Job Discussion Forums

[neilfagan]

Just looking for some feed back from folk who have worked in both Madrid and Barcelona. Wondering which you preferred re:

Cost of living
Finding work
Social life

I am asking as a European passport holder with a little over years experience.....

Thanks !

[SgtPhilco]

Hi, I am going to do my 4 week TEFL course in Barcelona in May. I have visited the city twice before and thing it is a lovely place to go but will find out soon enough the work situation and all other aspects. Will post asap sorry it can't be sooner really as I ma keen to get away and get this course under my belt. Hope you maybe get some other replys as I know mine probably has not been much help

Cheers and good luck

Phil.H

[Moore]

Can only do the Madrid side of things I'm afraid:

Cost of living:Room 350, shopping about 150, bills 35, shared internet 25, transport 35. Basic pay packet: about 1100, but will go up to about 1400 when you get into your stride (don't forget there's little work to be had in July and August though).

Getting work: easy, just need a few weeks of pounding the yellow pages.

Social life: insane - Madrid has an excellent social life and this is what I didn't include in the expenses: alcohol has to be most peoples biggest expense here, often as much or more than your rent.

Spain is not a place to save up money in: it's much more about learning Spanish and having a good laugh. If you want to save up a lot or have debts and stuff then get yourself off to Korea or Taiwan. Madrid is superb and I highly recommend it.

[j bradley]

Hey Moore, for the first time in a while .... Go Moore.

Madrid is great. I've been here for quite a while now. I did my TEFL with EBC, they helped get me working and after that ...... boy Madrid is one hell of a terrific place.

My rent is 375 a month and I share with a Spanish couple in central Madrid. Food etc. is about 150 a month and the rest is party money.

I earn just over 1,000 Euros a month and it's enough to keep this gal happy. There's always something going on and on summer weekends you won't get home until after the sun comes up. Forget New York, Madrid beats it into the shade. Frank sang about the wrong town when he said "I wanna wake up in the city that never sleeps. He was talking about Madrid.

The place I love best in the summer is the Castellana. They open up bars all the way down the boulevard and you can bar hop all night long.

By the way, there's lot's of teaching work here as well just to fill in those non-party hours.

Seriously though, Madrid is a great place for work and fun.

[neilfagan]

Cheers for the response guys. I've actually been to Madrid on holiday and always wanted to return and work there for a few years. Have any of you ever supplemented your income with Bar work etc ?

Thanks again for the positive feedback.

[Moore]

I've got a couple of mates who did work in bars: the money's very poor, but you get a lot of hours in so you can make about a thousand a month (plus some free booze depending on where you work plus a bit of food plus good instant social life) but the bar opening hours here (until very late) and varying shifts from week to week, sometimes split, mean it's hard to combine with teaching which tends to start at 8:00am and can go on until 8:00pm. It's pretty much either/or. The last mate to do it did it to get into her Spanish which did work to some extent but she gave up after a few months to do teaching. The other alternative is to go down to the Costas in May and get soem summer work, but they ask for a certain level of Spanish and preferably other languges too, but the money there can be pretty good and a lot of fun if you're into the ladies.

[JohnnyDangerously]

How hard will it be to find work if I show up in Spain in April? Not very, I mean, are they basically recruiting people on a rolling basis untied to any sort of academic calendar? That's how it is in Thailand. I understand that jobs become scarce around the summer months... how bad is it? Do you go hungry (or, even worse, thirsty) if you don't have money saved up for the drought? And just what level is this "certain level of Spanish" you refer to regarding Costas. (I can count to 100!)
Are there other areas of summer work, b/c if not it seems these would be highly sought after.

[Moore]

Schools do recruit all year round, but new groups to teach don't tend to get formed just before summer. To clarify, April, May, and June are full months, still a bit of work in July, really sparse in August and September, ned of September things start to pick up. Your best bet is to go to the UK to teach summer camps then come back in September, sort out a flat and be ready for things to get going. Or stick it out through the rainy season over in Bangkok: the pay's the same here as it is over there.

[AllOne]

So the night life is good in Madrid, the work is abundant, housing is costly - but if you can share, you can manage...my big question: how is the air? I've read that the pollution level exceeds the WHO limits.

Alos, how about cigarette smoking? I've just spent 4 years in Budapest where everybody and their child smokes cheap cigs that stink and choke all those who don't smoke. I got sick just being around those smokers. Do the Spaniards also smoke like fiends?

Madrid sounds great, but I want to breathe and use a bicycle. Maybe Barcelona is better for me? I've heard they're snotty, is it true? I don't want to live with snotty people - which is why I'm passing on Vienna where the air is very clean and streets bicycle friendly and the night life great - and I even have friends! (But there's not much work!)

[Moore]

If you don't like smoke and want to ride your bicycle then don't come to Madrid, seriously, wrong place for you if that's important to you.