i wanna live in spain someday! what do i need to do to prepare myself?

I lived in Leganes for a bit, which is a suburb of Madrid, near Carrabanchel, and I've also lived in Galicia, along the north coast.

The first thing that struck me about Spain is that it literally shuts down during the evening hours. From about 3 pm until 6 pm, most stores are closed. God forbid you have to go to the supermakert or pharmacy, because you wont' get any service. Also, "prime time" is completely different. What I mean is that in madrid itself, during the summer months, the sun often won't set til about 10/11 pm. Since dinner isn't until then either, US prime time lasts from about 10 pm til 2 am Madrid time.

The benefits of living in Madrid (like any large city) is that there's a great amount of public transportation, which is usually cheap, especially for students (I went to the University of Carlos III in Leganes). The metro is usually easy and leads to any part of the city, but it's often crowded and it really smells (sorry to be blunt). There's rush hours along the metros, so soemtimes you might have to wait for another metro to come by.

But what I would personally do to prepare myself?

Buy some nose plugs. The city seriously reeks. A lot of people don't bathe everyday (that's not the custom there). Also, a lot of the fashionable clothes are made of polyester and nylon, which can create unpleasant odors at 40 degree Celsius weather.

I'm pretty sure this is a very open list, and I'll keep posting if you have further (specific questions).

I wouldn;t bother even considering living in Spain. Its not the place painted on the TV or what you see on holidays for two weeks at a time. The place as a whole, is going downhill, I have seen this decline over the last 3.5 years. The bars and restuarantas are not doing very well with many really struggling to survive the summer, let alone the winter. You cannot buy the same level of goods here as you can in the UK, there are so many rip offs and scames going with regard to buying property too, with many estate agents being rip off merchants and over charging horrendously. Many homes are up for sale and not selling, prices are begining to fall and those who have mortgages will soon be in a negative equity position, many not even selling through estate agents because of the fees. Taxes are frequent, while the equivalent of the council tax may not be much, inheritance tax is a big issue, its payable within 6 months of death and kicks in after 15k€ not the several hundred thousand pounds you're all moaning about in the UK! You can't sell the property to pay the taxes either! 50% of new build homes are not selling and 9% of the housing stock is empty, people are being sold the dream of a property in the eastern side of europe from here now as they know the market is done here. prices of food and fuel are much the same as the Uk but wages considerably lower! So in the long term its more expensive to live here. Its all very well coming for two weeks and thinking its great, it not, its dull, and dead, shops dont open 24/7 and they only have sunday opening during the high season, thats if youpre on the coast as well! Its hard being here and I can;t wait to be able to get out...

You will also be subjected to stacks of red tape and blatant racism as there is a huge resentment of the spanish towards the english as its the english thats built this place up, pricing the spanish out of many things.....you ownt get work for a spanish company unless you are completely fluent, dont even consider coming here to be a plasterer or builder, the place is saturated completely and they are all struggling for a bit of work, undercutting each other and almost working for nothing....

Learn Spanish and Catalan!!!