning of the sum­mer (2014). It was bru­tal, the swim was fan­tas­tic but while on the bike, the heav­ens opened and I was so cold. I was wrapped in foil and a plas­tic bag to keep warm, while rid­ing! It was a long event but I feel very proud to have done it.
When you train do you get out of the city or ride your bike from Barcelona?
No, I need dan­ger money to ride my bike in Barcelona, we tend to drive out of the city. Thank­fully on my bike I have dis­cov­ered more of Cat­alo­nia than I have done in my car. You go slower and ap­pre­ci­ate the beauty. And talk about beauty, there is every­thing from the coast­line to the vine­yards to the moun­tains.
Which di­rec­tion do you tend to head off in?
One of my favourite spots to visit is the Penedès Re­gion. It is 40 min­utes by car from Barcelona and there you have un­in­ter­rupted roads to ride on. The scenery is amaz­ing, I just love it.
Can you give me three top tips to any­one com­ing to live in Barcelona.
Cat­alo­nia has so much more to it than just Barcelona. Ex­plore! I love the Penedès, Girona re­gion the Gar­rotxa and many more. And my final tip would be to not let the lack of the lan­guage stop you. If you show an in­ter­est in Cat­alo­nia, the peo­ple here are very wel­com­ing.
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