The week before I moved to Barcelona a friend of mine recommended a book she thought I’d find very interesting. Thomas L. Friedman’s The World Is Flat, and aside from my superficial judgement regarding the author feeling the need to add his middle initial to the cover, I found the concept interesting indeed.

The book is essentially the detailing of how through technology, and certain economic drivers, industrial globalization is not only changing the way we work; but how we live, how we interact, and how we evolve as a planet.

Download the free E-book here. See, reading this blog DOES have its perks.

I purchased The World is Flat in early September, and finally managed to dive into it as of this morning… while in a Starbucks. I’ve unfortunately had little time to do any pleasure reading, mainly because I tend to work late calling all around the globe drumming up new business for this new job. So basically, I’ve postponed reading a book on globalization because I’m too tired from living it contents. The irony is deafening.

The concept of the flattening of our world comes from the author’s perspective of the global levelling of economic playing fields, particularly throughout India and China. According to Friedman, Indian call centers like 24/7 are receiving upwards of 700 resumes a day (with only 6 percent of applicants being hired), and that’s from a 2004 study. Some associates are working for $200- $500/month for companies like Microsoft, Delta Airlines, and America Online to name a small few. There are hundreds, perhaps thousands of more companies filling the buildings and bank accounts of Indians riding on the waves of the global outsourcing trend.

With Indian business schools churning out “89,000 MBA grads a year”, their talent pool is more than impressive. Not to mention that since it appears the Indian’s haven’t yet adopted the Western Gen-X’s motto of “What’s in it for me?” These MBA grads are willing to work just as hard for a fraction of what our North American yuppies are holding out for.

I’m consciously aware that the concept of globalization may resonate more within me due to my current circumstances. Let me detail a typical day to illustrate my point. I awake in a 3 bedroom apartment with a Mexican man who speaks 4 languages and a British ex-pat who was born in Venezuela and currently is in Cleveland opening new offices for his company, which is based in Slovakia.

Then I go to work…

My daily tasks are done via a computer and VoIP phone network based in Bratislava, while my clients are anywhere from California to Germany to Mumbai. For a short while last month, across from me sat the Sales Director from our Dubai office. He discussed new strategies with us regarding the Middle East and still continued to run his home office from his laptop and 3 phone lines. The talent in our office speaks enough languages combined to successfully run a small portion of the United Nations. Each interaction can turn into a lesson in international relations at any moment.

My evenings are either spent struggling desperately in Spanish class, at home downloading American TV shows or chatting online with friends and family around the world on Skype (an online program which allows users to chat across the globe through the internet for free). Globalization has me wrapped around its little finger.

The world is surely changing, and this can be unsettling unless you’re willing to learn to accept and adapt. We’re all afraid of change -myself certainly included-because it’s different, it’s unknown. It’s the boogieman, the black flog of the future, where you never know what minor aspect could hiccup a blue sky life into chaos. Yet on the flipside, it’s important to seek out new opportunities to where you may fit into this new world. We only live one life, so I think it’s important to experience the changes within the lifetime we have.

In past generations only a small amount of people had the opportunity to participate in their own revolutions. Others were completely disenfranchised from the process and left to feel the effects of the few visionaries with the power and ability to affect change.

I’m not suggesting you need to go out and start your own Brokerage house in Bangalore, or start a phone sex from China, but the fact is that we’re in the midst of one of the most innovative times in the history of our planet. And personally, I think that’s pretty cool. Its always better to try and ride the wave of change opposed to looking up too late and have it bowl you over. In my first read of The World is Flat I’m reminded of something that was said to me by a friend of mine’s 91 year old aunt while I was in Sicily a few years ago.

“Tutto il mondo e soltanto una piccola citta” The whole world is just a small city”

If an old lady living in a city that even McDonald’s wouldn’t touch can figure this out, I think the rest of us also have a pretty good chance.

Halloween in Barcelona, who would’ve thought?

As an email crossed my inbox 2 days before the big bad 31st I learned that our company Halloween party was “costume mandatory”. Crisis immediately struck as I realized I had left my Superman tights in Canada and would be forced to search the city of Barcelona for appropriate attire. My first idea was to go as a Sugar Daddy. I would dress as a pimp but tape and staple candy and chocolate all over my body. I found the idea hilarious and perfect, until i started asking a few people if they had any idea what a Sugar Daddy is and the idea died there. Pity.

