My Birthday in Alicante

I turned 30 last 6th of February, and to celebrate this remarkable date I flew to Alicante, so I spent those days with my girlfriend and family. In a sunny morning, Sarah and I visited one of the two castle that custody the city of Alicante. This is the Santa Barbara Castle. I hope you will enjoy these beautiful pictures:

To this end, I think the next picture shows how I feel:

Push it to the limit!

Song from Scarface soundtrack. 

Christmas

This year I will spend Christmas in Germany, as I promised to Sarah. However, I will be in Spain for New Year's Eve. We still don't have any plan for that night. I have to be back in the UK by the 8th of January, so I am taking my inbound flight on the 7th.
I am really looking forward to enjoy my German Christmas. It will be the first time I spent those dates in Sarah's country. Last year I stayed in Spain since I had to finish my dissertation. This year I will meet up with Monika and Mario, and that's always good news. A big hug to them.
I really feel like going home too. I kind of miss my home town, its promenade, its beach, and its atmosphere. However, I can't complain, since I am really enjoying England.

Job

I have been in the UK for over two months now, so I think it is the moment for an assessment of my time here.

I moved back into England because I had the feeling that I would find better opportunities for me to develop my career, and because some problems made my stay in Madrid a bit hard to bear. Now I am working for a small company that creates applications for the administration of large computers networks. I am quite happy with this job, and I think I will acquire quite a good experience here. At the moment I am working on the field of databases, trying to find matching patterns within lots of data. I enjoy my job very much, and I look forward to seeing where it takes me.

So I can say that I don't regret having moved into the UK, and I believe it's been a good choice.

BU Graduation Ceremony 2008

English
This week I have attended the acts of my graduation. On wednesday Sarah and me attended the graduation ceremony, and we went to the ball on Friday night. Both the ceremony and the ball were held at the BIC. The ceremony was a great moment to remember. I specially liked when the guy remarks "with Distinction", hehe, it makes me feel proud.

You can watch the video of the ceremony(DEC School) on the BU website. For my friends on Facebook, I have uploaded some photos and a video of the ceremony, when I collect the title. 

Me and Sarah have really enjoyed these days in Bournemouth. As you can see I got dressed as the occasion required. Thanks Kit for the advice on the suit.

Now it is like something has been acknowledge, and my mind starts realising that something has got to its end. 

Spanish

Esta semana he tenido los actos de graduación del master en la Bournemouth University. Han sido unos días bonitos en los que uno analiza lo que ha conseguido en este tiempo. La ceremonia de graduación, que tuvo lugar este miércoles,  fue una experiencia nueva para mí, y sabiendo que lo sería, no me la quise perder. Uno siente una cierta gratificación cuando su nombre es nombrado en un acto solemne, y encima se subraya la nota adquirida: "with Distinction". Sarah vino a Inglaterra para asistir al evento. 

He colgado en Facebook un vídeo y las fotos que tomamos tanto en la ceremonia como en el baile, que fue el viernes. En este enlace podéis ver el vídeo completo de la entrega de títulos a la DEC School en la página web de la BU. 

El baile estuvo bien, pero me dio la impresión de que sólo acudieron alumnos de under-graduate, ya que no vi a nadie de master. Pero sin duda fue el colofón a algo que termina, y que ya parece muy lejano. Es un reconocimiento también. 

Careful: Elderly People

No doubt: this is England... Such a traffic sign was seen near Chichester, probably the smallest city in Britain. 

Hehe, enjoy your journey. 

BBB

Spanish
Éste es el dispositivo de mis sueños en estos momentos. Ha sido una cosa casual, espontánea y subita, pero me ha pegado fuerte. La idea de poder utilizar Skype mientras paseo por los alrededores de mi casa, realizando llamadas internacionales a tarifa plana, me parece sencillamente fascinante. Si a eso unimos el poder abrir y modificar documentos descargados de los correos, las funcionalidades multimedia, y la inclusion de un GPS, que podria utilizar en mi coche... el resultado es un deseo irrefrenable por conseguir esta joya.

A partir de ahí, he ido alimentando este deseo mediante la visualización de algunos vídeos. Aunque en su comparación con el dispositivo de la manzana, el BBB salga perdiendo en algunos aspectos, eso no me ha hecho cambiar de idea. Os dejo la comparación para que saquéis conclusiones.

English version
This is the device I am longing for these days. It's been something casual and sudden, but it hit me to the bone. Just thinking that I would be able to make international calls at a flat rate via Skype whilst I walked around nearby my house, simply appeals me, it is just brilliant. If we add the ability to open and modify docs which have been previously downloaded from our emails, the multimedia features, and the GPS fitted, which I could use in my car... the result is an irrepressible desire to get this gem of a gadget.

I have been encouraging this feeling with videos such as this, and despite the comparison with the apple's device is not favorable to the BBB, I leave you with the video below so you can reach your own conclusions.

Bye, bye Madrid... hello Portsmouth!

I have moved back into the UK. After a careful consideration I decided that I preferred to work by the Jurassic Coast, rather that in the capital of Spain.

I live in Portsmouth now, in Southsea. This is the only city-island in the UK, as stated in Wikipedia. It is a nice city located in the South East coast of England. Near Bournemouth, Southampton, and not far from Brighton or London, it is a good place to live. I found a nice host family to live with, and a job in Chichester; it is an easy commute.

This is my face after having driven 1.660 Km in two days... The picture was taken from the ferry, at Le Havre ferry terminal.

Greetings to my friends, who I haven't seen for a long time. And a special hug to Sarah, who copes with me in any situation.

Working in Madrid and a little breakdown

I have been quite busy lately so I had no time to keep the blog up-to-date. Some things have changed in my life. I finished my job hunt when I had some good offers in Madrid. So I chose one of them and started working for an IT consultancy company.
That implied moving to Madrid, more precisely to Torrejon de Ardoz. I started working in June, and I used to come down to Alicante almost every weekend. Last Friday after driving all my way home, right after arriving to Alicante, I felt a bit unwell so I went to hospital.
Having waited a while for tests and analysis I had an operation of my appendix. So now I am healing at home. I guess I will have to rest at least two more weeks. I think I was lucky for noticing this pain when I was at home for the weekend, so I can be heal at home with good food and being with my family.

Congratulations to all the football fans. Spain is the European champion, and the Spanish National Football Team is the first on FIFA's ranking.

Are you Googleable?

I guess this is a typical entry on every blog. Blog writers are usually people who have other profiles on the Internet. That is my case too ;) I used to be a member of Neurona, and I also had a profile on Xing. These two companies merged into Xing, so herein is where I have one of my profiles. It has a market place where you can apply to job offers, and professionals are able to approach you and offer you a job, like it happened to me.
I have recently created another profile on the internet. This is on LindkedIn. I think this network is the predominant option in the UK. I still have to complete my details and update my professional background, so if you go and have a look, it will be incomplete.
I also use Facebook, mainly to share photos and comments with my friends, but I don't give it a professional use.
So now if you want to find me, you just have to google me.