Charlie’s Arrival at the Billabong Surfcamp
Well-known places, new people
Nobody likes getting up in the middle of the night, but it somehow is okay to do so for the right reason: Having an early flight to go on your next adventure is one of those reasons. The plane was set to take off at 6.20 in the morning which on the other hand came with the big advantage for Charlie to arrive early in the day in Fuerteventura.
Since it was a weekday, the busses (guaguas – as they are known in the Canary Islands) came quite frequently and Charlie scored a new record time getting from the airport to the Billabong Surf Camp in Corralejo. It came in handy that she had been there before and knew exactly which bus to take and where to change. She was positively surprised when she found out that the price for the bus hadn’t changed since she had last been there (2 years ago).
When Charlie arrived at the surf house, all the others had gone out for surfing apart from one: Leanne. She had spent the last two months travelling the Canary Islands and Fuerteventura was her last stop where she would just relax. Surfing did not really fit that plan.
Leanne was having lunch when Charlie arrived, and they got immediately caught in a conversation. Both seemed to be on the same wavelength. Instead of unpacking her things, Charlie just kept on chatting with Leanne. They shared a passion for travelling and had both been studying languages at university. Their jobs were similar too, but nobody wanted to read about work here.
Charlie’s Favourite Spot
After a good conversation with Leanne, Charlie still managed to take her things out of the suitcase, put them on the shelves and go to the supermarket. Following these errands, it was time to get comfy in her favourite spot: The hammock in between the palm trees in front of the surf house. Of course, that involved a sea view. A Tropical in one hand, and a good book in the other – Charlie couldn’t have imagined a better place to be in the world. It was like the last time she had been at the Billabong surf camp: After a short while everybody knew where they would find Charlie. It was as if this hammock had her name printed on it.
It’s all about the people
What Charlie really likes about the Billabong Surfcamp in Corralejo is the community. Every time she had been there, she had met amazing people. It was her third time there and every stay was completely different, but one thing never changed: It was a wonderful experience! She kept in touch with all those people over the years – she had met a girl there who is now one of her closest friends in London.
After all, to find out who the people would be this time, she had to leave the hammock at some point and join the others at one of the tables in front of the house. That’s how she met two Spanish girls that same afternoon: Tania and her sister Carla. Tania spoke English very well as she had been living in London for some time, whereas Carla didn’t really speak any English. How convenient that Charlie spoke a little Spanish and the three girls started chatting. They wanted to have sushi for dinner and asked Charlie if she wanted to join. It wasn’t really her plan to travel to Spain to have Sushi, but somehow, raw fish in Japanese style is always a good option. She decided to join and met two others who were also staying at the surf house: Jorge (he was travelling together with Tania and Carla) and Yoann who also spent his holiday in Fuerteventura. Tania and Jorge had been friends since childhood. Because he had moved to Germany some time ago, they met regularly somewhere in the world. Yoann came from the French-speaking part of Switzerland and was like Charlie a solo traveller.
Language mash
As it was often the case, the conversation quickly brought up what everybody was doing professionally and what they had been studying. Yoann was very interested when he heard that Charlie had a degree in Romance languages, and he had to put her French to a test. As usual, it was a bit tricky for Charlie to switch from one language to the other, although the switch from Spanish to French was a lot easier than Spanish to Italian which usually ended up in a weird version of a mixed language.
Charlie still remembers very well when she was travelling to Italy the day after her Spanish exam when Italians had mistaken her for being Spanish. So far though, she managed well to express her thoughts and to be understood despite all the mixing of the languages. After all, that’s what matters.
The situation that evening in Corralejo was special though because Carla only spoke Spanish whereas Jorge spoke better Spanish and German than English, but Yoann only spoke English and French. Tania handled the conversation around the table well with English and Spanish, Charlie ended up in the usual language mash.
Japanese in Spanish
It wasn’t unusual for the Spanish to leave the house for dinner at 9 p.m. but Charlie who was used to northern European habits, struggled a bit getting used to Spanish schedules again. To be honest, it was more her empty stomach that struggled a bit with the timing of dinner than her mind. The five were lucky to get a free table at the Sushi restaurant without any long wait and decided to order a few sushi rolls to share – just like Tapas.
Going out with a group of people that you just met can be a strange situation, but it’s part of the experience: The first evening, people aren’t comfortable with each other yet, but after a few days, you don’t even remember anymore that you were just strangers a few days before.
Getting to know real people
You probably know how it feels to share food with brothers, sisters and friends. Everybody knows what the other person likes or dislikes and nobody cares about what others might think if you take the last piece. When you’re going out with a group of people that you just met, there are some strange moments when nobody dares to take the last piece. Those moments generally go by quickly and after a short while, it feels as if you’ve been knowing each other for ages. That is particularly true with the people you meet in a surf camp: you share a room, a kitchen, beers and food, you go in the water together and you come out together. Especially after surfing, people are usually just themselves – with messy hair, burned noses, stains of sunscreen around the ears and very salty. It is the perfect circumstance to get to know someone as the person he or she really is.
After Sushi, they all agreed that a dessert was a must and no questions had to be asked about where the best place in Corralejo would be for pancakes with Nutella. They met by coincidence some other surfers who were also staying at the Billabong surfhouse. Charlie hadn’t met them yet and the others simply called those three “the Austrians”. They were about to get ice cream on their way home. Tania would have liked to go for drinks with everybody, but they were too tired and decided to call it a night.
