A House of Stuff

For the last year, my backpack was my life. I managed to fit a lot in there too: Three pairs of pants, one pair of shorts, on average about six t-shirts, four pairs of socks, four pairs of boxers, two jackets, scarf, sarong, a towel, a pair of boots, sandals, climbing gear, toiletries, camera(s), 3 iPods, AC/DC chargers and power cords, universal pronged outlet adapter, journals, books, a map of the world, souvenirs, medication, bug repellent, colored pencils, harmonica, a "blow piano" aka Pianica, passport, immunization/health documentation, a small padlock, a utility knife, sunscreen, aloe, sunglasses, and I'm sure a lot of other small crap. Needless to say, I had a relatively large backpack and I didn't pack especially light. On average, it was around 20kg.

Question: Have you ever tried to fit INTO a backpack? It's hard. I don't fit. I think that is why living out of a backpack never feels like home. I guess that's part of the allure of traveling -- to not feel at home. Though after a year in a backpack, the comforts of a house become more appealing than when I left.  I'm in a western country again, and my instincts said I should be in an apartment. In another sense, imagine if you lived out of a backpack in your home town... people would be quick to call you "homeless" before they called you "adventurous".

Now, after three weeks of scouring Gumtree for reasonable people and reasonable prices and reasonable locations to live, and a little bit of rejection, I've found a flat-share with a university student, Tijana. (I think she picked me as a roommate because she is also a rock climber).  Along with being pretty chilled out, Tijana is also nerdy, which has its benefits. For example, not only can she joke about a zombie apocalypse, but she can also give out prudent practical advice for when it happens. Another plus: her boyfriend is a head chef, who occasionally stops by with gourmet food to eat. Win!

Before I found Tijana, I had met a few notable eclectic possibilities to share a house with. There was the anal retentive 45 year old guy who said he had friends over "every few months or so" and cleaned the entire house everyday, partially for the zen-like experience. Then the lesbian couple who had a rule that no one other than tenants could ever, ever, ever stay overnight, and a house contract that allowed for arbitration in case of an infraction (overkill?). Or the granola-y hipsters with table foosball in the middle of their living room and chickens in the front yard that, unfortunately, lived in the middle of nowhere.

So when I found my current place, a few minutes walk from a main train line into Perth and a seemingly reasonable person living in it (or at least reasonable rules), it looked like an oasis in the desert. I got a call later that night that the room was mine if I wanted it. Finally! I could check off something significant from my To Do list.

Three days later, I moved in and unpacked into a closet that could hold a freakin' elephant. All that empty space I now possessed brought to mind George Carlin riffing on stuff: "That's what your house is, a place to keep your stuff while you go out and get MORE STUFF". And I instantly wanted more stuff too. If only I wasn't so poor and so unemployed. But I'm making progress in that field now.

Anyway, the real point of this blog post was to post pictures of the flat to those curious (Mom and Sister).

The outside of my apartment building taken from the street. Notice the super blue clear skies. Australia seems to have a lot of those. Let's take a walk down the driveway on the left...

See the small white rectangle between two windows in the bottom left corner -- try to remember those for later. The door to my apartment is in front of that tiny little car. 

Here is the picture of the living room from the perspective of the front door. While my roommate ran off to Melbourne for the week, I assembled all of her Ikea furniture featured here. Nice wood floors, but everything echos, so rugs will be the next pick-up I think. Barely visible on the left hand edge of the picture is the start of the hallway. Let's take a look...

Nothing out of the ordinary here. Far left rear door opens to Tijana's room. Far right rear door opens to the kitchen. The near right door opens to the bathroom. And on the near left side is my bedroom.  

Here is my sparsely decorated bedroom... 

... and here is my closet. I've made some "stuff" purchases since moving in -- mainly a suit for professional interviews.

Across the hallway is the bathroom. I picked out the floor mat and the bathroom curtain. Classy choice, right?

And here is the toilet and the only mirror in the house. Shaving my beard is a mess.

The kitchen is notable for the very rusty fridge that Tijana picked up for free. It was an outside fridge once, but she tamed it and brought it inside. The inside is very clean though. Hey, remember that white square I pointed out in the second picture of the series. Well, that corresponds to the square above the stove in this picture. Let's take a closer look...

It's...

... a...

... a drive-thru! (Why?)

Oh, and here is Tijana's room. It looks all blowed'd up because she left for Melbourne to compete with her rubgy team in a national playoffs. There wasn't enough time with uni, work, and a new apartment to finish everything. Also, a  messy room is safer -- zombies are very clumsy and trip on things. 

And there you have it. My new flat for the next few months in Perth.