Day Two: Monday, July 9, 2007

Our sea shipment arrived today. They were supposed to be here at 11:00 - they showed up at 10:20. I don't think that ever in my life has someone showed up early for an appointment like that. It is all a little surreal when you walk down to the loading dock with the agent. He shows you the documentation with the lock number and asks you to verify that the sea container is locked with that lock. This is stuff that adults deal with, not me. I do have to keep reminding myself (as I'm about to turn 30) that I do qualify as an adult. Nevertheless, I was very excited to have all of our stuff delivered to make it feel more like our home. That's when the fun began.

A little background: in Milwaukee, Chris and I decided that we were going to bring both of our beds with just a regular bed frame - we didn't have enough room for a bedroom set. I even went out and bought a second bed frame since the one we were using only worked with our head/foot board. We had the movers in Mke store our bedroom set but ship our bed frame. So, you can imagine my surprise when the little Chinese guy walked in to our apartment with our headboard and foot board. I just about fell over. So now we have two beds and three bed frames. It's all a little ridiculous but I just had to laugh.

I mean, I swear that I was perfectly clear with our movers that I wanted it to go in to storage. But, as I looked at the inventory sheet I used to check off our boxes as they arrived (that I incidentally signed in Mke when the movers left), there it was in black and white: MBR Foot board & MBR Head board. I mean, it couldn't have been more clear. Lesson learned: even when the movers are staring at you and wanting to leave, make sure to read the fine print. Not sure why I chose to ignore my parents' advice at that point in time, but I did. So if anyone knows of someone looking for a queen-sized bed frame in Hong Kong, please let me know.

Other fun things from the day:

• I'm still trying to figure out how to get hot water in the kitchen sink. I had to fill up a bucket in the bathroom and bring it in to the kitchen so that I could wipe down all of our cabinets. I didn't know I'd be camping in my own apartment but that's apparently the case for now.
  
  
• Our moving woes didn't end with the bed frame. The rug we brought for the guest bedroom is too long (mostly because the wardrobes are in the way because they can't be moved out of the room - one of those, you can only keep them in the room that they are assembled in) so it's now rolled up in a corner. It was like I couldn't win!
  
  
• The Chinese don't have a box spring and a mattress. The mover looked at me like I was crazy when we only had one empty bedroom and both a box spring and a mattress. Thankfully that at least fits in the room.