That’s what I got yesterday. It’s awesome that I was complaining about just the idea of moving, when by the end that was the easiest and simplest part.
Kelly started looking for apartments at 12. Unfortunately because of the newly returning students, every apartment she tried to buy was taken by the time she tried to sign the lease an hour later. Apartments were literally slipping through our fingers to a rush of Americans. Damn them all!
I joined her at 4 and we finally decided on a place. We were about to sign the contract when our new Real Estate Agent, English-speaking “Cathy”, told us that the landlord had ordered another bed for the second room. What followed was a 90 min. debate where we tried our best to explain why we not only didn’t want the damn bed, but would refuse the apartment if the extra furniture was put in our soon-to-be-yoga/meditation room. We tried everything from, “She’s an artist, she likes sleeping on the floor” to “This couch is great – You should see what she slept on in NY!” Needless to say they didn’t understand why, and eventually we had to take all of our stuff and start to walk out the door before the landlord agreed to keep his offending furniture.
With that finally settled it was 6:30 and we rushed back down the street to our old apartment. We called our friends, Erica and Roxanne, to quickly help us pack. Cathy said that the van was coming in 20 min., and we still had to pack! We rushed around throwing things in bags as quickly as possible and managed to get ready in time.
I’m not sure, really, why what happened next actually happened, but somehow Kelly and I were in the middle of a serious Chinese scam. Cathy came to the apartment and told us that the guards at the front gate would not let us leave unless we have permission from the landlord. (The same landlord who had been missing for four days, and refused to come and sign us into a real lease, or bring us to the police station as he is supposed to.)
After more than an hour had passed, and we were still not able to leave, panic started to set in. Some woman who claims to be the landlord kept calling and berating us for leaving instead of waiting another 7 days to sign the lease with her. People were calling and pretending to be our old Real Estate Agent. Cathy kept insisting that we were not allowed to leave, and should wait until they find another person to take over the apartment. None of us had eaten dinner, Kelly hadn’t had more than a banana all day, we only had half a bottle of drinkable water -though we did crack open some pi geo (beer),- and we all still had to work at 7 in the morning the next day. We brought up calling the police and demanding to leave, but Cathy insisted that we would be punished for staying in the apartment without a lease.
Eventually, we called our director and she called any random Chinese person who happens to work at our school. That person called the police and told us that it is illegal for them to keep us from moving out. When we shared this news Cathy pretended to take a phone call and jetted out of the apartment, even leaving behind her Chinese-speaking coworker who realized minutes later and was pissed.
Finally, we just took our stuff and left. No one stopped us or questioned us at the gate after all. By the time we were down the street in our new place it was 11 pm.
Times I wished I was in America yesterday: 19298343093290+
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