Let it be me

This week involved interviewing interns. Those who have made it through the rigorous screening process, which every year sees my colleagues hanging about after work one day with a few bottles of wine as we sift through the many CVs. My team is young, with the majority of us being under 30, so it’s not that long since we ourselves were the interviewee. Life is tough – there are slim margins between applicants on the academic side as they all seem to be excelling at top notch universities – so more often than not, it comes down to that special chance that one word somewhere on the CV makes a connection with the interviewer – be it a shared interest or the same home town. At the end of the day, they are all plenty smart but you want them to fit in with the existing team but also to bring something new.

At university, I was much like any other student, with that subtle arrogance from the belief that I was en route to something big. The place was full of high achievers who spent their free time perfecting their tennis serve, protesting for human rights or running for university president – all things I believed I could achieve too if I chose to. Then comes graduation, which for many is the final curtain on their childhood, and we are released to once again, become the smallest fish in a very large pond. My self belief is eroded away with every unsuccessful job application and I’m left with regrets. I had a unique four year window of opportunity where I was free to chase after any dream but was too lazy to take advantage of it.

And now it gives me great pleasure to meet these hopeful interns, who are trying to plan their summer vacation to include experiences that will help them on their road forward. Their new suits, straight postures and eager eyes takes me back to a happy time – although with every passing year, the edges become a little more frayed with thoughts of what could have been.

What is life...

"What is life if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare"

Just hearing the first 2 lines of this poem slows down my breathing and brings me a sense of peace. I can't describe it any other way but I often recite it to myself when I'm feeling stressed or overwhelmed - easily done in these inpatient times we live in. I'm back at my parents' house this weekend and my dad came down to the canal with me this morning on my run. I hadn't even noticed that he wasn't following me but I jogged back to find him chatting with a canal boat owner at one of the locks. He was like a child - completely enthralled by how the lock was controlling the water levels to allow the boat to pass. I was jogging on the spot, stretching, shuffling my feet and generally acting like a spoilt child when he asked if I had ever seen this before and understood how it worked. I only just stopped myself from answering yes, because on reflection, I don't think I have. I just think I have because I've obviously seen it on TV at some point - maybe in a geography class in school when I was much younger. Don't get me wrong, I am and will forever remain a huge TV addict and it lets me into worlds that I would never otherwise see. But it's also de-sensitized me to the real world - I could really do with some standing and staring...

In case I'm coming over all zen, I'm going to end with a mini-rant. Our great leader has pushed through an incredible 50% tax rate to begin next year on any income over £150k. This comes after having made every £1 in my pocket worth substantially less than it ever has been at a time when all food and commodities are priced much higher. Sure, copy the Italians with their Robin Hood tax and placate the masses but how many high earners does he think will remain UK domiciled if they have to pay 50% tax? Discourage the high earners and high spenders, and all he will be left with is a huge deficit created by his own over spending and his sell off of the UK manufacturing industry (currently one of the only countries without their own steel production which is arguably a national defense issue). I don't know, it all seems very complicated and vicious-circle-esque. I think I'm just bitter because despite my best efforts, I don't make it anywhere near the £150k line! My lack of career progression has been effective tax planning all along...

Recession dating

Another effect of the financial crisis has been the change in the dating scene. Gone are the days when 2 girls out at a wine bar in the City could almost guarantee being offered a drink by some well heeled banker - they are much more calculating over their discretionary incomes now. Also, there's probably a lot less of them around. Bankers are either moving on to pastures new - the cheese shop they've dreamt of running, the new start in a new country or even moving into teaching where bankers are being offered a fast track option to lessen the shortage of science/maths teachers - or they are even more tied to their desks as the fight for survival gets tougher and tougher.

I've always been a big believer in opposites attract so have generally tried to avoid dating anyone in finance. Can you imagine how dull life as a couple would be if your common interest was limited to work - especially if you work in an industry that encourages high competition and high stress. Plus now there's the added risk of both of you being unemployed. No no, the best piece of advice now would be diversify your assets and spread away those risks...

The man I am currently pretending not to like is a government employee (safe as houses!) - and this is the first time I have dipped my toe in Her Majesty's pool (so to speak). I always say I am far too mature and sensible to be dealing with boys who play games, but secretly I love all this will-he-won't-he-call-me angst. The James Bond affair has been one hell of a long game, I think we've met up all of 6 times in the last 8 months but he's incredibly witty and very confident. He came to meet me after work one time, to have a drink I thought, but he took me to this small museum which has recreated a London house in the 18th Century (sight, sounds, smell - the lot). You walk from the servants quarters in the basement all the way up past the kitchens, living room to the top floor bedrooms and you're not allowed to talk. I never even knew it was there - I love that he is so different.

