Mike Broeckhart, 28,
Web/Interface designer
Born in Antwerp to Belgian parents; grew up in Tenerife then
educated for eight years in the UK. Moved back to the island after
working in both Germany and the Czech Republic.
Jonathan Green, 28, trained as an aeronautic engineer.
Born and raised in Tenerife; attended university in England and later
worked in Munich before moving back to Tenerife. Currently developing
his own company, as well as producing/directing a feature film.
Surya Pereyra Kröll, 27, Receptionist
Born in Tenerife to an Argentinean father and a German mother;
attended the British Wingate School, later studied for A levels in the
UK. Travelled extensively around Europe and the USA.
What are the advantages, as well as disadvantages, of being brought
up here?
Mike: I think my parents made the right decision sending my brother
and me to an English school [in the UK]. It opened up a lot of doors.
Surya: Definitely, yes.
Mike: I much prefer the English education system.
Jonathan: Neither of you are English so, going to
an English school, did your parents think that in the future you’d
move back to England?
Surya: In my case, my mother is German and my father is Argentinean
so they thought it would be good to have another language.
Jonathan: I speak Spanish but I make many mistakes
in the writing. Sometimes I wish I’d gone maybe a year or two to a Spanish school,
just to get it 100 per cent. And obviously I’ve been away from
Spain so I’ve lost a lot.
Mike: The advantage I had was that during the first few years of my
life I was going back to Belgium a lot. Being so young it was easy
to assimilate other languages. I think it made it a lot easier for
me to learn. But, growing up here in Tenerife has made it even easier.
How many languages do you speak?
Mike: Five or six. Dutch and Flemish are considered
different languages but they’re very similar.
Surya: Well, my parents are two different nationalities so I already
had Spanish and German. English I learnt through studying and then
at school I studied French and Spanish also.
Mike: I found that I perfected my Spanish working
for the last two or three years here in Tenerife. I hadn’t really
had a use for the Spanish language but working for a tour operator
I found that I had to write letters in correct Spanish, with the correct
grammar.
Jonathan: I speak English better than I speak Spanish
but I’m
more comfortable speaking Spanish. I learnt English at school and from
my parents who came here 30 years ago. So, when I was in England I
ended up using really old-fashioned words and people would look at
me oddly. I got quite uncomfortable speaking English. Also, I think
my accent is very posh, even though I don’t consider myself posh.
When I speak Spanish people know I haven’t lived here for a while
because they can hear it in my accent, but at least I feel that I’m
part of the culture here. I’m part of the people and the sense
of humour and I’m much more relaxed using slang. If I use English
slang it’s learnt, and because they’re words I wasn’t
brought up with it sounds forced.
Mike: My native language is supposed to be Flemish
but I think I speak English and Spanish a lot better. Out of those
two I don’t know
which I speak better. I think probably Spanish now at this stage. But
the three of us speak Spanglish quite often. We use the most appropriate
or funniest words of each language.
Surya: English was usually the language that we spoke
at home – but
I mean ‘our’ English, ‘home English’ (laughter),
which is a mixture of German, English and Spanish. I tend to speak
English and Spanish more or less the same.
What did you study and why? Did you take into account the career opportunities/limitations
you’d have here?
Surya: I had the opportunity to study in an English
school, and then went to England and did language A Levels because
[at the time] I couldn’t
do them here. Then I just worked. I didn’t go to university.
Mike: I did language A Levels too. I went to boarding
school for five years in England and then I went to university and
did a degree in Applied Psychology and Computing. I did it deliberately
because it was a very general degree - I didn’t want anything too specific.
I didn’t know – I still don’t know – what I
want to do, so I thought I’d study something I was interested
in.
Jonathan: I did A Levels in Spanish, Maths and Physics
and then studied Engineering. I knew that Tenerife would always be
home but Engineering was just something that sort of happened. I didn’t
really have the intention of coming back to Tenerife, even though I
knew this was home.
Surya: But having languages does give you the opportunity to work
abroad.
Jonathan: Well, that’s the thing. You’ve
got a language base from living in Tenerife and then you do a degree
in Engineering or whatever and then you can use that to do all sorts
of stuff.
Do you think the career opportunities are limited here?
Mike: I found that to get a job here it’s not necessary to study
anything. As long as you speak a few languages you’ll be accepted
for almost any job.
Jonathan. Well, most people here don’t bother
with learning anything because they know they can get a job anywhere
though those that have languages get a better one. The ambition here
is quite low because there are no real opportunities.
