Moving in

Looking back on our first month in Madrid, as I sit on our terrace, glass of wine in one hand, nibbles on the table, cats rolling around in the sunshine, it’s hard to believe that neither of us has actually killed each other yet.

Moving is one of the most stressful things going. Move to a new countryand you can multiply that stress level by every single one of the thousands of miles you’ve just travelled, and sometimes the level gets so high that you can see smoke billowing from your ears and heaven protect whoever is standing next to you.

When we first arrived, we knew we had to stay in a hotel for a few days while we opened a bank account and filled in all the necessary paperwork for the flat. What we didn’t know was that the bank would take that particular time to install new software, which meant our “aval bancario” (bank guarantee) disappeared into the ether longer than it should. A couple of nights in a hotel turned into a week, despite the fact that Gema, the rental agent, had actually gone with us to open the account. “Can’t we just move in?” we pleaded. By the look she gave us in answer, you’d think we’d just asked her to take a one-hour lunch break. Frustration forced us to the bar, silently accusing each other: “You wanted to move here . . .” over glasses of cold rioja. Several glasses later, making our way back to the hotel through crowds of families enjoying the end of a hot, summer’s day in a way we’d envied so much as visitors, the accusations died away. If this was the worst that happened, we could cope.

Except it wasn’t. I had to return to the UK to pick up my babies – Harrie and Hattie, two mangy cats who cost me £2.50 to buy 12 years ago and several hundreds of pounds to transport now. Thanks to pet passports, getting them prepared for the journey was easy. Much easier than physically carting them around two airports while a certain airline’s staff looked on in bemusement. I tried to be inconspicous, but the girls wouldn’t stop stop shouting. (Not that I could blame them; I had already knocked Harrie’s case off the luggage trolley and it had gone rolling across the floor - with her inside. If miaows could be translated, none of hers would have had more than four letters.)

Then, at Heathrow, after I had snaked my way round the check-in queue, I had to take them out of their cases – right in the middle of terminal two – while a lovely man named Mo drilled extra holes into their boxes for them to be able to travel. After her topsy-turvy entrance into the world of airports, I could see Harrie eyeing the runway with interest and I had visions of her becoming one of the “bongs” on that night’s Ten O’Clock News: “And finally, a runaway cat has halted all air traffic in and out of Heathrow. Her owner, who has since been given enough valium to knock-out a horse, was last seen gibbering dementedly in a corner clutching a half-empty bottle of Spanish brandy”.

But their ultimate humiliation came at Barajas. They were given their own private escort to the terminal. I, meanwhile, had to go fleeing around like a madwoman and was just heading for the excess baggage area (where I had been told I would pick them up) when I heard a howling from the carousel. There were their boxes, going round and round and round, with Harrie and Hattie inside, scowling as several planeloads of Spaniards ooohed and aaahed at them. It took another hour for my suitcases to arrive, by which point I just wanted to plonk myself at the airport bar and forget about everything.

But at least we were home and it would be plain sailing from now on. You bet? Ged, my husband, greeted me with the news: “We have to meet Don Carlos, the landlord – now.” So, on our first day in our new home, nervous, scared, and with two very angry cats in tow, we met Don Carlos. Think of Sean Connery in the film Medicine Man – old man, beard, ponytail – and add a moped and a helmet and you’ve got the idea. He went to a Jesuit school in Brighton as a child and had all the manners and formality you would imagine of a Spaniard who gets called “Don”. Well, Don Carlos took one glance at the Bedlam reject standing in front of him and decided to just talk to Ged, while I followed them around like a lapdog – still clutching a catbox in either hand.

When he’d gone, Ged turned to me. “You wouldn’t believe how stressful today’s been,” he said. I glared at him. There was nothing for it – he had to die. “How stressful your day’s been?” I shouted. “Here,” he answered, before the rant could begin, “Have a glass of rioja.” And suddenly, it didn’t seem so bad . . .