I set off after work one evening with Dennys, our token American, in hopes of glory. Our first stop was a proper costume store with everything from a sailor’s outfit to Freddy Kruger and Roman Warriors. The only catch was that to rent these costumes would have cost us a minimum of 50 euros. In case I didn’t mention it, sure we were searching for glory, but glory had to come with a price tag of 30 euros at most. We gave up with sadness that day but were back at it on the 30th with a renewed sense of determination. In other words, the girls in the office were all set to wear costumes and had pressured us to “man-up”and come in costume. What men do for women never ceases to amaze. Luckily I had come up with the world’s greatest idea for costumes for each of us and a price we would be happy with.

Since Dennys speaks fluent spanish I figured our mission would be easily executed. We walked to Plaza Catalunya and found the nearest Burger King and McDonald’s; side by side of course. We walked into what seemed like Burger King’s busiest day of the year, but with some slick maneuvering we managed to find the woman in charge. So Dennys, with me feeding the english version into his ear since he was too nervous to act on his own, proceeded to ask the nice woman if she would sell us two Burger King hat and shirt uniforms. Well…from her reaction you would’ve guessed he just asked her if she’d like to have a threesome on a pile of Whoppers. She wasn’t pleased and stormed off in disgust. I was VERY upset by this as in my mind I was already preparing to be king.. Plan B. Mickey Ds.

The manager from McDonald’s was much easier to find, but because of our last experience Dennys was borderline petrified to speak to this woman. Thankfully he finally managed to propose our idea and even upped our buying price from 20 to 25 euros (desperate times). This woman said no, but when she said it I thought from the look on her face she was trying to solve a calculus problem. Utter confusion. After we explained she burst into laughter and I saw a glimmer of hope that she may have mercy on us costume-less beggars, but it wasn’t to be. Blast! Foiled again!

This was getting tight. We were on our lunch break on Oct 30th and we had one stop left before giving up.

We walked into the last store and quickly found 2 things, many options that we could easily pull off, and the prices were just above our threshold, most costumes were 40 euros to buy. Again, the things we do for women. I eventually decided to be a Sailor based on a number of important factors.

#1 I’d be able to wear my jeans and runners underneath the costume.

#2 It was incredibly easy to put on and required ZERO makeup

#3 Apparently women love sailors.

#4 I kinda liked the hat.

Surprisingly these factors outweighed the fact that I knew I would be referred to as either a gay sailor or part of the Village people at some point throughout the night. On Halloween night some smart ass even tried to be the life of the party at the bar; he came up behind me with his girlfriend and started to sing Y-M-C-A, but wasn’t he surprised when I jump-turned around during the chorus and started spelling out the letters. He became even more annoyed when Reason #3 showed up and his girlfriend kept singing along with me through the next verse and even put my hat on her head. Sailor- 1 Funny guy- 0
Back during the decision making process Dennys was stumped. He had to choose between being a priest, pirate, rock star, vampire etc etc but nothing pleased him. Then I found it, the world’s greatest costume that I would NEVER wear myself. “The Party Animal- The Pig”. The costume was a big pajama like onesie with a pig hat complete with snout that strapped on like a big plush helmet. It was beautiful.

It doesn’t matter that it took me 45minutes to convince Dennys how incredibly funny this costume was, he bought it and I was pumped.

On Halloween night as we walked through the streets, metro stations, bars and clubs in our costumes I derived pure joy from watching people stare in bewilderment as they wondered why a grown man would voluntarily dress himself as a pig. I can just picture someone waking up hungover the next day and turning to his buddy to say, “Man, I must’ve been REALLY REALLY hammered last night, all I remember is seeing this giant pig dancing around on the floor.” And believe me, you’ll never known joy until you’ve watched your friend come out of a bathroom 5-10 times through the course of a night and ask random strangers “can you zip me up?” Brilliant.

I must say, this was one of the most memorable and fun Halloweens I’ve had in years. And I owe it all to a giant pig.

Below are some pictures of all of us from the night, and then an extra of my friend Dexter at work. Priceless costume.

Though I really have no need for drugs from South America, I’ve always wanted to be like Red from The Shawshank Redemption, “I’m just a guy that knows how to get things.” It doesn’t mean I have to actually get them, but, I know how to.