Mike: That’s true. When I went to the UK I thought, why study
tourism? I didn’t think there was anything new to learn. You
grow up with it here. You see it all. I think the locals should study
other things that will bring in other markets and new industries.
Jonathan: You’re not going to get an engineering company or
any major company to invest here if there’s no level of education.
What is your opinion of the education system in Tenerife? How could
it be improved?
Surya: I went to a private English school whilst
my sister studied in a private German school, then to a normal local
school. Now she’s
at university. I think that if you’re a dedicated person you
can do well at a local school.
Jonathan: It’s down to ambition. In Germany and England it’s
cold and miserable. If you don’t have a nice house then your
standard of living is quite low, so you have this ambition. Here you
don’t need that much money. You can have a great day at the beach
and not spend any money. Here you think, what’s the difference
of earning this much or that much if I’m happy anyway?
Mike: That’s right.
Surya: Yes. Here you have the option of working in tourism, which
means you can earn 1,000 euros a month. You can be a waiter earning
1,000 euros and with that have a car, a house. That gives people less
drive to progress in their studies.
Jonathan: There’s unemployment here, but it’s not a problem.
In England or Germany you think you’ve got to study to get a
job, you don’t want to end up living in the streets. It’s
all about fear. If you don’t study, it’ll be really bad.
Whereas, if you don’t study here it’s probably the same
as if you do study. Most of my friends left school at 14 and they didn’t
see anything strange in that, whereas in England the attitude is, if
you don’t go to university, you’re never going to get a
job.
Mike: I think there’s a big difference between mainland Europe
and here - the parental motivation and encouragement. I think the majority
of parents here have never even had an education. In mainland Europe,
the parents have had an education to a certain level, they’ve
been to university and they’ll encourage their children to study.
But here it’s not like that.
Is it difficult to have a career here in something not directly linked
to tourism?
Jonathan: I think immigration will change things.
There are a lot of people coming into Tenerife who know there are jobs
here. People come from mainland Spain and Argentina who speak the language
and are more qualified than the people here and they’re getting some
of the jobs. There are the Canarians who left school at 14 with no
languages and suddenly there’s some guy from another part of
Spain who’s taken a job that they could’ve got. If that
happens a lot people will say, hold on, we’ve got to do something
about this.
Mike: And there’s also cheap labour coming
in from Morocco.
Jonathan: Yes. Canarians used to be the cheap labour.
Now you get all these people coming from Germany and England and mainland
Spain who are setting up businesses and the Canarians are losing the
cheap-end jobs and then not getting the high-end jobs because they
haven’t
studied. So, there may be a lot of problems but it hasn’t happened
yet, so I don’t think people are that bothered. There are a lot
more opportunities in Santa Cruz. I’ve never lived there but
it seems that way.
Is the best option here to open your own business?
Jonathan: I think so. I think there are many opportunities. Maybe
not so much now, but certainly before. There are a lot of foreigners
coming in with different ideas.
Surya: Usually I think that’s what gives the impetus to local
people. They see a business that does well and they think, what a good
idea. But it’s important that they have their own initiative.
They are too settled. Tourism is what there is, but they should take
into account what the locals need a bit more.
Mike: Yes. There are other industries that should
be concentrated on, like renewable energies. Ok, tourism evolved here
because of the perfect climate we have and because it’s only four hours away
from mainland Europe. But, the climate also means we can have an amazing
agricultural industry, which isn’t being taken advantage of.
The banana plantations are going downhill big time.
Surya: Tourism brings in more money that agriculture,
so people will leave it and go into tourism. Also, the owner will say,’ well,
if I sell my land for a hotel, I’ll get more money,’ which
means that in the future all this area full of plantations will be
hotels.
Mike: They brought in a moratorium, which I think
is great, although I think there should be a total building stop now.
I think the infrastructure that exists needs to be improved upon and
we should try to develop the tourism we’re getting here, to make
the quality better and then work on other aspects. Although, I do think
the quality has improved.
Do you think you have an advantage over most people from here?
All: Yes, definitely.
Jonathan: Even if you’ve got no education. Just the fact that
you’re bilingual means you can walk into a job.
Surya: Usually to work in reception you need languages
but you usually also need a qualification in tourism. I don’t have one but I
had experience and languages so in my case it wasn’t necessary.
Mike: I think that the best thing you can do as a
local person is to get out, at least for a year. I think it does a
lot of good. But I don’t think you should force people to be
ambitious, it should grow naturally.
Jonathan: In so many places money is the sole commanding
decider in anything you do. I think I’d be wary of pushing the island that
way. To be quite honest, I wouldn’t change Tenerife for anything.