Week Two

A few days ago, I got a comment about the videos and people wanting to see more photos. As I used to take my camera everywhere, it never really was a problem. Out here, right now, making photos just isn't a priority yet. However, at my photo album there is a new folder, named Week Two, and it hosts a few more pictures taken from my hotelroom balcony (we moved rooms this wednesday night). It also hosts a batch of pictures of the house we went to visit today. A three bedroom house around 2,5km from the hotel, with a Publix supermarket and WholeFoods shop, which sells a lot of fresh (and ecological) food and other items for the environmentally friendly people (with a lot of money, I must add. It's not cheap there) at walking distance. Straight around the corner, actually.
It's the best option we've come to find in two days of full-time checking and working with the people at Kensington & Company, a real estate broker located at Las Olas, of which the three women were very, very helpful to us.
One of them, Patricia, was branded as "mum" already. She has boys our age and has been kind enough to drive us around the two days, help us out by looking while we were at work, and just helping us out a great deal. She currently contacting the owner of the place to see what we can have, need to have, and want to have, and at what price.
Yesterday we also found an amazing place, a little further out, close to Broward Blvd, which had everything we could ask for, in terms of furniture and design, neighborhood and pricing, but it was just too small for the four of us. Speaking of our new mum; her sister, Mimi, works at the Chrysel dealer closeby and has been kind enough to call around, going through her contact list to help Georgi get the second hand car he wants to buy (and later ship out of the country to keep using). We also heard that her brother owns an ice cream store at Sunshine Blvd, and another sister is in web design. Quite a family.
Anyway, take a look at the photos of the place we visited, and let me know what the thoughts are. Except for the master bedroom furniture (the great dark wooden bed and matching items) and two major plasma TVs, everything will stay there as it is, by the current looks of things.
The living room TV will probably stay there when we move in, so that's not too bad, is it?
More news on the house will follow as we'll get closer to completing the transfer, or not.

Last blog ended two nights before my days off. Four days ago now. The wednesday itself wasn't much. Worked again, and during those working hours (it's low season, not that much to do in the hotel) Christian, our damn amazing Guest Service Director drove us to the Social Security Office. Got that all covered that day and spent the night in the rooms. Didn't go out for dinner, didn't cook anything special here either.

Thursday was our first day off. Bart, Yatha and myself all had some time off and we went to open up bank accounts at Wachovia bank, I got myself a hair cut, which isn't even that bad, but I still love my old me way better, and we walked around the Sunrise Blvd area, getting something to eat at Subways before we went back to the hotel. Around 6PM we went with a guy named Milan to play indoor soccer with other colleagues, 6 vs 6 for an hour at this place somewhere in Hollywood (the Florida version, it was only a 30 minute drive). Totally drained myself there, and went with 8 (or 10) people to Sushi Rock. They mostly sold seafood there, but I managed to find chicken on the menu, and I started out with a wasabi-infused entree, with pork. Everyone was waiting for me to burn badly with the wasabi, but the technique of gentle chewing and swallowing bigger pieces worked out just fine. Didn't even need to touch my bottomless drink.
Went with Paris, Marinka (another Dutch intern who's been here for a few months) and Bart to a bar closeby for one last drink and this touchscreen game.
Got home after midnight and went to bed after reading another chapter in Baldacci's debut novel.

Friday was a day in which Georgi rented a car to drive us around and see houses all over. We started at 9, with rain, drove around, tried to call and make appointments, until we hit the office of Kensington, were the ladies were helping us out a lot. That day they showed us to 3 places we looked up, meeting our demands, and we stayed in touch. That took up pretty much the entire day. That night we went over to the house of Marten, Marinka and Tommy, the Dutch people that have been here for half a year now, living just two blocks from the hotel. Their house is way less attractive than ours and they end up paying more, per person per month, I think. It's well close though. Had a barbecue at their place, but as I was exhausted I went home early, read some more, watched an episode of Eureka and went to bed.

Today then, finally, Georgi and Yatha needed to start at 3, so Patricia took them for a drive, showing them more properties (among that, the one I took pictures of). When they got to the hotel they contacted us for a quick meeting, and made sure that Bart and I could also visit the property with Patricia later. Work was really easy, with hardly anything to do. We did some computer training (Chapter 1 - Basic Skills, operating a pointing device (a mouse), and no, I'm not joking!) and other daily work next to that.
Went to visit the house as I mentioned, did some groceries with Patricia and spent the night, so far, at the room. Just watched an episode of Wipeout and will now enjoy some computer time here, and will probably read again later.

I wasn't planning on sharing a video, but weird as it gets here with all these hiphop people around me (everytime we go for a drive with Christian there's the satellite-driven nationwide Hiphop radio station playing) I actually started to like a few songs.
Here's my current favorite, one of the bigger hits in the States at the moment (not sure how big this is in Holland, for example).

T.I. - Whatever You Like