Full House

You can tell our new abode is basically a bachelor pad from the moment you see the sitting room with its smart but minimalist decor, black wood furniture, DJ decks set up in one corner, a bicycle propped up in the other and a huge flat screen TV in the middle. A slightly closer look would suggest the two main interests of the household are sport (specifically, rugby and padel - a game similar to real tennis) and technology.

As it happens, this all suits Theo and me very well. Theo's sport of choice is rugby, which immediately gives him something in common with Pete, the English PE teacher. We're both interested in learning to play padel, which makes the fact that we live with a padel coach rather useful (Jorge, the Brazilian) and there is nothing more useful than a helpful geek (believe me, I use the term with affection and reverence) to assist with the inevitable computer problems - that's Alex, then.

Our first impressions that this would be a fairly easy household to live in are so far proving correct. Everyone is friendly and easygoing and there is an obvious and inclusive camaraderie among the flatmates.

With Theo being away at work yesterday afternoon. I was taken on a mini tour of central Madrid's shops by Jorge, who'd decided to peruse the sales for a new sports top. In fact, he made a pretty decent shopping companion, being patient when I was perusing the hosiery for new tights; helpful with my mission to purchase myself an espresso maker (one of the few things the flat doesn't have - I'm living in Spain with four non-coffee drinkers, for heaven's sake!) and positively bombastic when it came to flagging down a sales assistant so I could procure a Madrid A-Z.

Jorge himself couldn't find a top of the exact shade of white he wanted in his size, so all in all, my shopping mission was more successful, although his was definitely cheaper. Jorge, although Brazilian and therefore a native speaker of Portugese, has excellent English and Spanish, so the shopping session also proved to be a useful tutorial for me as I continually tested out and tried to expand my Spanish repertoire.

Theo's first attempts to expand the English repertoire of various Spanish people proved to be something of a let-down, mainly because most of his pupils didn't actually show up to their lessons. I'm sure the four that did go to his classes found it highly worthwhile, though. And the fact that his final conversation class attracted no one at all at least meant he was able to go home early.