“I leave my house at 6.15 am and after crossing the border, I start work at 6 am”

40% of the territory of the European Union is formed by border regions. Almost two million so-called cross-border workers live in these areas. Cristina is one of them and she is familiar with the oldest border in Europe, this imaginary line that separates Spain from Portugal, which has been the witness of dozens of daily anecdotes. Known as ‘La Raya’ (The Stripe), this border has two different time zones, making it unique in Europe. Hundreds of people cross this line every day to go to work or to study. Two countries and a difference of one hour which, at times, causes chaos with people’s biological clocks.

This is the case of Cristina, a 48 year-old Galician cross-border worker who wakes up every day in Spain and works in Portugal. She lives in Gondomar, in the province of Pontevedra, but she has worked in Portugal for the past two years. Married with two small children, she was made redundant from her job in the automotive industry. In Spain, she was going through hard times “so when I got a call from a Portuguese number in reply to an offer on an online employment portal, I didn’t hesitate,” she recalls. She was unemployed and although “at the beginning the time change made me reticent,” she took the risk. The interview went very well and she was given the job on the spot. “I started working in an automotive company specialising in cables in Valença, just over 21 kilometres from my home. There was just the small fact of it being in a different country,” she explains.

‘La Raya’ is an invisible border separating Spain and Portugal and it has two different time zones, making it unique in Europe

Her working times vary, but she normally works – in Portuguese time zone, from six in the morning to two in the afternoon. This means she has to keep two clocks under control. The first one makes the alarm clock ring at five o’clock in the morning in Spain. There, she gets everything ready for school for her children, she has breakfast and, an hour later, gets into her car. It is around six o’clock in the morning in Gondomar. “I like to leave with time to spare so I can drive calmly. The road I use is also complicated because many animals cross it.” Thirty minutes later she arrives at work. She starts working at six in the morning, as well, but in Portugal. In other words, in her home in Galicia, it is now seven o’clock. She is ready to keep her eye on two different times.

This situation is also experienced in other regions that border with Portugal, such as Extremadura. The Extremadura Public Employment Service (SEXPE) launched a cross-border Extremadura-Alentejo project. According to Nacho Sánchez, a EURES director of the SEXPE, the fact that the border is “much more permeable” must be taken into account along with the fact that public organisations such as the one he represents intermediate “on one part of the cross-border contracts that exist.” In fact, last year this cross-border cooperation between Extremadura and Alentejo (a central-southern region in Portugal), reached agreements for 81 positions in sectors such as “basically construction and farming, followed by the catering and hotel trade, healthcare or in call centres.” Sánchez believes that the difficulty of cross-border jobs lies mainly in the little visibility that they have and not so much on the fact that Spaniards do not accept them. In reality, he explains, “it is easier for a person from Badajoz to travel to Campomaior or Elvas (Portugal) than to Merida.”

Fear of oversleeping

Cristina is happy in her new job. “I feel very good, but I admit that until you adapt to the time change, life becomes slightly chaotic,” she explains. She carries her telephone with Spanish time on it (which automatically changes when she crosses the border), and a hand-wound watch showing Portuguese time. And the fact is that, in the end, she has to be guided by Portuguese time for most of the day. “To begin with it is difficult. You have to think hard about what time it is in each place and when I started, I was very frightened of oversleeping or making a mistake. So I slept very badly and this is a very common occurrence.” When she works the morning shift, she only looks at her telephone in her break and this is the only time she has to check her calls, emails from her children’s school or to carry out any personal business. “I have to think what time it really is at home to know whether I can ring at that moment or not,” she states.

I am very happy in my Portuguese company, but I admit that until you adapt to the constant time change, live is slightly chaotic

This need to constantly corroborate the time also forms part of the daily work at the Extremadura Public Employment Service. “In spite of the fact that companies and administrations are aware of the time change, we always need to check whether a meeting has been arranged at Spanish or Portuguese time and it is difficult to keep it in mind all the time,” Nacho Sánchez explains. On the other hand, Cristina recalls that a few months’ ago she had a training day at her company and she needed to arrive in Portugal slightly earlier. “With all the rushing at home, getting my children’s things ready and the hassle with the different times, I got very stressed. You think you are running very late and you dash off,” she laughs. When she arrived, she realised that she was still on Spanish time and she had an hour’s leeway. “It was a great relief and I enjoyed the extra hour just for me,” she adds. The truth is that these scares and nervousness believing that they are going to arrive late are very normal amongst La Raya cross-border workers. They have a clear conclusion: “Being as close as we are, if we were in the same time zone, it would be much easier for everyone.”