Tag Archives: relocation

Auf Wiedersehen, Hollandstrasse 8.

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012We left behind our first “home” in Vienna this morning.  I already miss it.  We moved into a new place, in another part of the city.  It’s smaller, it’s not as nice, and it’s not as much in the area that we want to be in.  That said, it is really neat to check out a different part of the city, and I think it will ultimately give us a more well-rounded view of Vienna.  It’s clean, it’s safe, it’s near a metro and it has everything we really need.  Benjamin is sleeping in the living room, but he’s happy.  Liam has a gigantic portacrib (I think he’s the only one whose sleeping situation improved) and he’s asleep and happy, too.  That’s what’s important.

Yesterday, I was really stressing about this place and this move.  It’s not ideal, and it’s not what I wanted to have happen.  I can think of several other places I’d rather be staying at the moment (not all of them on this side of the Atlantic).  But, so what?  It’s not really a big deal.  As my sister, Amanda, said, “This will be a fond memory soon.”  She may be entirely right.  It’s quite possible that the effort that goes in to making this place our home for the next week will cause it to be remembered fondly in the end.

So often, it’s the shared challenges that we remember with a laugh and a smile with our families.  I was talking with my dad this afternoon about exactly that, when he reminded me of “that camping trip when it rained”.  I think everyone who has camped with any regularity has a good “rainy camping” story, and in our case, we awoke in the middle of the night with the runoff from the mountains actually running (with some volume and force) THROUGH the middle of the tent.  I think it was spring time, and not warm at all.  We spent the rest of the night cranky and sodden in the car, and went damply home (early) the next day.  At the time, I’m sure I was grumpy about it.  I know I was wet and cold.  Today, my dad and I shared a sincere and happy laugh about it.  I really, truly, remember that trip fondly.  It’s a memory I share with my dad and my siblings.  We ALL remember it.  We shared the struggle together, we got through it together, and it even contributed to my mental picture of myself (and my family) as relatively hardy campers (even though we didn’t last the rest of the weekend, it didn’t stop us from camping again, many times).  I don’t remember exactly how old I was (early teens?) and I don’t remember much of the other details about that trip (they all tend to blend together as a happy melange in my mind).  But I think of it fondly.  I think if it’s possible to have a happy teenage memory of being soaked, miserable and cold in the woods with my family, then it’s certainly possible that this little apartment will be remembered with a laugh and a smile (if at all) as part of our adventure.  Thanks, to my family, for reminding me of that.

We’re moving tomorrow . . . and I’m not sure to where

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Our stay in our first temporary apartment is coming to an end.  We have to leave by 10:00 tomorrow morning.  It’s been great.  Super-IKEA-ified, really comfortable, really clean, safe for the kids, and the location is super convenient.  It has served us well for our first 10 days here.  (I can’t believe we’ve been here for 10 days.)

So now, it’s on to the next place.  But until 3 hours ago, we didn’t have a “next place”.  (I’m still not sure we really do.)  This past week, we’ve been mostly focused on finding a place for permanent housing (and we’d been kind of hoping we might get that settled fast enough to not have to find a second temporary apartment) so we let the search for tomorrow’s apartment go until way too late.  We do have a favorite permanent place picked out, but we won’t even see a lease on it until Monday, so we need a place for the next little while.

We were being really flexible on location, price and size, so we didn’t figure it would be too hard to find a place.  Well, it turns out that finding a place equipped for kids (we need a porta-crib for Liam), walking distance to the U and which would allow Bailey wasn’t that easy after all.  Also, most temporary apartments in Vienna are listed with multiple agencies, so three times now we have had places promised to us which are not actually available.  Also, the Vienna City Marathon is this weekend, and is apparently really popular, so finding a place has been really challenging.

But, we have a place.  At least, I think we do.  It’s not ideal — it’s very small, no tub, only one bedroom.  And hopefully a porta-crib.  Ok, so it’s very not ideal.  Sigh.  Looks like I’m off to do more hotel/apartment searches . . . there has to be something out there that will work for us.

Red tape

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I mentioned, in a previous post, that the pace of things is just slower here.  Although Vienna is a bustling city, the vibe is just different than home.  That’s fine.  I actually think that I will come to really appreciate this about our experience here, and it’s something I’m already getting used to.  Dan & I were talking today about going back to look at our two favorite housing options.  My first instinct was, “Email them now so maybe we can go see the places tomorrow!”, but then I realized that no matter how quickly we contact them, we’re not going to go look at those apartments tomorrow.  That just isn’t how it works.  We’ll email them today, talk about it tomorrow and go see them Monday or Tuesday (because very little happens here on the weekends — I guess apartment shopping might turn out to be an exception).

