Hello neighbor, could we borrow a cup of … crowbar?

Every few days we’ve received deliveries of furniture, dishware and electronics from local and online stores – replacements for things we chose not to ship. Amazingly, each item has made daily life so much easier. Who would have thought crisping bread in a toaster would ever feel luxurious?

And last week, we got word from the company delivering our household goods from the states that they’d be here on Friday. Great, we’d climb a major rung of domesticate living ladder, we thought.

But as the saying goes, anything worth having is worth the work (or something like that). We had assumed we’d ordered a full service delivery to our apartment. But here’s what we got:

Enter the wooden crates...yes WOODEN CRATES.

At 5:30 p.m. - just after dark - the crates arrived. And here I thought only vampire coffins and cursed museum relics came in wooden crates.

The crates were about 2,5 meters (over 8 feet) tall...and a gazillion pounds

The “movers” turned out to be a freight shipping company. So after they helped Thomas wheel them to our apartment entrance way, they left us with the sealed, metal-band-reinforced crates. And to adding to our stress level was the German concept of Ruhezeit (where you shouldn’t make noise after during certain hours, like after 8 p.m.). Yeah…busting splitting timber and carting boxes and furniture up several stories won’t make noise.

Crate 1 of 2.

So, we stood there for a few minutes looking up at the rectangular monsters blocking half the sidewalk. At least it wasn’t snowing.

Then it started snowing.

I knew our neighbors across the hall had been doing a lot of interior construction, so what better time to introduce yourself than when you need something…especially something as common as a crowbar…or better yet, a chainsaw. Unfortunately, they had neither. They also probably think we’re insane now. Super.

But somewhere along the way, we must have earned some moving karma points. Another neighbor (the husband of Thomas’ co-worker who also lives in our building) had a small, manual handsaw and – more importantly – a willingness to help.

For the next two hours, Thomas tore the crates open, board-by-board. Then the three of us hurried all of the long-awaited contents out of the snow and into the building.

One down...one to go

We finished around 8:30 (slightly breaking the sacred Ruhezeit, but too tired to care).

The next day...

Even though our belongings were safely inside, we still had to deal with the empty and now unstable crates looming outside. Unlike in the U.S. where we usually just pay someone to cart of large amounts of waste, in Munich, you’re on your own…unless you give at least a week notice. And don't even think about taking wood to the regular trash. There's a special handling facilty for that, of course.

The morning after

So while I spent most of Saturday unpacking boxes inside, Thomas spend about seven hours tearing down the crates and stashing the wood in our underground parking spot. It's a good thing we don’t have a car. But maybe now we can build one…out of wood. Oh wait, I just remembered, we hate wood now.

Swallowing cats to catch flies

You know that nursery rhythm where the old lady swallows a fly, and then swallows a cat to catch the fly, then a dog to catch the cat, etc.?Well,  I’m starting to feel a little like that old lady.

A couple of days ago, Thomas and I discovered a nice public library. But in order for me to get a card, I need to provide proof of address (in addition to paying €18 and showing my U.S. passport). But I can’t provide this proof of address until I register with the Munich (something all German citizens and residents must do when they change cities).

But, I can’t register with the city until I complete the residence card process. And before I can do that, I need to pass either a Göthe Institut A1 language exam or show proof of my university degrees. Sounds simple enough except that the next open exam isn’t for at least another week or two and proof of my studies is currently travelling though Germany – without me.

You see, we’re still waiting on our household goods to be shipped to Munich. Yeah...here’s how that’s been going:

• Exactly two months ago today, the moving company came, picked up our boxes and furniture and trucked it down to Chicago where they (hopefully) packed it all tightly into a ship container.
• About four weeks ago, we had no idea if our container was still cruising the Atlantic Ocean, sitting on a deserted island confusing the local fauna or somewhere in Germany.
• Three weeks ago, we were notified it had made it Bremen where it must clear customers. But in order to clear customs, they needed a detailed log of each box’s contents – in German.  Fortunately, we’d already done this in part for our records and the original transport company. So Thomas sat down one evening and painstakingly translated the 20 pages, itemizing everything we own in German.
• Last week we were told it finally cleared customs and that we had to pay a few hundred Euros in standard port fees. Ok, done. But since then, all’s been quiet on the northern front. I’m not sure if the container is still in Bremen or if a delivery man will pop by any minute. Guess I’d better change out of my Rocket Squirrel pajamas…just in case.

So that’s where I am. No university degrees, no residence card, no Munich registration, no library card. And the worst part? I really wanted to see if they had a copy of this book (yes, I’m judging it favorably by its cover alone):

Title Translation: Bring me the head of Nicolas.

Moving day...well, sort of

Our sparsely "decorated" bedroom

I say "sort of" because today is moving day for everything in our apartment, except Thomas, me and the cats.

It takes about 5 to 7 weeks to ship a household to Germany. We were hoping the movers could come on Monday, but a scheduling problem actually bumped us up in their waiting list. Normally, earlier is better. But not when you haven't even started packing. So, we spent the last two nights (somewhat frantically) packing almost everything we own into 4.5 cubic foot boxes. We didn't get to bed last night until after 2 a.m. OK, so technically Thomas didn't get to bed until after  2 a.m. I passed out on a pile of blankets and half-folded clothes around midnight.

Packing the past couple of nights felt like a never-ending task. But to our surprise, when we documented our belongings for the moving company, we realized just how little we actually have. Granted, we sold several things over the weekend, but still, typing "0" after "0" into the company's standard list of furniture, appliances and household goods (some of which we questioned the usefulness of; who the heck needs a special vegetable bin?), conjured up mixed emotions for us. I was happy we didn't have that much stuff, having less meant we'd be easier to move. Thomas' response was a little different. "That's all we've accumulated these past five years," he asked incredulously.

Having less - or being more agile, as I like to say - does have its downside. Each piece of furniture or appliance we sold will likely cost four times as much to buy new in Germany (especially given the current strength of the euro against the dollar: currently about 1.40 to 1)...a costly fact we've resigned ourselves to.

So, the movers arrived this afternoon to wrap up and move out everything, leaving us in an empty apartment for the next five weeks.

I already miss having a bedroom dresser and hangers. What few clothes I didn't send away are crumpled up in laundry bins in the nearly-bare closet. Good thing I kept the iron...

A moving company maze

Finding a moving company is like navigating this WI corn maze.

After spending the better part of yesterday evening researching international moving companies, we whittled our finalists down to five. Our selections process was simple. 

Step 1: Draw a company name out of the virtual internet hat.

Step 2: Find online reviews of the company.

Step 3: Look up the company’s Better Business Bureau (BBB) rating.

Step 4: If we were still on the fence, we’d critique the company’s website. That might sound a bit strange, but we figured that if a company’s website looks like a fifth grader set it up in the mid-nineties, it probably won’t have the resources to provide a smooth moving experience.

I started putting the company information in a Word document, but my engineering husband hijacked the computer and re-compiled the data into a “much more efficient” spreadsheet. I hate spreadsheets almost as much I hated calculating planetary brightness and flux density in college, so I happily sat back on the couch and let him do his thing.

Today, I started calling the companies for estimates. But I didn’t open the spreadsheet, yet.