So I'm officially all moved in to my new flat; lease signed, everything unpacked, pictures hung, groceries bought, supper made, bed slept in. Unofficial housewarming party is this Friday. All that's left is to is get rid of the rest of the fucking furniture at the old place, clean it (yay..), and figure out this miscommunication and fee situation with the "expert" who does the État des lieux to determine how much money the landlord gets to keep from our deposit before releasing it. Simple. Then when this is all finished I have to catch up on my research for my much neglected studies which took back burner to all of this. But really, the last thing you want to do after 3 days of packing, disassembling, hauling, moving, carrying up 3 flights of stairs, unpacking, reassembling, is start reading up on The Failures of Statebuilding and Mainstreaming Conflict Prevention. Plus Vera was in the city for a week, thank god. She was indispensable with helping me make a few trips with stuff to the new flat, and getting her boyfriend to help me move my desk, chair and heavy suitcase with his car. You know, a good friend will help you move, a great friend will offer to help you move. While other friends just ask how it went and when the housewarming party is...
The new flat is fantastic though! I am actually a little upset that I found this place now, and I'm leaving for Switzerland in two months. If I come back to Brussels in the fall, I'm most definitely coming back here. It is one of those older two storey character apartments that has been redone, painted, and completely cleaned. For a virtual tour click here.
Bad qualities: outside door knob falls off all the time, keys to the outside door really suck and I can barely get in, no toaster, single bed.
Good qualities: the only walls that are white are the bedrooms, which means colour!; great modern kitchen with gas stove, new oven and dishwasher; very well decorated with everything going together well; laundry!; very nice size bedroom and bathroom.
So-so qualities: third floor apartment with no elevator. And European third floor, which means there is floor 0 (main), 1, 2, and finally 3, of windy tiny European stairs. I don't like this for obvious reasons, that include moving, buying groceries, carrying heavy objects, and going to and from the flat several times a day. I do like that I'm getting a good workout every time I go to the apartment though.
Which brings me to the Great qualities:
A) Location. Amazing. 40 feet from Parc Cinquantenaire, that I have previously mentioned in other blogs. This huge, beautiful parc with tons of benches, grass, fountains, historic arches, etc. Less than 5 minutes from Mérode, a main metro station connection to campus, the centre, everywhere you need to go. And what's even more, something which Vera and I discovered today, a great little shopping district right off Mérode! Cute little cafés, boulangeries, patisseries, grocery stores, sub and healthy food shops/cafés, Mac store, malls, Chocolate shops, banks; bref, everything you need!
B) Roommate. Chavdar is this extremely metrosexual Bulgarian guy who works for some EU institution or big company doing something with finance...lol. He likes things very clean, loves cooking and makes these amazing things. He made Bulgarian meatballs last night for supper after I finished assembling shit (quite possibly the best meatballs I've ever had), and strawberry cheesecake made with real strawberries, homemade strawberry sauce, and Bulgarian cheese as I was moving in. Plus, he always has at least a few bottles of wine on hand and he already knows Tom and that whole network.
If today would be representative of every day in this new flat, I'll take it. As my first day officially waking up in the flat, it was a great day for a few reasons. One is finally have someone enjoyable to talk to when they/we get home. Not that Tom wasn't great, lol, but he was always working or on the computer. Another is the realization that with all of this walking and stair climbing that is now part of my every day, I am getting a fairly good workout. The average day when I have class like today, I speedwalk (which all of my 'alone' walking is) 10 minutes to the tram that takes me directly to school, walk 5 minutes to campus, 5 minutes back from campus to tram, walk two stops from tram to Mérode, walk to parc, wander neighbourhood, walk back to tram, walk 5 minutes to and from campus, 10 minute walk back to flat, climb 4 flights of stairs, walk 8 minutes to grocery stores, walk 8 minutes back from grocery stores carrying two heavy bags, and finally, climb 4 flights of stairs with heavy bags. Weird thing is, today was a very chill day. I met Vera for lunch before she caught her flight back to Berlin between my classes. We walked to a Panos, grabbed sandwiches and went to leisurely eat them in the Parc with full sun, next to the fountain. After this we casually wandered the neighbourhood discovering all these shops, before walking back in the sun to the tram stop. And I mean, after ALL of this today, I still got home, made supper, and finished putting away my room and hanging pictures. And blogging. Strangest thing? I feel great. I love being busy like this. A good busy; a having non-stress inducing things to do kind of busy. I wish every day was like this.
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