I joined Price Waterhouse in Paseo de Gracia 110, Barcelona, on April 26th 1965.
I drove out in my Morris-Minor, actually flying from Lydd Airport in Kent for the hop over the Channel to Le Touquet. This service was run by British United Air Ferries and the plane took 3 cars and 14 passengers. With the channel ferries being introduced this service didn’t last too long after I flew with them. Most people since dispute I drove a car onto a plane, strange but true.
For those that still doubt – here was an example of the plane I flew on
I met my girlfriend, Pat, in Paris (as we couldn’t leave the UK together – umm, well that’s another story and not for the internet) and we rented a flat on the beach in Castelldefels from Peter and Margaret Tedesco (see Homes).
Cheap and cheerful, but in a wonderful position, and I could commute to Barcelona by car or train. Later I took the Morris Minor back to the UK and purchased a Spanish Citroen 2CV – the model just after you had a stick to find out how much petrol you had in the tank.
PW was a great firm to work for. I was lucky, as this was a time when the Americans and British were investing in Spanish companies. Most of the work was to do with investigating these companies and reporting on their results and financial situation. Did a fair bit lot of travelling, to Madrid of course (you went on the train overnight in those days as much of the line was single track), and a spell down in southern Spain investigating a company that Beechams were wanting to buy.
Some actual audits of Spanish companies including Gallina Blanca (who did everything you could possibly do with chickens). During this time I spent a lot of time with American businessmen, who I liked, and their systems which they wanted to be implemented, and which the Spanish found a little against the grain.
The strangest aspect of working in Spain was getting used to there being two sets of books – the actual results and those submitted to the taxman. These records were kept separate and sometimes with two accounts departments.
Pat, who had epileptic fits, had to go back to the UK and I spent some time in Barcelona in a friend’s flat, but this time in Spain was put to a sudden end by a letter from my uncle, Jimmy Bussicott, who told me my father (52) was dying from lung cancer.
Jimmy, who worked for British American Tobacco, was the one to handle this and I have always kept his letter to me
I must have received this letter early in February 1966 and came back to the UK soon afterwards.
An only child, I came back to London to be with my Mum and saw out his lingering death.
The doctors were right as my dad died on 31st March 1966.
Not made easier by Lesley, my fiancé, changing her mind about marrying me as she didn’t want to live overseas. This after her father, a tailor, had just made me a rather smart mohair suit to be married in!!
So I came back to the UK, and although PW in London said they could offer me a temporary position, I saw an opportunity with B.O.A.C.