Austria definitely spoiled me. I was born and grew up in Moscow, one of the biggest, busiest, crowdiest cities on the Planet. I have never spent in quite small places longer than a week on vacation and even there I was mostly busy with organizing some events, going out, travelling, sightseeing and so on. I always declared that I will never be able to live in a small town, even more on a country side. I coudldn't imagine my life without 24hour shops, everyday choice of cultural events, driving a car and lots of friends around me. Ok, the last is still my priority. And I still prefer driving a car or at least to have a choice of driving it or bycicle. But the rest.... I really got used during my 4 months there to this nice views, nature, to destinations not longer than 30 minutes, to bycicle or walk somewhere. First several weeks there I was uneasy before going to sleep because it was too silent and I felt like the world probably was gone and we're the last men alive. But gradually I got used and I really started to enjoy it. I also got used to the fact that you have to buy food on week-days or on Saturday (but not anytime, only during the first half of the day) and no-way on Sunday. And you really can plan that if you don't have to stay at work until late in the evening and it takes you only half an hour to commute home. And this feeling of safety... this is the best thing ever. There's nothing better than to go home in the evening and be completely relaxed and not be afraid that something can happen.
So, after all this I feel surprisingly strange and too nervous here in US since I compare it not to Moscow but to Altach:) Though it's really a nice place here in Silicon Valley. They say that it's one of the safest places in US and the crime rate here is quite low (of course, it varies again in different areas of California). And the roads are wide here, there are lots of people and cars, there are big shops and there are those which are open during the night. But I find myself sometimes suddenly complaining about "too loud", "to "crowdy" or something like this or saying that I don't want to go out, I just want to come home, probably watch a movie and go to sleep not very late. Funny, no?
But of course it's just probably the consequenses of several big changes in my life lately, obviously I appeared to be not so open-minded about changes as I thought myself to be:) It still takes some time to re-adjust one more time.
Last week we finally moved to a new flat. First month we were living in a temporary residence provided by the company of my husband and were busy with finding a permanent one (well, permanent for a year). It was an interesting quest since the task is different from russian or austrian analogue. There are lots of private landlords as well as managed apartment complexes. The difference is that these apartment complexes are the companies which rent apartments which were especially built for this purpose. This company is your landlord and they also provide you with some kind of maintainance and services. All technical issues are on their responsibility, they often have some common areas, sometimes fitness-rooms, pools, BBQ-areas. They also have some rules you have to follow. It has it's good and bad sides. Normally I would expect them to care more about the quality of provided services as it involves directly the reputation. And it does, there are yelp.com and apartmentratings.com and probably some other resources which pepole use to share experiences. But still there are complexes which have quite bad reviews and still obviously profit somehow. On the other side when you're renting the private flat you can almost never check any previous tenants opinions neither regarding the flat itself nor regarding the landlord. So, it's a bit more risky in these terms. We've looked through lots and lots of complexes and just a few private options. And in the end we've still chosed the private one. When we've found the advertisement on craigslist.com I though that the landlord could probably be russian due to her name, called her and she really appear to be russian. We came to see the flat and it was really almost perfect for us. We've seen a lot of flats and have already developed our criteria list. One of the most important points on that list besides the location which was supposed to be not further than 15 minutes by bike from my husband's office was a balcony. Who would believe that the balcony would become an important criteria for me when I was living in Russia? I have never used a balcony in Russia and have never think about using one except to store there my bike. But after living in Austria I was and am really eager to spend my time outside enjoing the nature when there is something to enjoy and here it is. So, in this flat, on Evelyn Terrace, Sunnyvale, the balcony was huge. The flat itself was bigger than an average apartmend provided by a non-private landlord. The landlords were nice and the parents of my landlord, also russians were living just next door which has promised us to be supported in maintenance and other local issues. The only disadvantage of the flat was that the Caltrain line was going just under the balcony. But that was the only one and we've had to admit that there was no other apartment better than this one. Each of them had some advantage, logically. So, we've thought a while and agreed to take this one. The landlords have made a good conditions for us - month-to-month contract and also they gave us the keys from the flat quite beforehand which allowed us to conduct moving slowly and gradually. During the whole week we went to the flat, figured out what we need, went to Ikea, bought something and brought it to the flat, next day went to Ikea again and bought twice more things than at first time, went to yard sale and bought some other things, cleaned the whole flat, arranged all the furniture and households and finally moved on the 16 of August.