I don’t mind the slower pace of life.  I like the fact that at 5:00, people are generally unreachable by email or at their work number.  People don’t work into the evening here, or over the weekend (unless that’s typical of their job).  I like that, because we will soon benefit from that lifestyle, too.  Dan isn’t going to have a laptop to bring home from his new job.  He isn’t going to be expected to get anything accomplished between the close of business on Friday and when he arrives on Monday morning.  He’s not going to answer work calls at 7:00 in the evening or on a Sunday.  And if he’s sick, or on vacation, he’s simply out, and no one expects him to check in or do any work until he returns.  That sounds excellent.

The non-excellent part of this is the red tape part of it.  And it’s not exactly “part” of a slower pace of life, but it exists side by side with it.  We’ve been jumping through hoops since we got here, and we’re still finding it difficult to make any progress on very basic things.  Our journey through red tape began with shopping for cell phones.  After finding a place that carried the cell phones that we want, Dan went to purchase them.  At home, this would be as simple as producing a credit card and signing a contract.  Well, Dan had neglected to bring his passport, so he came home to get it.  I went with him, and brought mine, for good measure.  We got back to the cell phone place, only to be told that we need proof of employment, proof of residency and a bank account.  Ok.  So, we head back home.

Dan figures the easiest way to get proof of residency is to get his “legit” card (which is what you get here instead of a visa if you or a family member is working for the UN).  So, he contacts his work to get it.  Well, turns out that you can’t get your legit card until you’ve signed your contract for work . . . and you can’t sign your work contract until your first day of work.  Turns out you also need your legit card to recieve your items shipped from home.  This includes the stuff we had shipped over by air so we could receive it 10 to 14 days after departing.  Nice.  (The latest we were expecting to get that stuff was today.)  The people in HR that Dan was dealing with knew that we were planning to be here 3 weeks before he started work.  Did it really not occur to them that we might need phones, or our stuff, or even proof of residency in the first 3 weeks we lived here?  (Or, at least, to tell us that we wouldn’t be able to have those things?)  Turns out, this is a common problem — happens all the time.  It’s something that is an issue for most people starting work at the UN.  Thanks for letting us know BEFORE we got on the plane.

So, one of the ideas we had was that maybe Dan could start work a bit earlier.  We’ve made excellent progress with the house hunting, and if it’s going to make our lives easier and allow us to make progress in getting settled (which was the whole point of coming over 3 weeks early) then why not?  Well, it turns out, he can’t start early, because the paperwork is done and people are already planning on his start date.  Sigh.

But, they did give him proof of employment!.  Starting with that, Dan went on to get his Austrian bank account (that part was remarkably easy) and then went to talk to the people in the visa office about maybe moving the paperwork ahead to get his legit card, or at least helping us get our air shipment stuff (which has been here since the beginning of the week, but which we can’t get to).  They started working on it (not sure what they can do, but apparently they like a challenge) and one of the things Dan had to go was to get pictures taken for his card.  So he did that.  Well, the boys and I need legit cards, too, so today we trundled off (looking presentable) to the UN to get our pictures taken, too . . . only to show up and find out that the picture taking office closes an hour earlier than everything else there.  Seriously?

So, now back to the phones.  On one of Dan’s trips to try and buy the phones, he was told to come back if he had at least proof of employment (including contract duration) and a bank account.  Great!  We have that now!  So, we went back today (after our failed attempt at getting our pictures taken).  Turns out, no.  Didn’t work.  Still need the legit card.  Argh!

So, here we are.  No phones.  No stuff.  The ridiculousness and inefficiency of it is enough to drive me crazy if I think about it too long.  If it were me (read as, “If I were queen of the universe, which sometimes I really think I ought to be . . .”) there would be a straightforward checklist and procedure for every incoming UN employee to follow:  start at this office, sign this form, go here, produce this paperwork, take a picture, submit this form, the end.  (But apparently, no one asked me.)

