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| Two feet tall and eight feet wide, I swear |
Waaaaaay back in...November--I think?--Paul was in Denmark for one day. And on that one day, he had the chance to see exactly one possible apartment that would be free in February. It was close to the main train station, which was good for our commutes. It was only going to be around $700/mo without the usual Danish requirement of paying the first three months up front. It was advertised as being the same size as Aquahaus. And, it was on a charming street.
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| I mean, come on, that's pretty charming, right? |
So, Paul went to see this apartment. Then he had me come up to Denmark on that same day to see the apartment. And, weighing the list of pros and cons, the pros eked out a victory and we decided to take it.
Now, there are some very good things about this apartment, a few of which I already mentioned. But, others included things like carpet (?!), not being directly above a very cold cellar, and having access to a dryer.
But, there are some decidedly not as good things about this apartment, too. For example? Well, the bathroom is the smallest bathroom in the entire scope of my imagination in all possible universes of quantum theory.
No seriously. I'll take pictures (maybe, if I can fit in there with a handheld camera...it may be a squeeze).
Also, there is no dishwasher. This is a horrible, horrible thing after having one here for the first time in our married lives.
Additionally, I'm not entirely sure if the oven/refrigerator/any-cabinet door can open without hitting the opposite wall.
Aaaaaand, if this apartment is the same size as Aquahaus, then I'm the same size as Sweden (fat. chance.).
Numero uno of the cons, however, had to be the fact that it is literally impossible to get anything longer than four feet into the front door. In fact, if our mattress had not been the kind that originally was delivered in the attitude of a jellyroll, then we would be using sleeping bags for the next three years.
Let me break this down for you: There are two staircases on either side of our tiny, skinny door. The one on the right comes up from the ground floor and is approximately two feet wide. The one on the left continues up to the third floor. Our door, in this highly accurate illustration, is the red thing. (The lilliputian bathroom is the blue postage-stamp).
The purple is the impossible u-turn trajectory one has to maneuver to get anything inside.
[Stay with me, I'm going somewhere with this.]
SO, as you can see, it is physically impossible to move something like...oh...say...a couch...into this apartment through the traditional "doorway" method.
Which left the windows. Yep. Getting a couch through the second story windows.
My overall point here is that this whole couch thing was REALLY STRESSING
It was also stressing out the previous tenants, who tried to get us to buy their used couch for $1,000+.
"HAH!" we said, in our semi-impoverished way. And in that same e-mail, I wrote that, since we couldn't afford it, we'd actually just go buy an IKEA couch that we could hopefully move up in pieces and that our price was therefore around $500 instead.
Well, dangit but I should have said $50!
Because this morning, as said previous tenants were, with their professional movers, attempting to get their $1000+ weird-shaped Scandinavianly-designed (did I mention weird-shaped?) couch out the window...they discovered that a certain window replacement in 2008 made the opening juuuuuuuust about two inches smaller than before
And their psycho-priced couch was never going to leave that apartment alive!
All of this is just my concise way of saying that now we own a couch, and because Paul's personality (and mine, if we're being honest) absolutely cannot handle any sort of any kind of haggling...he paid $500 for it--
An absurdly short, fat couch that has been christened "Devito" and will live the rest of its unchainsawed days in our apartment.
Fin.
Ba ha ha haha!! I love it all. Minus the getting stuck with a $500 couch. Then again, maybe it's good you said $500 because then they couldn't just be like, heeeey, it's gonna cost you $1000 to keep the couch? Nope...getting stuck with their couch really stinks. THEY should've paid YOU to take it off their hands. ::sigh::
ReplyDeleteI hope to see a tour of this apartment. Maybe you can buy a wide-angle lens for the bathroom photo. I want to hear more about this apartment, complete with diagrams. Seriously.
You're right! They SHOULD have paid us! Dangit...
ReplyDeleteAlso, even though I said that Paul and I can't haggle, I'd like to hope that, if I had been there, I would have at least gotten them down to $250 or something. "Well...you know, we had another couch lined up for $250...but if you want us to take it off your hands then, maybe we could cancel with the other folks?" Something like that. But, I think in the stress of the moment, Paul was just like, "Uhhhh fine. Okay!"
And now we will never, ever move.
Also...the fact that the tenant's mother was standing right there AND she happens to be our landlord might have had something to do with Paul's capitulation.
And, when we get there and get squared away, a tour you shall have.
Devito is....awesome! It looks like a queen sized bed! Time for houseguests!!") You should get patches from all the places you travel to and sew them onto him/her/it. Then, when ever you and Paul move, the new people that you will inevitably have to sell him/her/it to will have a handy reference tool.
ReplyDeleteHave fun in this part of the invasion!
I do so enjoy reading your posts - this one was particularly entertaining! AND, my relatives are from Denmark so I might want you to research some fun things and take pictures for me if you have the time/desire to do so! :) I'll email you!
ReplyDeleteOur first place in SB had a similar issue: 90-degree turn up the tiny 19th c. factory worker house staircase up to the bedrooms. My fil didn't see a problem: he sawed our box frame in half, then nailed it back together. That night I drove 3 hours (each way) to ikea to buy a cheap bedframe--with slats.
ReplyDeleteThe couch does look comfortable...