Moving in

Well today was the first "day of moving" into the new apartment. It actually began last night with me packing boxes and suitcases at the current place (after going to the gym).

I had booked the "Man with a Van" to collect the stuff at 9am, and he arrived on the dot. There were 3 big boxes (think the size of M&D's TV), plus four suitcases (two big, two carry-on). Even with all of that, there is still stuff left at the old apartment that must be moved before the end of this week. Just goes to show how you quickly accumulate stuff - although this does represent what we have been living on for the past 18 months, and two of the boxes contained only new crockery that we bought just before leaving Tokyo.

Anyway, for those of you who follow this, remember I mentioned that the new place is on the 5th floor of a walkup building (no lifts)? Well in order to avoid paying too much to move the stuff (cutbacks!), I arranged for the man with the van to deliver the stuff to the ground floor. So I spent the next hour walking up and down the stairs carrying boxes and suitcases. Easy on the first one, much harder by the time you get to the last one. In fact the last box held the bulk of the heavy plates so I ended up leaving it on one of the landings and shuttling a carry-on bag up and down until I could carry what was left in the box.

The landlord had ordered a new desk and arranged for it to be delivered between 10 and 12, so I spent the morning unpacking. Then off to Ikea to pick up a few things (including towels, Sonia!). Once more up the stairs carrying bags...

I am now sitting in Cafe O (refer to map) recuperating. You will see from the map how close this is to the apartment, so I am sure we will become even more regular customers than we are already.

The worst bit is that I know I have to make at least one more trip up the stairs today. My next stop is the Japan Home Store up the road, where I need to get cleaning stuff. This must be delivered to the apartment so that I can spend time tomorrow cleaning (just dusty because no-one has lived in the apartment for a while).

Finally, to whomever left the comment, I was writing on the mobile phone rather than blackberry. But yes it is a direct result of the predictive text and me being at the gym at the time and so not paying as much attention as I should have!