Before I Go
I just want to write down why I am leaving before moving to Las Palmas. Some curious people do want to know why I’m going there, so I want to elaborate a little. I will communicate in English because of the broader audience, but it is not my native language so feel free to correct my grammar with the top right button (on GitHub).
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Why am I leaving?
First of all, I’m not going there to find a great new future. I’m not unhappy how things are going in The Netherlands but I know there are some things that could be better. When I worked for GoldRepublic in Amsterdam for a few months I realized that their company culture didn’t fit my needs. It was a typical 9:00 till 18:00 job, five days a week. I do not know where the saying —9:00 till 17:00— is coming from, but I only see those times at governmental positions. Anyway, the job itself was not bad and I got payed pretty well. But I thought, this I can’t do for the next few years.
At that moment I started looking for other opportunities. For a long time I had this idea to work remotely. Maybe a place with some nice beach close by or some interesting people around me. I started looking for a place which is kind of close (relatively cheap flights) and has a nice climate. I think the moment Las Palmas crossed my mind was when I was on a train from Harlem to Amsterdam (thanks Jeroen & Marieke). I looked up the city on Wikipedia, Googled some pictures and did some research on their internet speed. They even had fiber!
Location is set
On that moment I knew that I had to go there. No idea for how long (and I still don’t know), but that was the plan. I also knew that this was not possible with my current job so I asked Christian to introduce me at my previous job. The Member Get Member Company (formerly Social Shop) had only two developers at that time. I know my wishes are not regular, but if you don’t try you will never get extraordinary luxury, so I asked if I could work remotely from Las Palmas and for just three days a week. They agreed and even gave me a golden MacBook. I’m very grateful to this company and its founder Sander!
Via a lot of Facebooking I found a nice CoWorking space called CoWorkingC, it looks good, and probably is. That will give me an easy opportunity to meet new people and have a place where I can concentrate on my work.
So the income is stable and I have a place to work, now it is time to find an apartment. With a lot of Google Translate, answering strange questions about my sexuality and contacting a lot of ads I found a nice place. The way housing agencies make money is the same as in The Netherlands, one month rent as the agency fee. It always hurts to pay so much for just a connection with the owner, but this agency did quite a lot (even got me an internet connection) for their fee.
Just before my move to Las Palmas I got the opportunity to see this great view. The contrast will be high in temperature, but in beauty hopefully not 
For the people who say “Wow, that you have the possibilities!”, you are wrong! Everyone has those options, you can choose how you fill your life. I truly believe there are people who can live fine by working at the same job for some years in the same city as they were born, but please, everyone has the opportunity to do something else. So it is not great that I’m doing it, everyone can do it. I have the same respect for the people who can do the opposite.