Stuff I´m Not Going to Miss

Seriously?

After living in Geneva for 4 years, you tend to get used to Geneva prices.
Everything is more expensive here and you only notice it when you are abroad, realizing that things are so cheap elsewhere. 11$ for a vodka tonic at the Pure club in Vegas? What a bargain, you pay the same at Calamar in Geneva!

But every now and then it´s over the top expensive. A vodka ginger ale at Java is 59 CHF if you do not specify that you want a single shot long drink, otherwise they give you a double shot without asking. Ouch!

I had coffee with a friend today and they charge you 7 CHF for a cafe au lait, or renverse how they call it here. I think that is a little bit steep, even for Geneva.

I am looking forward to Amsterdam, where you can sit in a chic bar, where the beats are bumping, the people are pretty and a cocktail is 8 EUR.

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Tick Tock

Time is ticking, if everything goes according to plan, an armada of movers will invade our apartment in Geneva on the 4th of November and pack up our stuff into a gazillion boxes, ship them to Amsterdam and hopefully will move everything into the house on the 9th of November.

I have been kicking Dutch butt a lot lately in order to get everything done in time. In comparison to this move, coming to Switzerland was a cakewalk. Since we are outside of the EU bringing our stuff back is a nightmare. We have filled out so many forms, ordered documents from Germany, which we had already but which were issued more than 6 months ago, a birth certificate is a birth certificate is a birth certificate, why do you need a "new" one, and I have spent a good amount of time on the phone with movers and relocation agencies.

One could get the feeling that Europe is not too keen on people from abroad coming over. Luckily we are Europeans so it´s a little less complicated. I can only imagine how hard it must be for let´s say Americans, to set up shop in Europe.

One thing I found particularly funny. If you are married or if you are in a civil union you have to provide proof in form of your marriage certificate. Makes sense, but the weird thing is that you need a certificate to prove that you are single, if you are single. How humiliating is that?
I can envision girls breaking down into tears in town halls, sobbing uncontrollably while asking for a "I am single and moving to a foreign country all on my own" certificate.

Anyway, I am still thrilled beyond believe about moving to Amsterdam. I am trying to ignore the little voice in my head telling me that I will not see some of my friends again.
We have a nice guestroom in Amsterdam and I think I have to open up a waiting list for it. So many people want to visit, and with Amsterdam being a popular weekend destination, I think a lot will actually show up on my doorstep. Not like Geneva, where everyone told me "Of course we are going to visit you" and never did, because flights to Geneva cost an arm and a leg.

18 days till the move!


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House Hunting in Amsterdam

We just returned from a 3 day long house hunting adventure in Amsterdam and I am happy to announce that we found the perfect home for us.

I had a good feeling about our real estate agent from the start as mentioned in my previous post and I was not wrong.

Annemieke, the real estate agent, picked us up from the airport on Thursday and spent the whole day with us looking at apartments. It was really great. Not only did she showed us nice apartments but also provided helpful advice about live in Amsterdam in general. Like where to apply for a parking permit, where the shopping is, how to find the nice little boutiques, public transportation and she pointed out some very good restaurants. It was an overall delight!

If you´re ever thinking of relocating to Amsterdam and you need a place, contact Annemieke from Partner in Real Estate.

Originally we thought a two bedroom apartment would be sufficient for us, since we are currently not using our thrid bedroom in Geneva and the second is our walk in closet. But instead of going smaller we ended up going bigger. We will move to a very nice 4 bedroom, separate living and dining room duplex with a gorgeous terrace and ample storage space in the attic. Since we stayed within our budget I am not really upset about it, to be honest I am thrilled. This apartment does not feel like an apartment it feels like a house. I am already referring to it as "The House".

T H E H O U S E

We ended up in the Rivierenbuurt, a very nice part of Amsterdam which is more in the south but still close enough to walk downtown if you want to. Although it would have been nice and very cliche to have a place right by a gracht it is simply impractical. You will never get a parking permit, the houses are very narrow and dark and not to mention all the drunk tourists falling asleep or puking on your doorstep.

I think our new place is fabulous and we are very much looking forward to the move. If only I could take my friends with me, that´s the only thing that makes leaving Geneva hard for me.

At least we have a guest bedroom, so people can visit us and Geneva is only a 80 CHF Easyjet flight away.


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Whoa!!!

Has anybody seen the handbrake? If yes, please pull it! The move to Amsterdam is in full on attack mode and I wonder if everything will come together all right eventually.