I apologize for being so long without a post, and I’ll apologize everytime I go a week without posting, but luckily today was too good to keep to myself. Today is the day I decided that no matter what happens from here on out, I’m happy I moved to Barcelona. It WAS a good decision.

As most of you know, being able to say something like that doesn’t come without thought, at least not from my mouth. I’ll think things through until I’m bleeding from both ears. Both a curse and a blessing I suppose.

Before I left for Spain some of my main reasons for accepting the position was to experience another country, to meet a new demographic of people, and of course, for the chance to teach my advanced sarcasm to a whole new country. But it wasn’t until lunch today that I realized I was living out those desires.

To catch everyone up on what a lunch really is, in Spain my entire two floor office is off from 1-230pm. Typically about 5% of the office stay at their desk, while everyone else picks a restaurant and for 10 euros you sit down with friends or colleagues for at least an hour and have a nice 2 course meal(including espresso of course). Since Spain is so world renowned for their food and I’m so open minded about cuisine, I took it upon myself and found the most authentic ITALIAN restaurant near the office, which has now become our go to place.

In the midst of another beautiful meal we somehow started discussing the life path of one of our colleagues. To look at and speak to this man, he comes off as a gentle, soft spoken, almost became a priest, type of person. But shockingly what was divulged between my delicious spaghetti bolognese to my Cafe Cortado gave me some added perspective on life that I certainly didn’t expect today.

My friend started his life in Bolivia, born and raised. In his early 20s he was given a job with the American Embassy as a narcotics enforcement officer. To give you an idea, in Canada that would be like someone being appointed the Tim Hortons Coffee enforcement officer. You try stopping the grade 3 teacher from getting her morning double cream-double sugar. Guaranteed homicide.

He told us some days he would search the jungle for drugs and criminals, and sleep with a gun under his pillow at night. He mentioned it was there that he learned the meaning of the saying, “Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” We all looked at one another after this quote, yet no one dared ask for clarification. It was a couple years later, a family friend within the American Embassy that saved him from the life he believed he was destined for, and fired him. Shortly after, he moved to Slovakia (for a woman of course) and started at one of their oldest and most renowned universities (maybe not renowned enough because I’ve clearly forgotten the name). He worked his way through school in Bratislava as a latin dance instructor -oh we had a good laugh at his expense at this one – before accepting the job he works at today in Barcelona. Now he comes in early everyday, works his ass off with a big smile on his face and lives for the day that he can bring over his wife and son to live with him.

After hearing about this guy’s path to Spain, I felt like I came straight from Pleasantville. Oddly enough though, the most engaging part of the story, was not hearing my friend tell it, but the reaction from the mix of people sitting around the table. There were 5 of us, comprised of a Slovakian, a Bolivian, a Dutch, a guy born and raised in the US but is also a Nicaragua national, and then me, Captain Canuck, Johnny Canadian.

It was borderline comical to watch the stereotypes play themselves out over our meal, especially over our quick discussion on gun control. 80% of the party looked down on handgun possession and began to discuss and compare crime rates and policies in different countries until we finally landed on Uncle Sam. Our American colleague, who is indeed a great guy, unfortunately didn’t let any of us down and began proclaiming the constitution’s Right to Bear arms and that every American has the right to protect themselves with a gun, yada, yada, yada. I choose to yada yada the rest of that one side debate because that’s exactly what the rest of us did. We laughed at the wanna-be NRA member, strengthened our already sullen view of the Yanks and got up to pay the bill.

On the walk back, thankfully no one noticed the sly smirk on my face because I had no desire to offer an explanation for it. But it was then that I realized it’s conversations, and people like these that were the reason I moved out here.

Again though, I think it all comes back to everyone’s frame of reference. I think its greatly important to fill your life with different types of experiences and people. Different opinions, backgrounds, stories, hardships, likes, dislikes, etc., etc., etc…ETC. All of this widens your frame of reference for any future decisions or action you’ll take.  It gives you physical proof that life isn’t just confined to your home town or country.  Though it may sound a little odd, physical proof is sometimes all we need.  Something that won’t allow you to ignore the world around you.

Otherwise, its very possible to find yourself years later in the midst of a half-lived life, to find that you’ve somehow grown-up, without ever actually growing.  Because if your frame of reference is so narrow, you put a limit on your potential.

A classic movie and unlikely philosopher once told us,

“Life moves pretty fast, if you don’t stop and look around once and a while…you could miss it”