Comparing apartments - The Weekend, 17 - 18 October 2009

My washing machine still wasn't working Saturday, so I went to the Philippino teachers' apartment to do my laundry. The girls live on the 12th floor in my building, and they are all very nice.

After having seen Valerie's, Christie's, and the Philippinos apartments, I must say that mine is the least nice. However, mine is not bad. Also, Valerie's has an open living room--an American-style apartment, wherein the living room, dining room, and kitchen all open into each other, no walls. It looks really nice and room, but there wouldn't be a room for Sophia. (Sophia sleeps in the room that would otherwise be a living room, around here it's common for living rooms to be separate, enclosed rooms.)

Valerie and Christie both have American-style bathrooms--with the toilet in the same room as the shower/bath. Valerie has a shower, no bath, like me, however hers looks cleaner.

The Philippinos' apartment layout is similar to mine--they're exactly above me, just 9 floors higher. So their bathroom and toilet are separate, however they have a nice bathtub. And mirrored ceiling! So you can watch yourself take a bath! Why in the world?!?

Their two bedrooms are nice. (One, like in our apartment, would be the living room otherwise.) The walls in one are sparkly, in the other there is pretty pink flowered wallpaper. Not showy, though, the walls are subtle yet sweet. The ceilings I can't quite describe--most of the ceiling is high, nearer the walls it's lower and with lots of lights/lightbulbs in the ceiling, creating a lot of light. Hard to describe, it really looks nice.

However, there are 3 people living there--four soon. One woman is still stuck in the Philippines; apparently they transliterated her name wrong or something.

And they only have one elevator key to share between them. So if they don't come home together, then they'll have to walk 12 flights of steps.

They are having trouble adjusting to the climate, and to being foreigners. I hadn't thought about it much, but Sophia and I are minorities, but barely. We look Russian, and the Russians make up a substantial minority here. So we don't look like foreigners. The Phillipinos look different. They say they get lots of stares. One of the guys is really tall, and he gets stopped a lot, and people ask where he's from. Luckily, he has a sense of humor--he tells them he's from Nigeria. And they believe him!

So, I'm happy with what I have, and very happy to have several friendly coworkers living 8 floors above me.