We had 2 moving companies in our apartment for pre-move surveys. Oh how I hate it. I get all panicky when I invite people over to my place, "Is everything spotless, are all the pictures leveled, is the light setting appropriate?" but with movers coming in it´s even worse. They want to look in your drawers, open closets, measure everything. "That´s my stuff!!" the 3 year old boy cries in my head "Don´t touch it!!!" but what can I do. Moving all the stuff myself? I don´t think so, so I have to suffer through it. The poor men, they heard "Oh that drawer, you don´t need to look into that drawer, I will pack it up myself, should be half a box which I will label "PRIVATE HANDS OFF" quite a few times.

If you think that they can simply pack up everything one day, ship it to Goudaland and unpack it there two days after that, you are sadly mistaken. The Dutch are a bit particular with peoples households entering the country. You have to hand in a a letter asking for permission, that part is ok, but you can only hand in that letter if you have registered yourself in Amsterdam, got a social security number, have a lease in Amsterdam, plus three gazillion copies of everything. The process to clear customs takes between 14 and 60!!!!! days. Now here is the kicker, you can only register yourself in Amsterdam if you can provide them with a lease, and original birth and marriage certificates that are not older than 6 month. HELLO?! I have all the certificates needed but they are too old?! I am still the same person and getting new certificates in Germany is a nightmare. Oh well, I guess we are lucky that we are more or less close to the Netherlands. Temp housing would be my personal nightmare.

Some people make it easy though. We have been assigned a wonderful real estate agent who exactly understood what we are looking for after one briefing.

We told her that we would need:

-90+ m2 size
-3 or more bedrooms, one of which will be converted into a walk in closet
-parking available (1 car, either underground parking or parking permit)
-built in kitchen, but apartment otherwise unfurnished
-Newly renovated
-Full length windows
-Terrace
-Hardwood floors
-No ground floor apartments
-Storage in cellar or attic preferred
-Good car connection to a motor way leading to Schiphol
-Good public transportation connection to downtown
- Price range X-Z in hard to get neighborhoods.

We thought she would come up with next to nothing, but we were wrong. She sent us a list of over 20 places, including pictures and details and we have picked 8 favorites.
So, we´re off to Amsterdam for a couple of days this week to look at all those places. I am really excited.

If everything goes according to plan, I have 4 weeks in Geneva left. So much to do, so many people to see, so many drinks that need to be had and so little time.

Oh well, I am happy anyway!

You should follow me on twitter here.

Change

I am happy to announce that I will be leaving Geneva and move to Amsterdam come December.


Be prepared for lots and lots of ranting about closing shop in Geneva and getting everything set up in Amsterdam.

Now I have finally something interesting to blog about again.

This Is Sooooo Awesome!!!

Did You Know?

Things I Wanna Do In Summer 2009

The Summer here in Geneva is beautiful it´s the complete opposite to the winter, which is a nightmare, always Grey, not really snowy, lot´s of rain and always cold, oh how I dread them.

Anyway back to the summer, with the lake right under your nose, there are things this summer I definitely want to do.


1. Get a boat license.
You can make a Swiss lake boat license without much of a hassle, it only takes you 10 hours of training since you don´t have to learn all the rules there are for driving down rivers which will connect to an ocean. So, I will go to the DMV, fill out a form, plunk down a small fee and then take my 10 mandatory hours with a teacher, who luckily speaks English, and I am good to go.

I will not get a boat of my own since it´s a complete waste of resources. Keeping a boat on the lake here costs you an arm and a leg, initial purchase, maintenance, having a parking spot, taxes and so on. Apparently there is a company in Geneva where you can rent boats on a time share basis. It´s like mobility, but with boats.
You pay a flat fee for which you will get points which will buy you time on one of their boats. You just log on to their website choose a date and time slot and you are good to go. How fabulous is that. I love it! I don´t fish, I don´t like swimming in the lake but spending a sunny Sunday on a boat with friends is just great.


2. Starting running again.
I don´t know how it happened this winter, but I have been packing on the pounds, which did not render me morbidly obese but I am not happy with my derriere lately, so I guess a little workout should be in order. It´s a funny thing really, I should really really really quit smoking but I am very afraid that I will gain more weight due to a shift of cravings, at the same time I do not last as long running as I used to since I am out of breath quite fast.
I guess I have to quit smoking and start running immediately to avoid gaining more weight and hopefully getting rid of the ones I acquired during the winter.


