Homeless No More!

---

As of 16 Aug 2007, I am homeless no more! I now live in Princeton Estates in DLF Phase V of Gurgaon! There are 948 apartments in this complex and we are surrounded by other complexes just as large. It's been quite the ordeal getting here, but I am now almost set. The gas gets hooked up tomorrow and the final repairs of the water purification system will also be done then. The gas man is supposed to come at 11am and the plumber at 10am which means I'll be lucky to see either of them by noon!

I'm still working on furniture and decorating, but I did have the vitals when I moved in Thursday evening. I was in Mumbai Friday and got picked up at 4:30am and returned home at 9:30pm so I haven't had much time to get settled. Vijay, our new administrative person, has been great and on his first day, helped me with the plumber, the AC installation, and with Domino's Pizza. Today, he took me to the mall and I did a lot of shopping at "Big Bazaar", India's answer to Wal-Mart, although Wal-Mart is working had to get into the country. They currently have a co-op deal with another company and will be jointly opening stores in 2008. We went to lunch afterwards and I now even have leftover Chinese food in the refrigerator.


















The good news:

* I have AC in the bedroom!
* I have cable TV with HBO (for which I gave a guy 200 rupees for the magic cable, no questions asked)!
* I have excellent wireless internet!
* The guards at the front gate are finally realizing that I live here and have stopped demanding a pass to let me in. Now, I just need to work on the guards in my building lobby who keep making me sign the register everytime I come in or go out.
* Domino's delivers: for 100 rupees (including tip), I can get a small cheese pizza and a soda delivered in less than 30 minutes!
* I have two Diet Cokes in the refrigerator!


The bad news:

* The AC is only in the bedroom - the rest of the place gets stiflingly hot, especially about 7:00pm in the evening. I do have fans in the living room and dining room, but you have to sit directly under them to feel the breeze. I'm not quite sure how to arrange the furniture to account for both this and the TV (see below).
* I have 80 channels of cable TV with HBO and there's nothing good on! Plus, you have to sit directly in front of the TV to be able to hear it and the romote control doesn't work very well - you can't punch in a double digit number so you have to go one by one. The landlord provided the TV which seems quite old so I may see about getting it switched out.
* When the power goes out, as if fairly frequently does, the wireless connection dies so I need to get in the habit of saving things more frequently (I'm retyping about half of this entry)
* I have 8,000,000 cockroaches in the kitchen! So far, they haven't ventured outside of that room so I really hope it stays that way. Cockroaches are just a fact of life here so I'm hoping my detente will hold and we can all live together in peace!


Vijay was very helpful today and I'm feeling more settled now. I'm going back out tomorrow to look for curtains for the windows. I feel like everyone can see into my place since I can see into so many other peoples' apartments. Luckily, last weekend I bought a shower curtain. There's no shower rod so I don't need it in the bathroom and it was a perfect fit for my bedroom window! I will use it as a curtain in the spare bedroom since there's no point in wasting it. Everything in the bathroom gets pretty wet when I shower so one of the things I bought today was a plastic container for the tp! I'd also like to find some shelf paper for the cupboards where my clothes will go.

Interior photos will follow once all my furniture is here and I have things set up the way I want.

---

Photos

Princeton Estates #1
A veiw of my apartment building - for those of you with good eyes, my apartment is on the right hand side, the fifth floor, the one with a blue bucket on the balcony railing

Princeton Estates #2
A closer view of my apartment building - my apartment is on the fifth floor, the one with a blue bucket on the balcony

Princeton Estates #3
A veiw from my apartment building - I can see the largest of several parks where there are always people relaxing and lots of kids running around

BFF #1
My BFF #1: my air conditioner! [I'll explain the duck shower curtain later]

BFF #2
My BFF #2: my wireless internet router! For 899 rupees a month ($23), I have unlimited local phone service plus wireless internet!

Non-BFF #1
My Non-BFF #1: A few of my new non-BFFs - I turn control of the kitchen over to them at night and in the meantime, keep everything securely encased in plastic tubs