South Korea blog part 3:
Sooo it’s time to find our own place and not just crash at my wife’s family’s apartment.
Now I thought finding a flat in Adong-Si south Korea would be an easy thing, after all it’s a decent sized city with around 200k inhabitants, with new developments popping up everywhere. Not so!
It seems that all the decent stuff is taken, the expensive stuff… well expensive and the cheap stuff with mouldy walls and peeling wallpaper.
The reason the good apartments is taken, is that everyone buys’ them for investment purposes. However they often don’t want to rent them out, as this reduces their value. Koreans only like to buy new new new. That applies to so many things. A topic I will cover at a later date.
Then out of the blue my father in law states: oh! I bought a bedsit (small apartment) for investment purposes (see! One of the guilty parties). It happens to be empty, how about staying there gratis. Great news, but for one thing. It seems he had only told his son about the investment and not any of his daughters. My wife didn’t mind, but her sisters were clearly displeased. Another example of South Korea’s sexisms it seems. Well, I let them sort it out and popped over to see our potential new home.
my wife giving the bedsit the once over
Great looking isn’t it. A bit small: one main room, a shower room, and open plan to a bedroom overlooking said main room… Except, the air con was clearly struggling to keep up with was had become one of the hottest summers in recent history. 41°C where we were. Also the room overlooking the main room, well you can’t stand up. I discovered this was normal for bedsits, targeting wealthier students or not so wealthy newlyweds. I was on my knees and my head just grazing the ceiling.
My wife didn’t look convinced, so we asked for a couple of days to think about it.
Luckily we did, the very last place we looked at was whiting our budget, not too big (as we had no furniture, and didn’t want to spend a fortune for just one year) and totally spanking brand new.
Tada!!!! Here it is:
Wife and sister in law inspection time!
Yes, yes! My thumb's in the picture
A modern shower, oh the joy
We mentioned the heat, well this flat came with not just one, but TWO air con units. Not only that, but two rooms and wait for it; a walk in cupboard. My wife has always wanted one, something we just could not afford in London.
Small, but our first and maybe only ever walk in cupboard - one of two, each room had one
You guessed it we chose the latter option, but with some minor reservations, as the other one was free. But we just loved this place, and the thought of being slowly cooked alive in her dad’s place was the clincher.
Now…. to make it a home. Until next time friends.
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