It has been a good day for me, in spite of that I had to wake up at 9 AM! Actually, I should've woken up at 8, but as you know, I was up last night writing this blog, so the waking up thing was just too hard for me. Anyway, I'm glad I did go out that early, because... I GOT AN APARTMENT! In this post I will tell you about my flat hunting. I realized that some people may want to learn something about living in France. But don't worry, I'm sure that there is no use reading this blog anyway. Hey, let's try:
Lesson number one: If you are considering going to France for a year, you must first ask yourself WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU THINKING?! WHO WOULD EVER WANT TO SPEND A YEAR IN FRANCE?! At least that is what I did not do. I should have. If you do it, you don't need to learn anything from this blog.
So now that it's clear that you won't be learning anything, I can move on to my favorite thing: complaining. As you probably know, I had problems with mosquitoes back in Finland. Well, I managed to almost avoid them there, but here, it's even worse!! Not only the mosquitoes, but also the small flies bite!! So, as a result, I look like this:
How lovely!! Luckily, the French like to kiss rather than shake hands. I don't know if I like that either.
But OK, enough of my gross hand, let's talk about the flat hunting! I will start at the beginning.
On Monday, I was really sick, so I basically searched some apartments and slept rest of the day. I felt really stressed because I thought I would never have the energy of finding an apartment.
On Tuesday I bought a prepaid connection for my phone so I could call the people about their offers. Yes, in French! And no, it didn't go well. I managed to speak to them but when it was time to understand... oh là là!! it was horrible! The guy kept talking and talking with no pause! And eventually we understood that the apartment was already gone. Like, what the fuck, French people?! Why do you talk so much if you have just a simple thing to say?! I definitely do not understand.
Too afraid to call again, we waited until the next day and went to the university to ask if they could help us. They said they didn't have time for us, gave us some web pages and told us to go to some kind of student helping thing that was right next to where we live at the moment. So, in brief, the university doesn't really care if you live under the bridge.
Next day, we tried calling to a woman who sounded very angry for some reason. Probably didn't like foreigners... She asked us where we come from. I said "Finland" and she said: "Uhhuh, and do you have the guarantor?" Of course, that's what's wrong with the French system! If you don't know French people, you are not trustworthy. I got a credit card in Finland, goddammit!
Then we tried a real estate agency. Of course, they wanted a guarantor as well, so we had to walk away almost immediately when they realized that we were this kind of horrible people who don't have French lovers or something.
We started to feel really desperate. There was no use calling the people and the real estate agencies threw us out. Then we found the student helping thing. Suddenly, everything was brighter. The people were really nice and they wanted to speak English! I mean, speaking French is not a problem for me but when I speak English, I feel home again.
The girl said that she could call the people for us if we gave her the phone numbers. What a great guy!! No more awkward phone calls for me! Fuck yes!
So that is why I didn't have time to update the blog that night. Heidi the slave driver made me look for apartments all night. I sent 3 emails for people just in case, even though I had heard that the French people wouldn't answer those.
By the end of the day, I received an email! It was a guy who asked us to come see the apartment the next day at 2 PM. Needless to say we were excited. And terrified. I went to look for my first own apartment ever and sadly, it's in France.
Heidi was nervous as hell. She worried that the guy would be some kind of 50 year old pervert and that the place would be awful. Then I told her that we would not probably even get the place, so that's when she started panicking about us not getting the place! Rational or what?
The guy was not 50. He was 22 and pretty shy. He asked if we were noisy. I told no. I lied.
Many people came to visit him and we felt really desperate. We could never get the house! The apartment was really nice but cost damn much, 450 euros per month. And it wasn't even in a great place!
We went back to the student advice thing and the girl called the people. Apparently French people are really bad at answering their phones. None of the apartments were available so the girl looked for new ones on the Internet. She called a guy who said we could come see the place immediately. We were tired, so we went to bank instead.
How I love the bank people! The guy was so funny, he was joking all the time and speaking English!! He even wanted to help us with the apartment thing so we had to close the door when he looked for one, because "his boss would be angry if he knew that he was doing not-work-related things"! :D
Still no apartment, but I received an email that asked if we could go see an apartment the next day.Of course I said yes, even though it required me waking up early!!
So, after hurrying to the place (because we had slept way too long!), we found this place:
Résidence les Sables. It was pretty nice, compared to the ugly buildings from the Middle Ages. It even had some kind of green things.
Terrified, we went in, waiting to see some guy again. Instead, there was an older woman. She showed us all the places, saying that there would be tidier. Like she was really trying to sell the thing. The place was old but roomy. She asked us if we preferred a girl or boy roommate. WTF? We didn't even live there! Then she asked whether we wanted a room where the sun shines in the morning or not. Needless to say, we chose the ones where we could get some sleep!!!
I went to ask her if we had any chances to get the apartment. She asked us if we wanted to sign the papers right away. Fuck yes!!!!!!!
Heidi signing the contract. I feel so grown up, signed my first rent contract after having to translate the shit in Finnish. The lady had some problems writing "Jyväskylä", my home town :DD
The view from the window. I wonder how our roommate will be. The Madame said there was 5 people waiting to get the apartment. Besides us!! Why on Earth did she choose us immediately?! Anyway, kinda cool.
See this? It's Heidi using our brand new keys for OUR APARTMENT!! Which we do have. We own it!! We don't have to sleep under the bridge!!
And guess what! Near the apartment, we found this:
That's right! Cake every day! The best thing ever! How many of you guys have a pâtisserie next to your house? That's right, bitches!
And we have also this:
It's some kind of park. We can have picnics! Close to our new apartment! Which is ours! Our own!
And the place is also near the university. Yes, the slum!
So this was a really boring update about boring practical stuff. The moral of the story is: children, everything is possible. And if you don't want to use your phone, use the email!! The less you have to talk to people, the better you survive!
Hope you don't stop following me after reading this one :DD I'm planning to write another one about my real life in Bordeaux - with a lot more pictures! So please comment if you don't want to read the educational shit anymore!
See you later! PS: I have an apartment!!!!!!!! :D
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