But there’s really no harm done.  It’s just a delay.  (A frustrating delay!)  Lest anyone worry, we really do have the things we need.  At least this way, when we move to our next temporary home this Saturday, we only have to move the 5 suitcases we arrived with.  Since we haven’t gotten our air shipment, we don’t have to move it.  And we’re surviving without phones — that’s not easy, but it’s ok, too.  And, just today, we found out that Dan may be able to sign his contract early . . . whether that means other things will happen sooner, remains to be seen.  And I have no idea why something that was impossible a week ago is suddenly possible, but I promise not to complain.

A grande soy chai is still a grande soy chai

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Today was probably our busiest day so far:  we looked at two apartment possibilities in different parts of town, Dan went by his new work to get some of the paperwork started and out of the way, we went shopping for non-food grocery items (which here you don’t buy at the grocery store), we went to the bakery (one of my new favorite places) for a loaf of bread and we had the cleaning lady come by.  And that was all before dinner, and in addition to the normal activity of life in a new place with two little ones.  Whew!

It was a very busy day.  With all of our activity, and the fact that Liam isn’t quite adjusted to the time change yet, we’re exhausted.  By 5:00, when we were finished with all of our errands, I was completely drained.  We were headed home and were discussing whether we should stop to grab a little something to treat ourselves on the way home.  I was too tired to walk the extra few blocks, but Dan went, and he brought something home for me:  a grande soy chai, from an actual Starbucks.  Even at home, I would have enjoyed and appreciated something like that after a long day.  But there’s something extra special about having a little treat from home when we’re so far away.  They make it a little less sweet here, but otherwise, it’s so familiar:  the taste, the smell, even the cup (it’s written in English, too!).  Because even though we’re having a wonderful adventure, and it’s great to explore all of the things that are exciting and different, it’s comforting to experience something warm and familiar at the end of a long day.

Apartment hunting

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025We’re looking for a more permanent home here in Vienna.  The place we’re in right now is only ours until the 16th (this coming weekend).  It’s a bit of a daunting task:  trying to find a place that will be good for us, fun for the kids, enough room to make us comfortable, not too expensive, in a good neighborhood, a reasonable commute to Dan’s new job and close to grocery shopping/pharmacy/bakery/market/train/tram because we don’t have a car here.  And 031we don’t really know what we’re doing because we moved here less than a week ago.  We don’t really have an educated idea of exactly where we want to be, and we don’t have an idea of what is reasonable to expect from places or from landlords.  It’s a challenge!

We started looking over the weekend.  We looked at a place that is beautiful, gigantic, very recently completely renovated and expensive.  We also looked at a place with is less extravagant but in the embassy section of the city with an amazing (and very Viennese) view of palace grounds.

038We have two places to look at tomorrow, and three more later in the week.  I’m trying to keep track of them, because I know that soon everything will start to run together.  Going for tram and train rides all over the city is giving us a better sense of Vienna, but it’s an intense amount of pressure to try and pick the right place for us from a place of such profound ignorance of our surroundings.

The boys have been so great while we’ve been looking.  Benjamin runs around and poses in the pictures I’m taking so I can remember the details of each place.  I love his sweet enthusiasm.  Liam is happily along for the ride in the carrier.  He’s happy wherever we go, as long as we’re together.  Today, we even had to wake them both up from their 013naps to make it to an appointment (almost) on time, and they were peaceful and relaxed for our journey.  They’re amazing.  (It does seem to help that when we went to our first apartment appointment, we stopped for gelato on the way home, and now Benjamin has decided that each appointment should be accompanied by gelato — not a bad idea, really.)

The search continues tomorrow.  Either of the places we’ve seen so far could work.  We just have to keep searching and find the one that is right for us.  The fatigue is setting in a bit, but I am motivated by keeping things fun for the kids, and inspired by how much fun they’re having and just by how happy they are.

Skills I didn’t even know I had

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There are lots of things that I know I’m good at.  But today I gained appreciation for something that it turns out I was good at, but didn’t realize.  I used to be really good at grocery shopping.  I could go in, take an efficient route through the store, shop for the best deal, manage the self-checkout line and get out quickly — with Benjamin or Liam, and usually without a meltdown from any of us.  I never really realized that this was something to be proud of until I learned something else today:  I am NOT as good at grocery shopping in Austria.

