Apartments, Curiosities, Online Shopping and the Upcoming Elections
We’ve been looking at apartments to rent. There are lots of them, to be fair, but only before sorting the wheat from the chaff. Many are too small (0 bedroom studios are a real thing here), too low (really, we’re too old for basements) or simply cost an arm and a leg (small 1 bedroom apartment for 5000$/month, anyone?).
But, we found a few dozen we liked, emailed and called them, mostly got no replies, but still looked at one as early as Sunday night. (With a fever, remember? But it went fine.) We loved it. It was big enough, in a quiet street, only one block from Kitsilano Point and the beach. The landlord wanted to get back to us on Monday, but he never did. So today, in a mild panic, we emailed and phoned a few dozen more and arranged for three viewings, all of them in the West End (so, more downtowny and Soviet-Union-in-the-70s style, less Bodensee-feeling and American-suburb-in-the-90s style, but they were more affordable and looked actually nicer than anything else we saw in Kits).
The first one was right around the corner from where we live now. The building’s a bit run down (it’s the one in the photo at the top), but the interior was actually newly renovated. Spacious, a bit sterile, and with a weird mixture of modern furniture and reaaally old appliances. Agnieszka liked it, I had a bad feeling about it, so in the end, we decided against it. The second one was 109 years old. Which can be nice, if properly renovated. It had very nice elements, to be honest, but all in all… the years in that run down apartment in Stuttgart were enough, thank you. We’re ready for the modern stuff. Where one doesn’t enter the bathroom through the kitchen. Also, it was way too large.
The third one’s a sub-lease. From a nice guy who plans and constructs sustainable, eco-friendly buildings. Who’s been looking at / for tenants for quite a while and was ready to give it up, because he didn’t find anyone he would entrust his furniture to. Who liked us. Who we liked. In a rush, I said “Yesyesyes!” and now – provided the building manager likes the numbers in our bank accounts and all – we have an apartment. Which might be neither the best nor cheapest one in the world. But it’s right next to the beach and Stanley Park, bright, with a view of the sunset, reasonably quiet. Agnieszka, it turns out, does a very good imitation of Canadians. (“That is so awesome!” – “Whooooaaaaa!” – “Wait, YOU did these paintings??”) She even fooled me. And told me later that, really, she wasn’t all that convinced and had indeed some valid reservations. And would have liked to talk about it some more, before I said “Yesyesyes!”. Now I feel like an ass.
To make the mess complete, we just got an email from the landlord who wanted to get back to us yesterday. He says we can have his flat. Had we just relaxed and taken a stroll in the sunny park today…
On a completely unrelated side note, we saw a quite stiffly walking guy with a blue plush tail. And an elderly woman with an entirely bonkers body-to-silicone ratio. I made a sketch for your amusement, although it’s not even remotely as exaggerated as you might be tempted into thinking. I’m sure she’s a nice person, though. So don’t laugh about her. Only about the sketch.
And – since the golden thread of this post seems lost beyond repair, anyway – we tried to order stuff on Amazon and it’s an experience that immediately propels you back to your youth, when Amazon sold books. And maybe a VHS tape of something. You can get a choice of three handheld blenders there, cotton squares from Hong Kong for 114$ (I know the exchange rate has gone to shit, recently, but really?) and a beard trimmer for 39.99 that you can also get from the drugstore around the corner… for 29.99. Hey Canada. Nice to meet you. Where were you the last two decades? Lazy sod.
And then, because why not, some councilman’s election campaigner calls you and wants to secure your vote and is terribly disappointed when you tell her you’re not going to vote because she just woke up your baby boy after he’d only gone to sleep 10 minutes ago. And also, you’re not Canadian.
*sigh*
