Barcelona Village
Barcelona village is an ex-pats view of moving to Spain from the UK with three children all aged under 10 and how we managed with paperwork, bureaucracy etc. Barcelona is one of the best cities in the world, with pretty much everything you could want - from the sea, culture and nightlife to mountains not so far away. This is our description of how we got on and what we've found out.
In all these things there are wrinkles and personal circumstances which perhaps aren't quite like the books say, and before we came out here we did read all the books, we visited all the other ex-pat sites (see links), we started learning Spanish, we looked for and took advice. So this isn't supposed to be a guide to moving to Spain, but more information about how we as a family coped with the vagaries of paperwork, administration, settling in and the nice things to do in Barcelona which others may find helpful.
Certainly the books are definitely helpful and we dip in and out from time-to-time as we face another new circumstance, but they tend to be generic - go to the Hacienda for instance to get registered for Spanish taxes, but which Hacienda where, and how do you find out where it is? In fact you can actually find it at agenciatributaria.es. Did you know the local tax office isn't called the Hacienda, but an Agencia Tributaria?
We came with one job in hand, but had to go through the process of finding accommodation (which areas do you pick), getting our children into school and school life, trying to work out how to live in Spain and have a business in the UK, coping with language and just general stuff about getting to and living in Barcelona.
You can be sure that we've not done it the best way (is there always a best way) but with a few bumps and scrapes along the way we've got here. May be it will be helpful to someone else.
