Movin’ In (Anthony’s Song)

Here I am in my swank new digs, sitting on the floor, typing on a computer who’s battery is about to die… But, you may ask, how did I get here? Well, I’ll tell you. It started many hours ago, on a day not too much different than today.

Saturday, 2 days ago…

Day to get the keys. Told you about furniture shopping, well today, I loaded up a cab with whatever I didn’t absolutely need that was in the hotel (which is a lot, trust me), and head over to the house. Frances drives me over (well, sits in the car with me, while her company’s driver, Joshua, technically does the driving). Arrive, do inspection of house, meeting landlady. Man, does it stink. The fumes are HORRID. You know the smell of paint in your house? You ever smell industrial site paint? Well this is a bit worse. It’s rides down your throat, even when you’re not breathing, and takes a nice tight grip all the way around inner circumference, and refuses to budge. I don’t know if it’s worse than if the air went all the way to your lungs, but it’s awful nonetheless.

Anywho, get my keys from the landlady (all 30 or so of them, I swear to God), we go over and sign a bunch of paperwork (everything requires your passport here). They need more passport-sized pictures for resident pass (this is for people living in our Villa to get through security, must be about 50 security guards on duty all the time here). When we’re done, I mention that I still haven’t bought a fridge, so we go by the big electronics/appliance store. Pretty nice place. Things of interest. Find a fridge I like, then look at water dispensers, pick one and buy it, then look at safes, pick one and buy it (all cash of course), then go back to make sure I still like the fridge. Decide to buy it, get it all written up, go over to the separate cash area to purchase it (I’ll explain on some future post how they sell things at department stores here, different from US), and they only take cash or Chinese credit cards. No Mastercard or Visa here! I feel very silly, that somehow I left the house without ~$550US worth of $100RMB notes.

Currency background: Currency in China is RMB (literally translated as the People’s Money, despite most of the People having very, very little of it). $1US+$8RMB. Almost everything is done in cash here. Now for the best part. In this country, the very largest denomination of money is $100RMB. That’s right. Think it through, now… Huge country, almost all transactions done in cash, and the largest bill is the equivalent of $12.50US. So, to buy the fridge, I needed $4600RMB – 46 bills.

So that was a bust. Home I went.

Sunday: Nothing special, a little bit of shopping (paper towels and plates, some snacks to survive, stuff like that), and went back with wads of cash and purchased my fridge. Actually, got a slightly cheaper one. So there, they got less money out of me. Also did some souvenir shopping.

Monday, today: Big move-in day.

Spend morning in hotel (did actually work out in morning, yay me!), have conference call, do a bit of work, start packing up the mess they call my hotel room. Have lunch in room before leaving, then take cab to my new home. Btw, it’s cold here, still right now. Like mid-50’s in middle of day. Dammit.

Get there around 1:15pm, and unload. Unload, that is, amongst about 8 workers doing clean up and painting. Downstairs is a mess, dirty beatup tarp across floor in all rooms, pain buckets and stuff everywhere, couple guys on painting ‘ladders’, and that wonderful smell. The ladders the guys use are about 4 ft tall, like a step ladder, hinged at the top, like a triangle with the point at the top. But, they don’t stand on it like ours (and these are very basic, just cheap wood thrown together, no latches, plastic, or any safety features. They straddle the ladder, so one foot is on each side of the triangle, and then when they finish painting a place, they ‘walk’ across the floor abit by waddling back and forth and adjusting the spacing of the ladder as they go. Certainly don’t get down from the ladder to move.

So, our Ayi (maid, babysitter, cook) shows up a little before 2pm, and begins helping me unpack everything I have, she also starts cleaning up dusty spots all throughout the rooms before putting and clothes down (where she gets the cloth, I have no idea). Then the furniture starts showing up. First is the safe. Guys shows me how to use it (speaking rapid fire Chinese the whole time, like that helps me). The cardboard box from the safe is where I get my ‘desk’ for my laptop. The fridge. It’s a 6ft tall, Asian style fridge. Not double doors like US typically has, but freezer on the bottom, and two sections above it. Top for fridge, middle for veggies and fruit, I guess. How do they get the fridge out of the truck? One guy helps lower down to another’s back, who then carries it over to lawn to put down before they unpack it. Don’t recall seeing one of those heavy lifting girdles they make everyone where at Walmart in the back…

Later water dispenser shows up (necessary in a place where you can’t drink the water).

Finally, the good part – my sofa (L-shaped + ottoman) and bed. I’ll send pics of the bed probably later, it’s a purple creature, not swank old style, but functional and a bit modern. Popular style they have here, with cushions as headboard. Good for people like Kimberly and I who like to read and watch tv in bed. But sofa is still wrapped up since it’s in the room with all the painting going on.

Chinese style furniture shopping… You bargain even though these are not back alley places, and there’s no discussion about how much it costs to ship, they just do it! And when it shows up, they immediately put it all together for you. And this bed was in pieces. Pretty cool.

So, the not so cool parts.

1. They’re still painting and touching up, will be doing it all week, and there will be dust and smell until they’re done.
2. My computer desk doesn’t show up until Tuesday, so I’ll be using the cardboard box and/or my lap until then. Of course, when the desk shows up (with bookshelves), it won’t help much, I don’t have a chair yet (that’s being shipped from Taiwan).
3. Don’t have nightstands yet (waiting for Kimberly to help pick ‘em out)
4. Don’t have enough storage space in master. Don’t know how I didn’t notice this before, but there’s not nearly enough room for all the clothes Kimberly and I have. Will have to rectify that later.
5. Haven’t figured out if hot water is working yet (need to get that fixed real soon if not).
6. Not enough electricity plugs, and each one is just that. One. Need to buy some power strips.
7. Not sure what I’m going to eat.
8. Have to work full day tomorrow and rest of week. Sigh.
9. Last and greatest, still empty – no family here.

But, neighborhood's great, I think the house will be nice once we get settled in, and I’m going through the hassle of workers and moving stuff, so Kimberly and kids won’t have to (minus last bits of furniture we need to buy). And so far, our Ayi is working out great (although I wish she spoke more Enlish...).

That’s it for now. Bye!