My own place

So, after gotten married and gave birth to a baby, this might be one of those monumental steps one is supposed to experience in life – moving into one’s own place.

Well, all these while I’ve been staying either at my parent’s house, my grandparent’s house, some relatives’ house or a hostel. Oh, and yes, I did squatted for a while in Leeds and in Manchester – but that was almost akin to staying in a hostel. Funny, I never thought the first time I move to a place of my own, it would be into a tiny 32.4meter² 2-room apartment in Chiba, Japan but here I am anyway.

Already I am wondering how to decorate it and what else do I need to buy. I guess I’m lucky because the apartment, being at the corner, is quite bright and installed with air-conditioner, lamps, hot water system in the kitchen and bathroom. Already, I’ve bought some essential household appliances – fridge, washing machine, microwave oven, rice cooker, electric kettle, mini vacuum cleaner and while I don’t really consider TV to be that important – I got it too. And just this evening, I also bought gas cooker (called gas table here in Japan), after two days of eating mixed rice a’la Korean drama Full House’s style (rice with leftover or in my case, instant, lauk - such as sambal bilis, serunding and some cut raw vegetables, such as carrot and cucumber – all mixed together)

All these while – I’ve never had to worry about paying my own house utilities bill or to make much contact with landlord or real estate agent regarding any house repairs and what nots. Already, I’ve to contact the real estate agent regarding some repairs that need to be done – the leaking pipe for the washing machine, the bathroom door that cannot be locked, and I need to be taught on how to connect the TV cable to the antenna outlet (it sure looks different here than in any other place I’ve been to, Tokyo included). And I’ve already been visited by the Keio Gas service representative to teach me on how to make use of gas-related utilities in my house.

The unpacking had been – blurgh. Mostly done, but it's a work in progress considering I still need to figure out how to make the most out of the one closet that we have. Bought a pipe hanger, and really hope it would help. Need to arrange everything neatly, to fit it with hubby’s and baby’s stuff later on. But I think we will do okay. It may be a little tight and compact – but we’ll do okay, insya Allah.

I’ll be working on the curtain rails tomorrow insya Allah. Is, who sold the microwave for 1500 yen (when they still cost about 3000 yen at the second hand shop) and gave a complimentary iron as well as an old TV cabinet, had promised to help me out with the curtain rails. I haven't even bought the curtain rails or the curtain but I've already got the windows measured. I still have a lot to do and buy for the house in preparation for the rombongan Cik Kiah from Malaysia, but eventually I believe everything will be just fine.

Of course it would be even better if I do get a phone call from some authority letting me know that my missing wallet – and all the important documents in it - had been found.