And yesterday we've had a housewarming party. We've invited some of our new russian friends which I got to know mostly online (facebook and livejournal), our swiss friends Pascal and Nadja and some colleagues of my husband among which were as well a russian couple Ira and Dima, a belarussian Viktor and also a french couple and an american couple. It was a very nice and funny evening, we've really enjoyed it and now we can officially anounce that we've settled in a our new home.
You can see the balcony behind us. Unfotrunately there was no train going by at the very moment:)
So, after all this I feel surprisingly strange and too nervous here in US since I compare it not to Moscow but to Altach:) Though it's really a nice place here in Silicon Valley. They say that it's one of the safest places in US and the crime rate here is quite low (of course, it varies again in different areas of California). And the roads are wide here, there are lots of people and cars, there are big shops and there are those which are open during the night. But I find myself sometimes suddenly complaining about "too loud", "to "crowdy" or something like this or saying that I don't want to go out, I just want to come home, probably watch a movie and go to sleep not very late. Funny, no?
But of course it's just probably the consequenses of several big changes in my life lately, obviously I appeared to be not so open-minded about changes as I thought myself to be:) It still takes some time to re-adjust one more time.
Last week we finally moved to a new flat. First month we were living in a temporary residence provided by the company of my husband and were busy with finding a permanent one (well, permanent for a year). It was an interesting quest since the task is different from russian or austrian analogue. There are lots of private landlords as well as managed apartment complexes. The difference is that these apartment complexes are the companies which rent apartments which were especially built for this purpose. This company is your landlord and they also provide you with some kind of maintainance and services. All technical issues are on their responsibility, they often have some common areas, sometimes fitness-rooms, pools, BBQ-areas. They also have some rules you have to follow. It has it's good and bad sides. Normally I would expect them to care more about the quality of provided services as it involves directly the reputation. And it does, there are yelp.com and apartmentratings.com and probably some other resources which pepole use to share experiences. But still there are complexes which have quite bad reviews and still obviously profit somehow. On the other side when you're renting the private flat you can almost never check any previous tenants opinions neither regarding the flat itself nor regarding the landlord. So, it's a bit more risky in these terms. We've looked through lots and lots of complexes and just a few private options. And in the end we've still chosed the private one. When we've found the advertisement on craigslist.com I though that the landlord could probably be russian due to her name, called her and she really appear to be russian. We came to see the flat and it was really almost perfect for us. We've seen a lot of flats and have already developed our criteria list. One of the most important points on that list besides the location which was supposed to be not further than 15 minutes by bike from my husband's office was a balcony. Who would believe that the balcony would become an important criteria for me when I was living in Russia? I have never used a balcony in Russia and have never think about using one except to store there my bike. But after living in Austria I was and am really eager to spend my time outside enjoing the nature when there is something to enjoy and here it is. So, in this flat, on Evelyn Terrace, Sunnyvale, the balcony was huge. The flat itself was bigger than an average apartmend provided by a non-private landlord. The landlords were nice and the parents of my landlord, also russians were living just next door which has promised us to be supported in maintenance and other local issues. The only disadvantage of the flat was that the Caltrain line was going just under the balcony. But that was the only one and we've had to admit that there was no other apartment better than this one. Each of them had some advantage, logically. So, we've thought a while and agreed to take this one. The landlords have made a good conditions for us - month-to-month contract and also they gave us the keys from the flat quite beforehand which allowed us to conduct moving slowly and gradually. During the whole week we went to the flat, figured out what we need, went to Ikea, bought something and brought it to the flat, next day went to Ikea again and bought twice more things than at first time, went to yard sale and bought some other things, cleaned the whole flat, arranged all the furniture and households and finally moved on the 16 of August.
And yesterday we've had a housewarming party. We've invited some of our new russian friends which I got to know mostly online (facebook and livejournal), our swiss friends Pascal and Nadja and some colleagues of my husband among which were as well a russian couple Ira and Dima, a belarussian Viktor and also a french couple and an american couple. It was a very nice and funny evening, we've really enjoyed it and now we can officially anounce that we've settled in a our new home.
You can see the balcony behind us. Unfotrunately there was no train going by at the very moment:)
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