Location, location, location!

Andrea


If you’ve been keeping up with our blog you may have noticed that there were a few weeks around the end of March in which neither Kristin nor I wrote anything.  During this time our six weeks at our vacation rental apartment came to an end and since Kenny and I had not found apartments yet, we moved into the hostel that Kristin and I work for.  Kristin moved in with the au pair family in Garbatella, so I set my sights on moving there, as well.  Prior to moving out I had already been visiting apartments and frantically calling Italian landlords, asking if they would be comfortable renting to us on a short term basis, if there was internet, how far the apartment was from the metro or train station, and a few other key questions.  Needless to say, I now have apartment hunting Italian vocabulary down.  I looked at eight apartments in two weeks (or at least I remember looking at eight, there may have been more), which doesn’t sound like much, but when you factor in all the time on public transit, it made each trip an ordeal.  I also spent hours on the phone, calling landlords and trying to figure out if their apartments were worth a look or not.   I think I spent about twenty-five euro on my phone in those two weeks.  

One of the things that I learned from all of this was the importance of the location of an apartment.  I already knew that it was important to be well connected (ben collegato) to public transit in Rome, but what I hadn’t realized was how important it would be for me to still be near Kristin and Kenny.  Once Kristin decided to be an au pair, I soon realized that it would be near impossible for Kenny and I to find an reasonably priced two bedroom apartment, or two rooms for rent in an apartment with others, so we decided to split up our dynamic duo and search for independent rooms.  Every man for himself!  I spent my days searching the web for apartments in Garbatella and helped Kenny set up showings for apartments in the Trastevere, San Giovanni, and Garbatella zones.  Though the hostel that I work for is very nice, I cannot tell you how defeating it was knowing that I would be sleeping there yet another night after a fruitless day of apartment searching.  I’m all for hostels, but when you’re in “living” mode and not in “travel” mode, living in a hostel is a bit like living in the dorms again… except that you have to share a room with seven other people and there are no commons to eat your meals at, or even a mini-fridge in your room!  All I wanted to do was be able to buy food to put into my own fridge and not have to wear earplugs to bed! 

Well, after about a week in the hostel and a few days camping out at Kristin’s new digs (I HAD to leave the hostel – I was going crazy!) I had found two apartments that I really liked and it was time to make a decision.  My options: 350 euro/month for a tiny (and I mean TINY – I can touch both sides of my room at the same time) bedroom in an apartment in Garbatella (near Kristin!) with two balconies, a living room, a dining room, and another seating area in the kitchen with roommates who were excited about the idea of me living there and who wanted to learn English, OR 320 euro/month to share a large room that looked like it had come out of the Ikea catalog, had little common space, and was in the San Giovanni zone (i.e. a forty-five minute walk to Kristin).  After days of deliberating (all the while camping out at Kristin’s place and trying to make sure she didn’t steal my pillow at night) I finally chose the Garbatella apartment with the closet-sized room (I’m pretty sure it used to be the pantry).  After a conversation with my mom I realized that the point of this trip was to experience Italy with my friends, and I was never going to be able to do that if I lived forty-five minutes from Kristin and even farther from Kenny, who found a REALLY nice place with a REALLY nice roommate in Trastevere.  Hence, I chose the tiny room in Garbatella where the bed takes up 75% of the space (an no, it’s not a full/queen, sadly).  Like I said, location, location, location!  I know Kristin and I keep mentioning how big of a pain in the arse it is to get around Rome, so you’re probably sick of reading about it, but maybe the repetition will further our point.  It sounds silly, but I knew that unless I lived in the same zone as my best friend, I would probably never see her.  Between our two different schedules and all that public transport between us, we would have never found time to learn how to do nothing together (which we’re still working on, by the way – seems like that’s fallen to the wayside a bit) if we lived multiple metro stops, bus lines, trains, or trams apart from each other.  At least now we’re only a twenty-minute walk apart!

So, dear readers, I hope you find the explanation of our hiatus entertaining, that it makes appreciate the likely ease of your next apartment hunt, and remember the importance of being near to the ones you love.