Now that everyone has been following the world economy and the €uropean financial crisis, it is good time to take a look back at the time when Euro was not yet in use. As a university student I was lucky enough to get a decent summer job in Tampere. That gave me some extra wealth to the otherwise tight student budget, so I and my girl friend headed to Costa Blanca, Spain, for a five week’s vacation. We stayed at the villa of my relatives, who were kind enough letting us to stay there. After exchanging some money in a bank and packing our suitcases, we were ready to take off. It felt so good with a pile of notes in my pocket.
Warm and humid air welcomed us at the Alicante airport after the midnight. We jumped into a taxi that drove us through the dark roads about one hour south on the cost line. Finally we arrived at the destination and it was time to pay the long trip. Even if the taxi driver spoke only Spanish, I was clever enough to note that something was wrong. Luckily as a child I had been active watching some western movies and therefore I had my four world vocabulary of Spanish (i.e. amigo, sombrero, mañana, Finlandesa). It became clear that instead of Spanish Pesetas, our notes were Greece Drachmas and the driver was very pissed off.
From my earlier visit I remembered that at least some years ago there was a Finnish family living some hundreds of meters down the same street. With my Spanish and lively hands I succeeded to explain to the taxi driver that I will be running in from of the taxi that will show me some light in the dark street. I was reading all the letter boxes in order to find a hint of a Finnish name. After about one kilometer run I found the sign of family V. in a letter box. I rang the door bell and after a while to door was opened. I explained that I am a Finn in Spain and I need some money. Finns always start with full trust, so I got the needed money and was able to pay the taxi driver. The driver took the money and sped angrily away.
The next morning family V. came to meet us. They were very kind and drove us to the nearest town where we could get some money out of the ATM. It was amazing that you were already late 90’s able to withdraw some Pesetas from a Spanish ATM with Finnish bank card. We were able to pay our debt and we also got new friends who were spending their retirement days in the sunny Costa Blanca.
The rest of the vacation went perfectly. We were sleeping long nights and daily siestas in order to get fresh again. The Spanish food was perfect and sun was shining every day. For a reason or another, I got an inspiration to study some Spanish. I was able to grow my vocabulary by reading Spanish-Finnish dictionary and by having some discussions with the native gardener who visited us couple times during the vacation.
While we returned back to Tampere, the university semester had started already some weeks ago. However, I was persistent enough to get into Spanish lectures by explaining the teacher how I got my sparkle to Spanish.
Lessons learnt:
Money counts.
Finns start relation with full trust.
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| Our vacation at Costa Blanca, Spain. Source: Here.com |
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