Let me begin
by saying Praise the Lord, I THINK that last Monday was the last time that Michael and I will have to pack up our stuff and move to a new location.  Although we have had our new apartment since April, we had been staying in our temporary, furnished apartment so that we could better host Michael’s family during their visit.   By 8pm on Monday, April 30^th however, we had to be OUT of there, so we spent the days after his family left in a frenzy running around trying to buy appliances, rent furniture and move our stuff over to our new place.  (Thankfully we have some incredible friends here who pitched in and made the move a breeze!)

Buying appliances was kind of an interesting experience.  I searched all of the stores online (Extra, Casa Biaha, Ponto Frio, Carre Four…) and made a list of the ideal appliances and their lowest prices online.  It’s important to do your research, but it’s best to buy in person so that you can negotiate.  So, we took my list to our nearby Ponto Frio to try our luck.  The selection is more limited in stores but they had enough to work with, so we ended up buying our fridge, stove, dishwasher and washing machine there and I think we netted out getting about 15% off the lowest online prices!  Michael was a star negotiator, 100% in Portuguese.  At this point, all of our appliances have been delivered but the fridge is the only thing that’s functional since the manufacturers have to come actually install the other items.  We think we’ll have the stove and dishwasher running later today and the washing machine…sometime soon thereafter.  We hope.

Amazingly, the furniture rental turned out to be pretty simple.  We heard of two companies to rent from – John Richards and Interiors – and went with John Richards since Michael has a coworker who is renting with them and had a positive experience.  We selected the items we needed online and on Monday afternoon it was all delivered.  In an effort to be economical, we only rented dishes and cooking supplies, sheets, towels, a bed, sofa and a coffee table.  So, right now our apartment is pretty empty.  We have no TV, no chairs, no table, no dressers…and as of right now, we still have no Internet!  They were supposed to install it last Saturday but there was some strange issue with the cables and now the Internet company is in touch with our landlord and we’re hoping it gets solved by Monday.  Also, we still have a little more work to do to the apartment as we need to buy some kitchen cabinets, we’re having some closets redone, etc.

Although a little unusual, we are making the most of our current situation by eating lots of cereal, ice cream and PB&Js (your options are limited when you only have a fridge!), playing card games and speed boggle, and having contests to see who can slide the farthest in their socks across our floors.  If you have on the right socks you can get pretty far.  🙂  Of course we are looking forward to having a stove and furniture and TV and Internet…but for now we’re having fun.

Oh, and an update on our stuff: our sea shipment landed in Brazil April 26^th and is going through the customs process – estimated to clear by June 1!  This is great news for us and means that we may only be renting furniture for the month of May and soon we’ll see our things again and get to really settle in here.  Oh to settle in…

Michael and me in our new apartment! Holding the keys

Praise the Lord, today Michael and I celebrated the SIGNING of our apartment lease.  Our 30 MONTH lease.  Which is totally normal here.  And maybe 30 months doesn’t sound so long to most people, but for a girl on her 15th or so move, it is a serious COMMITMENT.   But it’s a good commitment.  So, in light of this momentous occasion, I thought I would take this opportunity to fill you in on what it’s like to rent an apartment here in São Paulo.

First of all, it’s EXPEN$IVE.  We feel like we got a great deal on our place but I’d say real estate here is comprable to San Francisco or New York.  Some people will say it’s more, some will say it’s less, but all in all I think the rental market is pretty similar.  Although in São Paulo, when you are calculating your monthly cost, you have to remember to factor in 1) Rent, 2) Condominium Fees, and 3) Taxes.  Instead of the landlord taking everything into account and giving you one bill, it is the renter’s responsibility to cover all of the costs.  You will quickly see that this is a common theme.

So secondly, when you rent in São Paulo, you are usually renting a place BARE BONES.  I’m talking no appliances, no light fixtures, sometimes no toilet seats or shower heads.  It is NORMAL for there to be random wires sticking out everywhere.  Renters here purchase their own appliances / fixtures and TAKE THEM WITH THEM when they leave.  This translates into being a major pain that ADDS to the cost of renting.  Our place LUCKILY had light fixtures and faucets, but we will definitely need to purchase appliances.  A quick note on this — appliances (and basically EVERYTHING else that one might need to buy in Brazil) are about about twice the price that they are in the US.  I can’t get into this right now (as it deserves to be it’s own post) but in the meantime I will link to THIS POST by my friends, the Joneses, on cost-of-living here.  BOOOO.

OK so next up about apartments in Brazil… the built-ins/small bedrooms.  All of the apartments that we looked at had TINY bedrooms.  This is influenced by the fact that all bedrooms have these random built-in closets which eliminates the need for Brazilians to put much furniture in their bedrooms.  Sounds OK but in my opinion the closets are usually really unattractive, poor quality, AND hello, we are bringing down a ton of bedroom furniture that will most certainly NOT fit in our bedroom.  It’s OK though.  We have a plan to re-do the built-ins and we’ll squeeze some of our furniture in the second bedroom. (Hear that friends??  Second bedroom = room for you to stay when you come VISIT!!!)

Another oddity that we had to get used to here is the inclusion of a Maid’s room/bathroom and a service entrance for each apartment.  This is really amazing to me for a few reasons.  First of all, we were not looking at large apartments.  These are small, compact, 2 bedroom places.  And yet it is such the cultural norm to have hired help (that often lives with you) to the point that even in these small apartments, there is still a designated (albeit TINY) room and bathroom for the maid.  The rooms seem hardly the size of a double mattress and the bathrooms are like those on an airplane, but nonetheless, there they are.  Usually they are off the laundry room which is off the kitchen.  Which leads me to the point that most kitchens here are more closed off and separated from the rest of the apartment.  The tradition is for the Empregada (maid) to work in the kitchen/laundry area so you would want to be able to close it off.  This is a bit sad to us as our place in San Francisco was totally open from the kitchen to the living & dining area and we loved that!  Oh well.  And, as I mentioned, there is always a separate “service entrance” that opens into the kitchen whereas the “main entrance” usually opens into the living area.  All a bit ODD to me.

So, when will we move in?  Well, this is a little tricky because we still haven’t gotten any of our stuff yet.  Supposedly our air shipment landed in Brazil on March 30th and is going through customs and our sea shipment is set to arrive in Brazil April 26th, but we expect 2 months of customs nonsense after it arrives so…we’ll see when we get it.  Right now our plan is to do a little work on the apartment and get our appliances this month so that we can move in May 1st, and we’ll just be renting furniture until we can get our stuff.  At this stage in our lives flexibility and a sense of humor are the key to happiness.  And tonight, we’re just happy that we found a place that we can commit to for the next 30 months.