The Foreign Service if full of many things. The most annoying? Moving. I forgot because I stayed in D.C. for five years, and the move to Afghanistan meant pack everything up and cart it off to storage. It was a lot easier than the chaos that ensued when I accepted the tour in Argentina. I packed out twice, and had to get it all in one place, and organize the boxes and select what to leave behind and bla bla bla. 
I own enough stuff to fill a three bedroom apartment, which, when I am in my two bedroom condo in DC, means I have to stack most of my stuff in a basement storage unit like sardines. But when I arrived in Argentina, with shipments from Kabul, from D.C. and from storage, it spread out like our middles as we age. The process is crazy. First, you find a lovely woman from Peru named Soledad who is willing to be paid to help you make order from chaos. Then, because she has worked for diplomatic families for more than 15 years, she knows how to pack a welcome kit back up. Then you have the moving crew arrive and bring, wait for it, 195 boxes. Yep. 195 boxes. And then they are everywhere. Like rabbits left to their own devices. And your underwear is packed with your pots and pans and you spend three weeks trying to remember what you owned to figure out if it all made it. I swear I am missing a canoe, but who knows.
Attached to this are the photos of the boxes, and lovely Soledad in my kitchen. Then you get a view out my balcony down 18 flights to the ground. My sofa (which I didn't even realize was part of my shipment, but thank god it was because...embassy sofas don't fit in the elevator so I would have had a house full of chairs) had to be lifted up all 18 flights! So here are a few pics of the entire Argenmove team working to lift the sofa up those flights. Let's just say, I can see why people never move. So we went from boxes to a living room filled with boxes, and a sofa...enjoy the unbelievable amount of work it took to put this apartment in this sad state..next phase, post two weeks of working every single day...wait for it :)
That's true. Moving from one place to another is pretty hard. I think, that's why most people prefer to renovate their homes, rather than moving to a new one. On the other hand, if you manage to move and redecorate your home, you'll feel that it’s all worth it. You just have to be patient with those piles of boxes, Kerri. Heheh. Will this be your permanent home? It seems like you move around quite a bit.
ReplyDeleteOrganizing the boxes is the job nobody wants to do. I remember when I first moved in to Argentina, there were millions of things to do, and I could not deal with them, while I was dealing with adapting to the new culture, schedules, food, weather, etc. I got this apartment in buenos aires with a rental company that offered the service that the Peruvian girl you talk about does: they make order from chaos. They really helped me get organized and put everything in place. I will be forever grateful!
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