Chicken Licken

It's amazing how much of a difference a four day week can have on your general well-being and goodwill towards men. After several months of chicken licken mania when all the media were running round telling the world that the sky was falling down, there seems to be a sort of reprieve at the moment. Maybe the markets are still sleepy after gorging on too many eggs but there is a definite calm and sense of peace. I think people are ready for some good news and willing it to happen. If we collectively wish for it hard enough - then maybe it can happen.

Sadly, fairytales don't cut it with me - I blame the years at an all girls high school where being the first to denounce santa claus and my little ponies was vital for survival. Moments of calm like these just make me worry about the impending storm. Whilst everyone else is enjoying the sun, I'm scrambling about buttoning down the hatches. You should have seen me entering the new millenium when Y2K was allegedly going to cause a global meltdown as all the sophisticated technology we rely on wouldn't be able to cope with a change of year... It was not pretty to say the least.

I've found a journalist who shares my view - have a read of his piece on how big corporations are still able to get away with accounting shenanigans. Have we learnt nothing from Lehmans, Enron, Northern Rock etc? Our ability to forget pain is often bandied about as a blessing in reference to child birth but it would probably be wise to keep a rubber band around our wrists to remind us to be more vigilant.

Gold Digger

As a budding young capitalist, whilst my school friends were dreaming of being doctors and lawyers, I dreamt of the day I would marry rich and live the content life of a kept woman. I must have done something bad in my life time as this is not what fate had in store for me at all. Not only am I nowhere near married but I am a fully signed up member of the rat race - working crazy hours to fund my non-designer lifestyle.

So it amuses (actually more irks) me that this week the Financial Times is carrying a piece on how women are paid substantially less than their male peers. I don't know why they do this same piece year in year out like it's some cutting edge piece of journalism but it grates me every time. I can't help but look at the rest of my otherwise all male team and wonder whether they earn more than I do simply by being male. This little seed of doubt is enough to drive my ambitious self crazy - good thing I am also blessed with the memory of a goldfish so will not think about this now until they write about it again.

Even more amusing, my new found hero is the Swedish Marie Douglas-David. Not happy with divorcing her much older husband for an arranged settlement of $43m, she is taking him to court to bump this up to $100m as currently it is not enough to finance her weekly spend which "include $4,500 for clothes, $1,000 for hair and skin treatments, $1,500 for restaurants and entertainment, $8,000 for travel, $700 for limousine services, $2,209 for an assistant, $1,570 for horse care and $600 for flowers".

Adios Madrileños...

Having crawled into bed at some outrageous time close to 5am, I dragged myself out of the hotel at 9am as this was already my last day in Madrid and there was much to see. Weekend breaks can be so stressful...

I walked along Gran Via down to Sol to wake myself up and had a quick stopover at the completely huge El Corte Ingles complex which covered three prime sites in this busy retail centre of town. I always like to look at Supermarkets when I'm abroad to see how people's daily food needs differ (weird I know) and given I had no time to track down a Mercadona, was thrilled to see huge Iberian jamon and cheese counters in the basement food store at the nation's favourite department store. The wines took up 4 aisles and was incredibly good value - we have the same brand wines in London supermarkets which sell at almost 2.5x the price.

My walk took me past all the fabulous old buildings on the way to Banco de Espana - theatres, national banks and the Spanish stock exchange. There was already a queue of budding art enthusiasts when I arrived at the Prado museum but the wait was to be proved worthwhile. I'm not a big art fan by any means but this gallery is so huge and packed with a variety of works that even I managed to recognise some of the paintings and artisits. Whilst as one of the most famous art collections it is obviously home to the Spanish greats such as Velazquez and Goya but the Prado also showcases some of the big names from Holland and Italy including Rubens and Titian's Venus.

After that draining cultural stop, I briefly paused for a cool beer at the Terrace of the Ritz hotel. You can walk straight in to this beautiful patio, where white wicker furniture with plump cushions allows you to rest your weary feet. The beer was served in tall stemmed glasses accompanied by a selection of nibbles (included in the price) and you can sit back in the Madrid sun and listen to the live pianist.

Feeling pretty mellow, the question now was whether I wanted to spend this gloriously sunny afternoon in the next gallery. Being somewhat sun starved, I figured I would return another time for Picasso and opted instead to stroll round the botanical gardens. Again, I'm no big gardening enthusiast, but for the sum of €2, I was able to roam this huge garden which had plenty of postcard-perfect landscapes and a greenhouse full of the more exotic plants.

