Sunday, November 4, 2012

The hunt continues


It turns out that SRV found ten apartments for me to check out on Thursday afternoon. This group of apartments was . . . interesting.  More of a mix of styles, layouts, and suitability for human habitation.

I apologize in advance for the dearth of pictures this time. I think SRV is still putting the picture profiles together for me, and again, I took notes on each apartment, not pictures. So, let your imagination run free as you read about my Thursday afternoon.

Three of the apartments I saw were immediate no-go’s. Basically, I walked in, looked around, and tried not to let the horror show on my face (I felt that might be rude). Perhaps “horror” is too strong a word—the apartments were livable, but not for my standards.

For example, in one of the places, the tenants were in the process of moving out, so the apartment was a disaster, and pretty dirty in general, even aside from the moving preparations. Imagine your house or apartment at its messiest and multiply that by five. I don’t think the current residents have taken very good care of the place either—dirty walls, grungy kitchen, some broken light fixtures and flooring, etc. It probably would have taken months to get it ready for someone to move in.

The other two “no’s” were two-floor apartments. Yes, that sounds cool, but it really isn’t. The layouts were terrible. One had both bedrooms on the second floor, which had a very low ceiling (even for me), no doors between the “rooms,” and there was hardly any natural light on that floor. Plus, the one bathroom in that apartment was on the first floor and it was in a sorry state—plumbing problems that the landlord was having fixed that week. This place did have one thing going for it; it overlooks a park.
Great view! It's a shame the apartment itself wasn't great. 
The second two-floor apartment was decent—one bedroom and a bathroom on the first floor along with the kitchen, living area, and dining room. But then you get to the second floor: two nice rooms and a nice-sized bathroom. The bathroom had a window looking out onto a patio/public area. Thoughts: 1) Why would you put a window there? 2) Why would you make that window large enough for a person to fit through? 3) The whole thing is just asking for trouble.  Plus, why would I need two floors anyway?

The SRV representative and I didn’t bother taking pictures of any of these hideous apartments, so I won’t have any proof of how crazy they were even after SRV sends me the apartment profiles.

Another three places I saw were okay, but had some shoddy workmanship in fundamental areas and/or they were in complexes located right next to huge construction sites. Examples of the shoddy workmanship: poorly laid floors; really cracked plaster walls; peeling wallpaper; bad paint jobs with ugly colors; one really, really, really tiny bathroom in a three bedroom apartment with no possibility of being able to install a temporary shower enclosure; etc.
Sign from the grounds of one of the complexes. The first
"funny" translation I've seen: the first icon caption
says "No litter cherishes your homalard."
That leaves four with possibilities (however slim). Unfortunately, all four are more than walking or biking distance from the office. For the right place, that wouldn’t necessarily be a deal-breaker, but I didn’t have that “this apartment is incredible!” feeling about any of them. My favorite one is owned by a very nice little old Chinese woman. The place is much too big for one person, but the layout and decorating were well-done (I hope SRV got some good pictures of this place so you can see some of it). This is also the only apartment I’ve visited where we have taken off our street shoes before entering. I’ve asked at every apartment, and the other landlords don’t have visitors take off their shoes. Very interesting.

I haven’t added these new apartments to my spreadsheet yet, and I may not. I still like the unfurnished apartment from the first trip (Apartment 3), and I’ve asked SRV if it’s still available. One of my colleagues lives in the same complex, and told me that it has its own little grocery store, pharmacy, barber shop, and pool within the complex. Rather convenient. Even though it may take more time for the apartment to be ready for move-in (I’ll need to pick out furniture), I could be happy there.

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