It wasn’t a complete disaster.  We did come away with groceries.  We even purchased about 75% of what was on our list.  It wasn’t efficient.  It wasn’t elegant.  It wasn’t fast.  There was a lot of confusion and even some tears (fortunately, the latter were from Benjamin and Liam only).  We took the stroller, which didn’t fit down most of the aisles.  I ended up purchasing some kind of baby cereal (which is NOT oatmeal) that is labelled with a word that doesn’t exist anywhere other than the box I purchased.  We struggled to find any kind of mustard, and I purchased powdered sugar instead of regular sugar.  But I braved the deli counter rather than settling for pre-packaged ham.  (This caused a great deal of confusion, because I wasn’t prepared to say anything other than the weight and name of what I wanted, and when presented with a more detailed question by the woman behind the counter, I could only repeat my request.)  I asked for ham, and I could swear she was telling me I wanted bacon (turns out she was asking if I wanted baked ham, which I think is what she gave me after several repetitions of the only phrase I had memorized) and I ended up getting about twice what we really needed, because we’re still not great at the kg/pound mental conversions.  I also think I accidentally cut in line in front of someone else who had been waiting.

But none of that is really the point.  So far, this is the thing that we’ve done that is the most “living here” vs. “visiting here”.  When you visit, you don’t brave the market for staples (at least, not with the sense of resolute determination that we did today).  We did it.  We bought food and ate lunch.  We got our 1/2 kg of schinken, and we even managed to pay and bag our own groceries — all in a store where I don’t think a single person spoke English.  It’s quite an accomplishment.  So, although I’m definitely better at grocery shopping back home, it turns out we’re not so bad at doing it here, either.

Hallo, Gelato!

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Our adventure today took us to the Viennese equivalent of Tysons Corner mall.  It’s just outside the city, about the same number and style of shops, and even had many of the same shops.  Ironic, of course, that we’d move to Europe to go to a mall nearly identical to one that was blocks away from where were living, but we were in search of new phones, and that is where the search took us.  (It was to no avail on that front, but that is not the purpose of this story.)

Upon discovering that we were not, in fact, going to get our iPhones today (bummer!) we decided to treat ourselves (and our very patient eldest child) to some gelato.  I’ve had gelato before in the states — it’s basically like strong tasting, less creamy ice cream that everyone gets very excited about and I have no idea why.  I had not, however, ever had real, European Gelato before.  Wow.  Yummy, yummy, yummy.  Pretty much like ice cream, but with a great texture — kind of like a combination of really decadent ice cream and marshmallow fluff.  Kind of like frozen custard, but creamier.  So good.  Can’t wait to get more.

We also found another Starbucks today (that makes two so far).  Dan popped inside and did some reconnaissance — apparently, it’s exactly the same as home.  Same stuff, same prices (which means really expensive for that kind of food here).  But good to know it’s there, just in case I find myself in dire need of a grand soy chai.

Generally, we’re finding it’s harder to get stuff done than we had expected.  We want to make appointments to do some house hunting, but to make those calls, we need phones.  We’ve been trying for two days to get phones, but it’s proving trickier than we expected:  the stores are not open American business hours, and when we finally got to an open store today, Dan first had to come back to get his passport, and then when we went back, we realized that we need paperwork (proof of residency) that we don’t have yet — partly because we haven’t been able to call the people at Dan’s work who we need to get in touch with because we don’t have phones.  It’s all a little frustrating — but only a little.  That seems to be just part of life here:  the pace of things is a little slower, and we aren’t really expected to be firing on all cylinders yet.  We’ll get it sorted out.  In the meantime, we need to get on with normal life stuff:  unpacking, grocery shopping, laundry . . . things like that.  Even big adventurers have housework to do.

Well, here we are

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So, our adventure begins.  I’m going to try to write a little, every day, about what we’re experiencing, but I’ll keep it short today and blame the jet lag.

My children are amazing.  They’re handling this amazingly well.  They both slept on the flight (Liam a little, Benjamin a good bit) and were truly in excellent, happy moods today, for the most part, which is pretty amazing considering the way their past few days have gone.

I feel like I’m already going through all the “stages” of relocating abroad that I’ve been told about.  I’m managing to simultaneously feel thrilled by the adventure we’re taking on, concerned that we’ve made a mistake and should be booking our tickets for home, impressed by how together and cool the Austrians seem as they go about their day in Vienna, wistful for the simplicity and straightforwardness of dealing with Americans, brave for taking on this challenge and chicken for being too afraid to try to speak any German today.

So, here we are.  We’ll see how it goes.

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