Only then did I realise that I hadn't eaten all day. I started walking through the back streets towards Plaza de Santa Ana - where I stopped for some tapas at Lateral. I opted to sit at the bar indoors as the outside terrace was largely unshaded and relatively full whilst the inside was cool and empty. Along with a glass of red house rioja which was beautifully drinkable and well priced, I enjoyed a taste of tortilla, sardines and pimientos. I chose this particulare tapas bar out of many on the square, as the restaurant was modern and clean and they use the cutest crockery - but the food turned out to be delicious too. Just a little further down past Plaza de Angel and on the way to Plaza Mayor is a little square with an open market selling various bric-a-brac. Not that I needed to after the tapas, but I bought a little bag of dry roasted sunflower seeds (toasty and sweet) from a man who was applying the same dry roast to everything imaginable!

A trip to Plaza Mayor saw a suspiciously Mexican looking group of street entainters who were pleasing the amassed tourists. The square is huge and amazingly, despite its scale, was completely packed with people - some sat in the outdoor terraces of the many bars and restaurants, some looking at the collection of stores under the grand arches and others, like me, just enjoying the sunset and watching the world go by. Tired, full and aware of the inhuman hour of my flight back home, this is where I bid adios to the City and its people.

Hola Madrid!

What a beautiful City.

On some sound advice from a fellow blogger, I did some homework and found that the Prado museum is free from 6pm on Fridays which was perfect as I was due to land at 2pm. However, as is often the case, even the best laid plans are thwarted by exogenous circumstances and I was delayed a massive 4 hours at the airport because of fog (the perils of being a Londoner).

When I finally arrived at Madrid, the airport itself was stunning. Terminal 4 was recently added in 2006 and has won several design awards for its straight lines, open plan structure, floor to ceiling windows and bamboo panelled ceilings (keeps it cool apparently). Using my google print outs, I bought a Metro ticket for 10 journeys (a bargain €7.40 although I didn't use it 10 times) and made my way to my hotel. I had to change lines twice but the Metro system is amazingly simple to follow, the platforms are well labelled and the trains are wide, modern and air conditioned. I was staying at the Melia Princesa, just North of the Plaza Espana. As a tip, if anyone is also looking to go to Madrid, I recommend looking at the Sol Melia or NH Hoteles websites - as publicly traded Spanish hotel companies, they have suffered the brunt of the Spanish real estate related sell-off and are now offering attractive rates to ensure hotel room occupancy at even their luxury hotels. The Melia Princesa is just 20 metres from the Metro stop and an easy walk to the Royal Palace, the stores of Gran Via and I even walked to the Prado Museum without much difficulty as there's so much to see, you forget how much you've walked. Plus it means you can work off those delicious churros dipped in thick chocolate you've indulged in for breakfast and be ready for the first round of tapas of the day!

Once settled in the hotel, I still had 2 hours before I was due to meet some friends for dinner - they had kindly decided to convene early for dinner as I was a heathen from London but still, at 9:30pm this was rather late for me! The sun was just setting, so I strolled down to the Palacio via the plaza Espana and enjoyed the relaxed atmosphere of the Palace gardens. The young Madrileños were out in force, dipping their toes in the fountain and enjoying the hazy sun. I took a seat at a terrace bar in the Plaza de Oriente to drink a quick aperitif before jumping on the Metro to get to dinner.

We met at a lovely restaurant called La Trainera in the affluent Salamanca region, which is home to most of the International banks and other corporates as well as boutique design stores and private galleries. They serve wonderfully fresh seafood from the Bay of Biscay - the restaurant is named after their fishing boat. I left the menu in the capable hands of my friend Jaime and his wife who had invited me here to meet their friends. I met Jaime a few years back through work as he works at a Spanish bank. His wife is training to become a nurse and his friends were artists of various sorts. After a hearty meal of almejas (clams) - so fresh they are served raw with a squirt of lemon and centollo (king crab) - again so fresh and tasty it was served on its own, I was ready to call it a day but this was only the beginning.

After much kissing and hugging with the restaurant staff at the door, we walked down to Momo's for a drink - something that was necessary as we had met so early for dinner (!) and could therefore not go straight on to a club. Our final destination was Pacha. I couldn't help but groan when I saw it - as a chain of clubs across Europe, it had been a long time since I had been to the one in London and I stay away for a reason! But the one in Madrid was much more relaxed, there was a huge mix of people from the very young to the more mature and it was genuinely good fun. The drinks are much more potent - a vodka tonic here is basically 50:50.

It was almost sunrise when we left and I got a lift home on a Vespa - first time for everything - from one of the artists who had drunk nothing but red bull all night which resulted in an interesting journey to say the least! We stopped over at the Chocolateria San Gines, named after the church in whose shadow the cafe stands. I'm not exaggerating here at all, but the place was completely packed and it was close to 4am. We ordered 2 cups of intensely thick, rich chocolate and the waitress cut off sticks (churros) from a huge long roll of freshly baked doughnut. I could seriously get used to this...