housing housing housing....

a good home is tough to find. that's what i have learned. but before i jump to this big conclusion, let me start earlier. alex, the guy i was going to live with, received a fantastic four year postdoc offer from switzerland (which by the way essentially pays with pure gold, or maybe pure saffron...) and hence will not be staying in cardiff next year. this is quite unfortunate for from a variety of angles two of which are that he is an awesome guy and we have become good friends, and that it means i need to re-figure out the housing situation...
so with these news i began my longest stint so far in cardiff. i have been regularly checking the equivalent of craigslist.org here, gumtree.com (note the .com at the end... in fact, you have the option of paying when posting an ad to make sure that your ad is always at the top of the searches!) and i have been visiting a few houses (essentially) every day. now this was quite interesting at the beginning as i was learning new things about this country. for instance i found out that i was meeting the landlords, the homeowners, the managers of the property - and they were interviewing me, but i was not meeting the flatmates. it turned out that this is quite common here, that people are simply placed into a house with the hopes that it all works out. strange.
so i began looking for houses where the flatmates interviewed me and see if there is chemistry, if i'm a good fit.
i went to see a couple of these, known as social houses, where the gender is maintained half male half female, and the point of the house is to socialize, to hang out, to be friends. three guys, three girls, all living together (or essentially together...) in a new city, hmm, sounds like a tv show i like. anyway, i went to a couple of these, and the first one i thought could be good, it was clean. a huge kitchen with two stoves and two ovens (not that i really know how to use one of those...) and a dining table in the kitchen. it seemed that the socializing in this social house was taking place in the kitchen as opposed to the tv lounge. i like. didn't like as much that as i arrived, the dude that opened the door for me decided to remark that i was ten minutes late and that this is not a good way to make a first impression. in actuality, i was two minutes early. no idea about that one... anyway, i decided to see maybe about that house. feeling tentative, i emailed the landlord/manager - who deals with this stuff at the end. he politely replied that the group decided that they want to see more people... bastards. so 0-1 in housing.
now another thing about the houses here, a lot of them, i'd say 50 percent plus, are 4 bedrooms or more - which means a minimum of 4 pepole in the house. after that 6 person house and a few more, where the living room was quite small, and always centered around the television, i decided to go for smaller houses. at most three people i decided. preferably with a garden - i want my herbs. still, there is a favorite garden here which is the concrete garden. they just concrete-ize their backyard to eliminate weeds, and hence eliminate gardening. me not like.
i began wondering, maybe i should take the place that i was going to take with alex. that house has a very nice living room and a very nice kitchen. the only perceivable problems i had with it were the fact that the stove was electric and that one of the bedrooms was quite small (hence possibly difficult to find a flatmate who would take it) and really near to each other. it turns out almost all bedrooms here are really near to each other. and also, surprisingly, the electric stove heats up amazingly fast.


still thinking about this house. maybe find my own roomate. maybe take it by myself, which would be quite expensive at the end. not sure.
still, i went to see three more houses today. nothing too exciting, except the last house had an amazing garden with tomatoes, spinach, beans, rosemary and basil. the girl who was taking care of it and showed me around was quite cute and sweet, with a thick irish accent (which of course i didn't recognize, but managed to understand just fine!!!). now i remember my friend big - O's story from davis. see, he came to see an apartment in davis, and thought that one of the housemates was quite cute. he later called and found out that they found someone else to take the room. good, he remarked, cause i wanted to ask katie out. now i always thought this was an awesome story, and i was wondering if i would ever face a similar situation. and here one was staring at me in the face. katie and him by the way are happily backpacking around and through mountains still.
i was invited for tea (somewhat common here...) so i stayed, to meet the flatmates better, get a feel for the place. i was wondering how to continue, as i am leaving the country tomorrow and i won't be back in another month. i figured i'd call when i get home, or maybe the next day to let them know that i won't be taking the place and take a page out of big O's playbook. the time arrived and i said my goodbyes and she walked me to the door. as we got there she suddenly said, well listen, even if you decide not to take the place, since you don't know anybody here (cardiff), we can meet up, hang out.

bitch. stole my line.