Our New Home

Holy jeepers, it has been a long time since I last blogged.  A lot has happened in the 8 (8?!) days since my last post.

Last Thursday was the big move.  I stayed home from work to oversee everything, and honestly, it was still a shitshow.  There were all kinds of things that we needed that we forgot to take out before the movers swarmed in like locusts and packed everything up.

I went to the new apartment early to try to get the utilities set up.  But I forgot to bring the modem, so we had to make a separate trip.  Then my laptop freaked out and wouldn't type.  Then I realized I forgot a water bottle and had not so much as a chair to sit on while I worked in the empty space and waited for the various utility representatives to cycle through.  Then after lunch the movers showed up and the place looked out of control - boxes everywhere, wheels rolling over the floors, a few scratches here and there, tape remnants all over the place.

The movers also "unpacked" our stuff by basically tossing things into drawers and onto shelves willy nilly.  I am sympathetic though - it's really the only way they can do a move in about 8 hours.  And at least they reassembled everything, including our bookshelf, bed, and Lola's crib.  But that aside, things were dire for a while - when I could not locate one clean pair of underwear and had no shorts.  All of this is probably to say, I really don't want to move again.

Here are the movers getting ready to attack our old place - cardboard, boxes, tape, all lining the hallway.

 Moving men in frenzied action!

Here are pictures of our new place - as it looked before movers came!

Here is the view from the balcony.

This is the view from the dining room/ looking out onto the balcony.

This is the view of the living room looking toward Michael's office.

Another view from the living room.  We look out onto the Happy Valley racecourse.

This is the kitchen - you can't see, but there is a HUGE stainless steel double door fridge and freezer that I have never seen in Hong Kong.  Pretty awesome.

This is the view looking out onto the living area from Michael's office.

This is the master bathroom - lots of jacuzzi jets

This is (a corner of) the master bedroom.

This is Lola's room.  Her closets are the only ones that have automatic doors!  Fancy.

This is Lola's bathroom (and will also be used by the twins), and is generally the guest bathroom.

This is a view of buildings across and farther down the street, taken from the twins' future bedroom.

This is the view from Lola's room, looking directly down.  She thinks the fountain across the street, which lights up at night, is a swimming pool.

 

One of the amazing things about the new place is the ample amount of built in wardrobes and closets.  It's pretty rare in Hong Kong. The ceilings are also pretty high, which really lends to the brightness and airiness of the space.

 Michael's office also has an en-suite bathroom, which is very nice.  We joke that with the closets, the view and the bathroom, all he needs is a little basket of snacks, a coffee machine, and he really does not have to emerge from there if he doesn't want to!  This is the view from his office looking out.

Here is where the memories of the pristine space captured in the pictures above start to fade... boxes everywhere!!  In all fairness though, we are slowly getting there.

Michael unequivocally loves this apartment.  Lola loves it also, but probably not as much as her dad.  I will sometimes catch him just starting out the window at night, marveling at the view.  And the view from his office is great also.  It also doesn't hurt that the windows in this apartment are phenomenal.  I don't think I have ever lived in a place with such huge, nearly floor to ceiling windows, that just wrap all the way around.

The view from my bedroom window at night. The moon was very big and bright because I caught it over Mid-Autumn Festival.

 I love the apartment as well - it is very luxurious and clearly a lot more space than where we were previously living.  But for me the big problem has been location - it's a one lane road up and down the steep hill and it takes SO long to get around compared to where we were before.  Yesterday, it took me a whopping HOUR to get home due to a wrong turn by my Uber driver and some crazy, crazy traffic.  I think it took us 45 minutes to go 900 meters.  I'm not sure what happened there but it was one of the more frustrating experiences.  I thought part of the reason we were paying an arm and a leg to live here was for convenience to my work.  It looks like I sorely misjudged the traffic situation. 

I miss the location and convenience of our old place keenly.  Plus it was such an amazing community with such great staff that we were so sad to leave...

Here are some pictures of Lola exploring her new home immediately after the move, by zooming around the space in her new red sports car.  Her reaction to the move was so sweet and adorable - she was so enthusiastic when she arrived to the new place after her afternoon playgroup.  We had already introduced her to "her new home" and had talked about it quite a bit.  She immediately scampered around and clapped her hands and squealed in delight.  This girl - I cannot get over how much personality she has and how she COMPREHENDS everything.