And more drive by blogging…

japra | Jun 17, 2009 | Comments 15

Had a great visit with my parents. They were a nice distraction!
Roxi’s graduation was wonderful. The weather was perfect, the school’s grounds were just so lovely—we couldn’t have asked for a better way to end our time in England.
Roxi went to see “Wicked” one last time with her best friend and another girl who is moving back to the States. They had second row seats. And in case you were wondering, that was the fourth time Roxi has seen it!
This is the first time in nearly a week that I’ve been on the computer. It’s been a good break, but I hate feeling out of touch.
The movers came to our English house last Tuesday. It took them a total of nine hours spread over two days to pack and load. Not bad, I think! I loved having movers—they are so much faster and definitely more careful than we would have been. Next time I will take care to label things that will end up in a different room in the new house.
We arrived in Den Haag on Thursday evening—we drove and it took us about 8 hours (taking the Eurotunnel). We ended up keeping our UK car—it made things simpler for us. It costs €12 a day to park our car in the street. As soon as we can get a copy of our tenancy agreement, we can apply for a resident parking permit. Hope we can get one without having to be on a waiting list. Someone told us that there is an ELEVEN YEAR waiting list in Amsterdam!
We stayed at the Kurhaus in Scheveningen for two nights while waiting for our furniture to arrive. What a lovely old hotel! I’ve wanted to stay there ever since Mr. DJ told me about it.
No matter what anyone says, there are plenty of great restaurants in Den Haag.
I love living in a bigger city again. And though I would have loved to have lived in Central London, it is a lot easier to get around in a city this size.
We decided to hire a travel companion for Trudy to make things less stressful for her and us. She was picked up last Tuesday and delivered to us yesterday. I think she had a nice time with her new friends. She seemed happy and well cared for. If anyone needs a service like this in Europe, feel free to contact me for more information.
Our new house is fabulous! It has the same number of rooms as our old house, but every room (except for the kitchen) is twice as big (or more) as our rooms in England. The kitchen is half the size of our old house, but that just means I need to be more organized. I think the fridge is smaller too. The freezer is definitely smaller. Photos and descriptions to follow once we have internet at our house.
Unfortunately, we’ve had two pretty major troubles at the house already. The first day, the movers um, let’s just say “used the toilets”. We have three toilets in our house—one on each floor, all located in separate rooms from the showers. At the end of the day, one of the guys told us one of the other guys said there was something wrong with our toilets. Long story short, there was a huge clog, we couldn’t find a plunger, there was toilet water on the floor of the ground level toilet because flushing the upstairs toilets caused the downstairs one to overflow. Our landlord lives in France, but he managed to find someone to come out and fix the problem. Unfortunately, there is a larger problem as the beautiful big tree in the front has started growing into the pipe, clogging it. According to our landlord, this is not a surprise. He has to get the same problem fixed twice in the 10 years he lived in the house.
All went well for the rest of the weekend, but yesterday, our water was cut. I noticed a drop in pressure, around 2 pm, but by 4:30 pm, we didn’t have any water. And of course, by the time Mr. DJ could get a hold of someone, it was too late to do anything. So we left Trudy at the house (boo hoo—on her first night too!) and stayed at a hotel.
Which brings us to today. Roxi and I are at the library (thanks for the suggestion, Fantastic Forrest!) killing a little time before we head back to the house. Our water is supposed to be turned on sometime between 12-4. So after Mr. DJ went to work, Roxi and I played tourist: had a leisurely breakfast, did a little shopping, and now are hanging out at the library. I’m writing this quick update while Roxi is practicing piano (cool, huh?).
Oh, our dryer needs replacing.
Internet and phone are supposed to be installed tomorrow. Fingers crossed.
And finally, thanks for all your comments and emails! I haven’t had a chance to answer all of them, but please know I’ve appreciated hearing from all of you. I hope to catch up with you soon!

Filed Under: Blog • Expat Life

Tags: moving

About the Author: JaPRA is an expat Texan living in England with her husband (Mr. DJ), their 17-year old daughter (Roxi), and their dog Trudy.

And more drive by blogging…

Comments (15)

Leave a Reply