We've Moved!!!

I think I have mentioned at some point that we were moved from the As
Hotel about a month ago to a tiny little flat 10 minutes' walk from
school. Since that fateful day, Lydia and I have been dreading the end
of the teaching day when we had to return to the flat. It was tiny,
and I really mean miniscule. The kitchen could not fir 2 people at the
same time - not like small kitchens where if there are 2 people in
them they are constantly bumping into each other and trying to get
past one another. This is a different category of small. There was not
enough floor space in the kitchen for 2 people to stand in it at the
same time!!! The refrigerator was out on the balcony. Someone trying
to cook in the miniscule kitchen would have to walk past the oversized
dining table (as in, if you put the chairs at the table, you couldn't
walk by), through the cluttered living area (a couch, a love seat, 2
armchairs in a 3 square metre area) open the balcony door (the word
"balcony" being used here because I don't know if there is a word for
the 1 by 2 metre space enclosed on 2 sides by windows overlooking the
neighbours' balconies), go out onto the balcony (because the
refrigerator door opened towards the living room and so you had to go
out onto the balcony itself to open it) and get their stuff from the
fridge. This wasn't a long walk, as the apartment was tiny, however,
the various obstructions of the furniturial kind made it quite a feat.
The kitchen and the layout of the flat were paltry problems when
compared to the bedroom situation. As you may know, I was sharing the
flat with another teacher, Lydia, a delightful Irish lass. We get
along well, which is a very good thing, since our "bedrooms" were
separated by a window that runs the length of the room. The window had
3 ill-fitting glass panels, the middle one supposedly sliding on a
poorly-designed wooden track if you wanted it open. The result was
that because of the poor alignment of the glass and the badly warped
wood, the glass pieces didn't actually touch each other, except to
rattle annoyingly whenever anyone in the building opened or closed a
door, and more so whenever a door in the flat was opened or closed.
The window was high off the floor, and we're both about 5'3" so
fortunately we couldn't see into one another's rooms, but volume-wise
it was as if we were sharing a room.
Why did my bedroom have a window to the next bedroom? What was the
reason for this bizarre design? Ventilation. That window was the only
window in my room. There was no light from anywhere else. If you
managed to slide open the window without cutting your hand on the
glass, there was a one square foot space through which air could enter
the room. Not fresh air from outside. Not a breeze. But if you waved
the bedroom door in and out, you could get the air in the room moving.
That window was also the only source of natural light. My room was a
windowless, airless box.
The other bedroom was not designed as a bedroom. It was a sort of
sunroom. In fact it was so not a bedroom that it didn't have a bed. An
uncomfortable folding couch, yes, bed no. It also had no place to
unpack and store anything. When we arrived, it was a small sitting
room, with the couch, an armchair from the living room, 2 dining room
chairs, a round living room table, a set of 3 small square tables, and
a huge display cabinet filled with dishes. If this sounds like a lot
of furniture for one small room, it is. We moved out the chairs,
squeezing the armchair into the already crowded living area, stacking
the dining chairs out on the balcony next to the fridge, moving the
round table (along with the other 2 that were in the other bedroom
making it impossible to move) to a storage area above the bedroom
window, and putting the small tables to use elsewhere in the flat. It
was insane. What was left was a sofa bed, and the cabinet with plates
and stuff in it. The room had a lot of light (as opposed to the box
next door), but nowhere to put anything. No clothes could be unpacked
or hung up. Basically, the person in that room had to live out of a
suitcase.
I'm not going to describe the bathroom. The apartment was a hellish
experience and to go talk about the worst part of it would just take
me back there. It was bad.
So anyway, sometime last month not long after moving in, after
explaining to the manager that our accomodation was unsuitable and a
long, involved discussion about what exactly qualified as suitable,
and also a few thoughts on what I thought about the fact that he put
us in this place, we were told that we would be moving out and that
they would use that flat for a couple.
The couple just moved in yesterday, and we moved out. The apartment
we've been moved to is WAY better. It's definitely up to standard and
is about what I expected when we first moved. Comfortable, airy,
bright, spacious - it's great! There's also 2 sofa beds for guests!
The sofa beds are double beds. So all you potential houseguests, Lydia
and I have agreed that houseguests are a good thing :o) Let me know
when you're coming!
We also have a balcony that overlooks a garden. It looks like all the
people on the ground floor of the buildings in the vicinity have
access to backyard space that they've used to grow flowers and things.
In addition, there seems to be an empty plot that someone is using to
grow vegetables and things. The flat is on a bit of a rise and we are
on the top floor, so we have a view over the neighbours' buildings to
distant areas and in the distance we can see mountains! There's a
mosque at the bottom of the street, a really cheap grocery store at
the end of the road, and a bus stop about a minute from the house.
It's a 25-minute walk to school (or a 7-minute bus ride or a $2.50
taxi ride if we're really late).
It's very nice.
We're happy :o)