A New Home Sweet Home

So the contract for the apartment I put a deposit on came through, and after a few modifications I signed the lease contract, handed over the first months rent, and took delivery of the keys.  As I said in my prior post the apartment had just been fully re-done so I get the benefit of everything being brand new.  I'm up on the 4th floor (which is the 5th floor if you're in America, they are start at level 0 here); and there is one more level above me.  So let me give you a brief (and not fantastically shot) tour:

Here's a look in the front door.  That's my bedroom through the door straight ahead, with a storage/coat closet there to the left of the door.

Standing just inside to the right of the doorway, this is looking at the hallway immediately in front of the door.  That black glass door is the door to the bathroom.  And you can still see the storage/coat closet there on the right.

Peeking in the bathroom door, you see one of the major attractions for me.  That is a combination washer and dryer, and they are pretty rare over here.  Most people in an apartment just have a washer and they hang the wet closes in their apartment (during winter) or outside (summer) to air dry.  When my agent found this place she mentioned to the owner that I was looking for a combo unit and he was nice enough to add one as part of the build-out.

Looking at the left side of the bathroom was one of the other main attractions of this place.  That is is a large-sized tub with shower head.  The fact that it has at least partial glass for the shower was nice for splash control as again, over here many tubs have a shower head or hand wand but have no curtain or glass to help keep the water in the shower area.

Now back into the hall and looking to the immediate right once you enter the door you see my combo living / dining / kitchen area.  Yes, that's my bag and giant sunglasses on the bookcase there.  As you can see the apartment is nicely furnished with a couch, coffee table, bookcase, storage cabinet (that white thing at the bottom right), a TV, and an extra chair (that orange thing at the bottom right).

Looking at the right side of the living room you see the storage unit and chair.  And the apartment even comes with a bit of artwork on the wall.  There are even lights behind that red panel so that if you want some dim lighting at night you can just turn those on.

And here is my "dining room" / nook.  The balcony is behind there.  And no, I have no idea why only 1 of the 4 chairs is red.  Either they were out of white ones or the architect or designer thought it would be an interesting touch.

Standing in the living room and looking the same direction you came in the front door, this is my kitchen.  The long white cupboard on the left is the refrigerator, and the smaller unit below is a freezer.  The white panel to the left of the over hides a dish washer too.  And I have both an induction cooktop and an over as you can see.  That bit of brown on the left is the door to a decent-sized pantry.

The oven is also a bit rare here unless you have a newer apartment.  One of the apartments I saw just had a cookplate and a microwave as the sole cooking appliances.  And a small under-counter dorm-size refrigerator is pretty common as well.  So again, I feel lucky that my agent found this place that was just being done up to more western tastes.

With the blinds up you can see I have a nice little balcony out there.  One thing you may not be able to see if that there are no window or door screens here.  If the window or door is open, everything outside can come right on inside.  Given that there is no AC over here, during the summer that will likely mean a fair number of mosquitos get in, or flies.

Back through the hallway into the bedroom and looking to the right you see the bed, mirror, and chest of drawer that come with the apartment.  And there is even a TV in the bedroom.  Unfortunately, for the cable package I ended up getting, I believe I will only have 8 channels available in English and I think 3 or 4 of those are news channels.

And finally, looking to the left from the bedroom door is the walk-in closet.  I'm told these are extremely rare other than in brand new buildings, so this was another great aspect of the apartment.  Even with as much of a clothes-horse as I am there is more than enough space.

So that's the new apartment.  Despite how big it looks in pictures, I think it's only around 560 square fee total. 

Unfortunately, things didn't off to a perfect start, and I'll cover in my next post.