Due to the crisis in Spain the desperation of many young Spanish people forces them to take their last savings and move to the UK in order to find work. As they live on a budget and often struggle with the culture and language, finding employment becomes a very stressful and exhausting task and many fail to find the lifeline they have desperately been looking for. Eventually those who cannot make it will resign and go back to Spain. This is the story of Angel Lopez, 36, one of these economic refugees.

I came to Edinburgh in the hope of finding a better paid job than in my country and also to learn English for a future employment. Ten years ago I studied Primary Education Teachers at the University of Almeria, but to work as a teacher for the Spanish state, you must overcome a contest presented to millions of people and offering very few places. I've tried two times and I passed one of them but my grade was not good enough to get tenure, now with the crisis do not even know if they'll hold a contest next ....

I've been here all July and August looking for work and have not achieved anything … my savings are spent. I stayed a month longer than expected with the savings I had, but eventually I will return back to Spain.

I feel sorry for not having got what he wanted ... I'm a musician and I sold all my instruments to come here with some money ... now I'll go with nothing.... finally I spent 3 months ... but hey ... it was an experience in my life and I have improved my English ...

The situation in Spain is disastrous, especially in the south where I live, everything moves by contact ... it is like a mafia ... I know people who are less qualified than I am and who are already working for the state. It is very similar to Italy, you have to have influence and contacts to get into the system, if not it is very difficult ...

I hope it will change soon because in Spain there are currently 6 million people unemployed and thousands of them are university graduates like me who also speak several languages (I speak French and Italian at a high level and English at a lower level and my mother tongue is Spanish) I thought that it would be easy to find work here in the UK, at least in hotels or similar sites but I am totally disappointed because I did not get even that ...

It's a shame ... also all the Spanish I know, even graduates with a very high level of English, here in the UK, they all work as waiters or cleaners .... i.e. jobs that Britons do not want to do ... it's terrible that you have to have a bad job, having a superior academic qualification and being unable to work, is this not Europe too??? ... Why does a Spanish engineer have to work as a cook in the UK? ? Also the British only speak English ... we speak different languages ... it is totally unfair ... sorry but I did not study all my life to be a waiter ...

Once you realize the economic situation in your country and that you have no outlet to the labour market, despite having a superior academic training, you feel pretty bad… but on the other hand ... well because it makes you go abroad it gives learning experiences that you would not get in your own country… that's what you get at the end

I was living in Italy almost three years and in the end apart from learning a new language I also learned many things in life … all those experiences you have is what you are as a person, perhaps more than the studies themselves ... the most significant example is mine ... I have been a lifetime studying and no time has helped me to have a stable life at my age ...

When I return to Spain I will continue to study a second course for graduates of something that I always liked: History. I hope to finish next year ... I currently live off the student benefits by the Spanish government and my university ... actually only "survive" because of the benefits. In Spain there are currently no jobs at all unless you have contacts ...

If I fail, perhaps I will go to South America (Mexico and Chile) where the situation is much improved and the Spanish do not have problems when validating qualifications and life is very cheap as well as easy, not as in northern Europe, where everything is complicated and where there are a lot of barriers for those who are not British... at least that's the feeling I've experienced living here ... But for now I prefer not to think about the future because they begin to mourn, seeing the every day situation of countries in southern Europe like Portugal, Spain, Italy, and Greece… I'm afraid to think ahead ...