Finally, out of the dorm...

Woo hoo!!!!!! I am in my new apartment in Jishuitan, near central Beijing. Heck I am about 5 -8 minutes by taxi from the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square. I could even walk down there. I can walk to the subway station and get to just about anywhere in the city in reasonable time. In these pictures you compare the new room to the old rooms.

My room about 60 square meters, includes a shower room and washing machine. The toilet works, the bed is big enough for two, it has one lousy TV set, a decent closet, an A/C that is serviceable, but it is clean and in a very secure building with two elevators. I am on the 12th floor, the top of the building and it has a big window that faces the south.

The refrigerator makes a little noise, I’m not sure what to do about that yet. I finally got the Internet working this afternoon. This complex offers broadband access so that is a big plus.

The guy across the hallway is cool, he knocked on my door this afternoon and pointed out that I left the keys in the door! Making the agreement with the girl who originally rented the room, going to the Agency to put the room into my name on the contract, etc was not easy. Fortunately a girl from the new company who I do some proofreading work for helped me. Otherwise I think it would have been a huge challenge. Its funny how one day I will think my Chinese is pretty good, then a situation comes up that puts me in my place. Anyway, when I moved the few things I have over from Renmin, I swept the floor and then got down on my hands and knees and cleaned the furniture and whole floor and bathroom with a wet old shirt. I want my floor to be clean enough I can walk barefoot. I like the Japanese way of not wearing shoes in the house. But I want the floor to be clean first!