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Published: June 24th 2009
I have been so busy unpacking and settling in that I have not had time to write or post an entry to our blog. Consequently this will be a long one….. so be prepared with a cup of coffee, glass of wine, box of chocolates or whatever tickles your fancy because here goes…..
Yes it is really true…. after 7 months of living out of suitcases we are finally settled with all the moving boxes unpacked (and the offending suitcases put away) in Brussels, Belgium. HALLELUJAH! Many of you have asked for pictures of our apartment, so in a separate blog entry I will post some pictures for those who are interested.
Marc jumped in to work on his second day here and has been working long hours ever since. He is really enjoying the job which of course is a plus. He has had business trips to Paris already and likes being able to travel back and forth on the train for just a day or two. He is so busy I have not been able to go with him yet, but we did go together to Paris this past weekend. We have some good friends (Deb and Gary) from Orlando who were there so we met up with them for the weekend. We hadn’t seen them since before we moved to Japan so we had a great time. We went to a Soufflé restaurant and I had a soufflé for every course... probably the only time I will be able to do that!
Meanwhile, now that the boxes are finally unpacked I am just getting used to being a European housewife… which means grocery shopping every one or two days (tiny refrigerators here) and spending hours and hours doing laundry (more of which later).
Moving day with the moving trucks and transporting the boxes and furniture to our apartment on the 4th floor (really the 5th floor because the ground floor is # “0”) was an
experience to say the least! The streets here are really narrow especially in the residential areas. Consequently you have to request that the police post signs several days in advance telling people not to park in the area where the moving trucks need to park on the specific day. The problem is that if they post the signs and someone is parked there who might be out of town, the car doesn’t get moved and then you have to wait for a tow truck to move it. Sure enough… we had that problem….though the fact that the day before the signs were placed on the wrong street and the landlord just went and moved them might have had something to do with it. There were two trucks here that morning and a car was in the way so the large moving van couldn’t park. In addition, it was so big it blocked the entire street. Of course it was 7:30 - 8:00 in the morning and the street he was blocking was the same one where there is a large school, so parents couldn’t drop off their kids and the unlucky ones who did drop them off couldn’t get off the street as there was such traffic mess. Marc and I just stayed upstairs watching out the windows and hoping no one would mention the fact that the no parking signs were not in the same place they had been the night before. The moving company called the police to have the offending car towed and when they showed up to deal with that they found complete traffic chaos! They had the mess cleared up in about 45 minutes so the moving could finally begin. The elevators here are tiny, tiny, tiny. Consequently the movers cannot get furniture in them. A man with a chair would have a difficult time fitting in ours let alone bringing up the sofa, dresser, china cabinet, etc. So… they bring another truck that has a sort of vertical conveyor with a large platform and they position it under a window and bring everything in that way. I was skeptical but it works really great. They fact that we have big windows helped a lot too. Marc and I were really wondering if they were going to get the china cabinet in but they did. Yes… I did get some pictures and will post them on another blog entry. In any case they brought up all 247 boxes up through the window without any mishaps so we were happy.
We really love it here and really, really love our apartment. We were so lucky to find one that suits us so well and is close to Marc’s bus to/from NATO, the metro, shopping etc. We have found some neighborhood cafés we really like and the weather has been so wonderful that it is fun to meet Marc for drinks and dinner after work. Marc has challenged himself to try all 3,000 Belgian Beers while we are here and as they are relatively inexpensive he is well on his way. We are slowing learning enough French and Flemish words to eat out without too many problems. Grocery shopping is another story… I finally got a French/English dictionary so hopefully it will get better and easier as time goes by. The other day (before I had the dictionary) I wanted Balsamic Vinegar. I found bottles labeled “Balsamic” and they were on the shelf above regular white vinegar, but then they were also right beside the salad dressings, so I didn’t know if I was looking at Balsamic Vinegar or Balsamic Vinaigrette dressing…. UGH! It is things like that that are difficult. There are some US brands and that helps, but many things are still confusing so it will just take time. On the other hand, the food here is wonderful. The French bread, the croissants, the wines, the chocolates, the pastries… forget about me losing any weight over here!
Grocery shopping though pales in comparison to laundry! In a word….UGH!!!!! We do have a washer and dryer in our apartment, but they are tiny. Two bath Towels, two hand towels and a washcloth constitute a full load. I would sure hate to have to do laundry for a family of four or six. One load takes up to an hour to run, and on some settings you have to remember to go in and manually start the spin cycle as it doesn’t start automatically. In addition the dryer is quite small and nothing like those we have in the states. They are not vented to the outside so they have a built in container for the moisture / condensation and it has to be emptied between each load and the above mentioned load of towels can take up to two hours to dry and still be a bit damp. (I am NOT exaggerating). The first couple of time we used both the washer and dryer they didn’t seem right, even taking the above into account. So… we had a technician come in to look at them. The dryer is OK, (There is yet another filter that has to be cleaned and the previous tenant apparently never did that) but the washer needed parts that we were told would take two weeks to receive. So…. We wait two weeks. He comes with the part yesterday…. Was in there 10 minutes and comes in to tell me it can’t be fixed and we need a new one. Great (Couldn’t he have told me two weeks ago?) So we go online to find one we want per instructions from our landlord. We tell him which one we want (A bigger one!!) Next problem…. The water pipes can’t take a larger machine and they wouldn’t be able to get it upstairs in the lift anyway. So we pick another one…..Nope… out of stock for another two weeks. So we pick another one… Great… we can have it by Saturday…. Nope…. now it is Monday….Aah geeez… . that is the day we scheduled (5 weeks ago) to go in to get our Belgian ID cards…. UGH……Nothing is easy here. In any case maybe I can do laundry on Tuesday, for the first time in about 3 weeks…. As little as each load is, it will probably take me until the following Tuesday to get it all done! Aaaahhh…. The joys of living in a foreign country!
Anyway….. Now that we are settled, one and all are welcome to come and visit us. We have a guest room ready and waiting. Keep in mind though, that if you plan to use our place as an intermediate stop on your trip to do laundry (and you are welcome to do so) you need to plan more time (An extra day or two) than you think!
I will also post pictures in a separate blog entry….
More later…..
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Gaile
non-member comment
Youth and Patience are on your side.
It's a good thing you are young enough to have patience and laugh at these little (LOL) problems. I can't even imagine Harry coping with any of it. But then that's why we are here safely tucked away in Florida and you are off experiencing the world. Good for you.