Update: I have deleted number 3 since some people find it offensive.

Ohrwurm Of The Week

An Ohrwurm, which literally means ear worm, is the German word for a song you have stuck in your head and can´t get rid of.

This week it´s Roisin Murphy. She used to be the singer for Moloko and went solo after Moloko broke up. The song is called "Slave to Love" a Brian Ferry song she covered for Gucci´s recent Gucci by Gucci fragarance add.

I Am A Deeply Superficial Person

Some people, who I don´t know, they commented on a blog anonymously, called me "lacking in depth, self-involved and superficial".

Do I care about it? No! Do I present my full personality here? No! Do I project a certain image of myself? Yes!

Come on, this is a fun blog. Most people end up here, because my Botox before and after pictures are on page 1, (how awesome is that?) if you Google pictures titled "Botox before and after".

Calling me superficial, while doing research on having their faces frozen, so they don´t have wrinkles is a tad hypocritical, don´t you think? ;)

Party In The Suite

Hmm, let me think, what blog worthy did happen in the last months. Oh, the Sindy New years party. Now that was something fabulous.

Nir, who is organizing the Sindy parties, somehow did not manage to be in time to secure a nice location, maybe there was a financial aspect as well, for a Christmas ball end of last year. So it was a new years ball instead.

The last Christmas ball was in a tent behind some building near the UN. SO NOT FABULOUS! It took ages to get in, waiting in the rain, spending an other hour at the coat check which was managed by the omnipresent volunteers. In my eyes it´s more like slavery, but hey, if they enjoy doing shit work for no pay, be my guest, I have some tasks for you as well.

Anyway, this year it was at a proper location, the Intercontinental Hotel. They just remodeled their lobby and some of their rooms, so the design was up to date.


I decided to rent a room for the festivities, so my friends and I were able to change and have a drink before the party downstairs would kick off. It was a black tie event so tuxedos and evening gowns were in order. Oh how I love events like that.

I invited some of my friends and organized who is bringing what.
My friend Phoebe picked me and Lynn up at home and we drove to the Interconti around 8 that evening. While checking in, I got carried away and upgraded to a suite. So worth it. We had a nice sitting area, a nice long table where we could put all the food and a big bathtub which would soon be filled with tons of ice and booze.


Everyone arrived around 2100 and we started to get ready for the party. Ordering ice from room service, an ironing board because some people wanted to add the finishing touch to their outfits, prepared all the food and drinks and started the night.

Well, the ball itself was not that spectacular, as expected. Lot´s of horny men in cheap suits, girls in stunning dresses, crappy music, the live band was horrible, and totally overpriced drinks.

We spent most of the night in the suite calling friends who were at the party as well, inviting them up to the room, getting plastered, in style though, on the booze we brought and going down every 1,5 hours or so to check if the ball was still boring.

Some of us lasted longer than others, so some people fell asleep on the huge king size bed, which is completely fine, why have a big bed in the room and not using it.

By 2:30 I had enough as well and kindly kicked the remainder of the people out and went to bed. I contemplated going home for a second, but why go home when I payed for the room?!

I slept like a rock and woke up around 12 the next morning, slightly hung over, cleaned the room, luckily I brought some 60L garbage bags, checked out, jumped into a car, which the hotel provided free of charge, very nice of them, and went to Becky´s place for some brunch.

That´s what I call a fabulous weekend. The fact that the husband was in the US and that I had to work before going to the ball was a bit of a bummer, but I guess you can´t have it all.

I think I will throw another party like this soon, this time without the ball.
As stated in a previous blog, I do love Hotels and why not have some nice parties in them.

Alright, blogging in the bus is kinda weird, but in a fun way. The computer is so small that it fits without a problem in my bag. Oh, on a side note, I got Jørn for Valentines day, and I LUUUUUUV it. ;)

I guess I will blog a bit more now since I found a way to use the dead time I have everyday in public transportation to do something fun.

Blogging From The Bus

One of the main reasons why I am not blogging as much as I would like to, is the fact that I am working since December. I know, bad excuse, but if 8 hours are missing from your day, stuff does not get done so fast anymore, although there is so much to tell.

But the husband came to the rescue and gave me one of those neat little net books for my birthday and after I spent a weekend hacking the living daylights out of the thing, making it believe it is a Mac, I can now blog form the bus, where I spend quite some time every day getting to and from work. So I guess, I will be le super geek, typing away on the tiny keyboard on the #19 or #2 in the future.