Paco´s Life: Madrid

Diplomatic Crisis

Hello fellas! This is Paco /Stockholm reporting again from the city of bikes. Many things to talk about in this post, most of them good but some others not so much.Let’s start with the second ones, we could say that the relations between the Spanish tenant and the Danish landlady suffered a serious crisis this week. Very complicated diplomatic conflict with almost ended up with me sleeping in Giorgos’s couch. I tell you, the apartment I got has a few not very nice weird things. The one I knew before I came was the attitude of the landlady concerning guests. She likes her apartment so much and she is so afraid it could get some damage that she does not want me to invite friends to sleep there, even if this would only be for a couple of nights. The funny thing is that this rule does not apply as long as the guest pays a fee of around 20 euros. It seems that this nice lady believes that paying guests do not break anything. Debatable at least….and she says she does not want to make profit out of this since I am paying the same rent she will be paying where she is going. If someone understand this please I would appreciate an explanation, from my point of view, and I am also a landlord, if I rent a room I have the right to invite whoever I want as long as the visit is limited to a few days and nothing gets broke. Or I may prohibit all kind of visits but in that case I don’t set a price like if my place was a hotel! Danish landlady 1 – Paco 0.

Anyway, this is something we had discussed by email before I came and I accepted. What really produced the crisis was all the stuff coming afterwards. To get here and find there was no shower was not exactly nice, I believe she should have told me about that but, anyway there is nothing she can do about that now. Danish landlady 2 – Paco 0. And now we get to the stuff which really got me pissed: the other way, when I was happily hanging around without my t-shirt in the apartment (Copenhagen is very hot now), she came to me and very seriously told me that I had to wear my t-shirt all the time in the apartment, specially when the door is open and neighbors can see inside. You may think Danish people is very conservative but the fact is that in the garden I have got next to the apartment entrance, these “shy” neighbors were sunbathing in bikini, yesterday there was even a woman doing top-less. It also happened that the other day when I got into the apartment, one of her daughters was hanging arround without her shirt, just with the bra. Of course I did not feel offended because of that… So… this issue started to make me feel rules were different for tenants but, since I am in a different country and trying to feel integrated, I just put my shirt on: Danish landlady 3 – paco 0. Next issue: after I few days here I was ready to comply with my housewife work and do my first Danish laundry. Did I already tell you that there is no shower in my apartment? The shower is with the washing machine in the basement. So I was about to use this washing machine when the landlady came to me and said nooooooo, we have discussed this between the neighbors and we decided tenants are not allowed to use the washing machine since we all paid for it and we are afraid someone can break it. You have to go to the public laundry at the end of the street… Oh! Nice detail from them, that’s what I call a warm welcome. This is when I started to get pissed… Danish landlady 4 – Paco 0

And the final thing which provoked the crisis, I had spent a couple of days with my computer on the living room, where the Internet connection is. Since by that time I had still not developed much my social life, I spent most of the Sunday there. Something that my dear Else did not like too much, she came to me saying that her daughters were feeling very uncomfortable having someone using a computer in the living room, that they felt her house invaded and they felt like staying in the room. Of course it is, remember!, now there is a person sharing with you! The living room, for those of you who may feel like justifying her point, is pretty big, with the computer in a corner. So I say, ok, the computer will be in my room as long as you are around but when you leave on the 15^th the apartment is mine and I will put my stuff wherever I want. Nooo, it happens to be that one of her daughters is going to use the room a couple of weekends and, of course, the poor girl can not come there and find that terrible screen in the living room… So, the conclusion I got is that, even when alone in the place, I was renting a room and not the whole apartment. That would be ok in some other cases but the truth is that I am paying 4000 krons!! Danish landlady 5 and Paco is definitely totally pissed off. Negotiations start: 1 hour arguing (in a civilized way), she does not give up anything, no chance of agreement and I finally take an impulsive decision: I am leaving the place, from the next day I will start looking for another flat.Mistake Paco!! Think before you act! To find a place in Copenhagen for only 2 months in August is kind of impossible!! I spent two days searching the web, trying to translate Danish posts and calling to people who tell me “sorry but there are already 10 people waiting to view the flat I advertised yesterday”. So I get to the conclusion that I have to stay where I am, when the Danish landlady leaves in 2 weeks I will do whatever I want, I will put my computer where I want, invite people and let’s see if I decide to use the washing machine… Of course, I will not damage the place, she should not worry about the that.

Unfortunately this decision happens at the same time my social life here starts to expand, I spent 2 days without almost showing up in the apartment, beers in parks, Wednesday night going out till very late… By the time I finally managed to talk to her again it happened to be that she already found another person for the apartment!! And of course, since she is Danish is does not matter she agreed with the other person in the morning and I am telling her that I stay in the afternoon, she does not like the idea of telling the other person that she is not finally renting the apartment to her. The possibility of ending up sleeping in the street is now pretty close. And now is when the real cold war starts, I tell her to tell the other person that the flat is not available anymore, I kind of indicate her that is going to be hard to kick me out of the apartment. In conclusion, I start to get ready for fortifying myself there, I have got provisions: 4 big bags of pipas, a handful of chorizos and 19 bottles of rums are my allies… She spends a couple of days trying to get me another room. She does not make it… raising tension that I try to reduce with happy faces and smiles, I fixed a problem in her computer, I allow the daughter to use my bike… Monday is set as negotiation deadline, that means today and aleluya!! We get an agreement. I just got a text from my dear Else, they have decided (apparently she and her daughters) that I stay in the apartment. I knew that allowing the daughter to use the bike would give me the points I needed… Great, no need to go to war, peaceful solution, I am no longer afraid of 4 big Danish guys showing up in the apartment to kick me out.I guess that, as it happens in any conflict, both parts are somehow right. I should not have acted so impulsively saying that I was leaving just to change my mind later but I think she pissed me off quite a lot and she could have been more flexible. I don’t know what your opinion about all this mess is…

I was intending to tell you about the positive things that, believe me, there was also quite a few this week, but after this big bunch of stuff I just wrote I will leave it for another post. I will just say that I love Copenhagen (even with its Danish landladys)!!