Looking out my new window, watching the typhoon...

Today "Typhoon 3" signals were hoisted and posted everywhere. It was pretty evident by the blowing rain that something semi-significant was happening. When I hear the word "typhoon", I get a bit nervous, but was reassured that we would make it through alive. They classify typhoon levels by how far the city is away from the center of the storm, not the intensity of the storm. If we make it to a typhoon 7, school is canceled.

I am getting settled into my apartment, but I need to get used to calling it my "flat", and taking the "lift" instead of the elevator to my floor. We had a bit of trouble with housing at first because our landlord was quite suspicious about paying some sort of tax, so our principal, who doubles as the schools resident real estate agent, took us around to look for something bigger and better. Or, at least, cheaper. My roommate, Caroline, and I ended up choosing a place that cost the same, in the same area, but is much nicer. It's a small place, about 700 square feet, but is definitely livable.

We are living in a complex with indoor/outdoor pool, gymnasium and workout facility, tennis courts, bbq pit, video game room, play areas, badminton and squash courts, etc. It's quite a nice clubhouse. Our complex, The Castello, has 7 towers of buildings with about 30 floors each. It's hard to get a handle on how many floors there actually are in a certain place, because the number 4 is considered unlucky, so none of the floors have a 4 in them.

There is a shuttle bus from the complex that goes to a big mall (which most businesses seem to be housed in anyway) that has a KCR train station in it. Right down from our place is also a bus stop and taxi hub, which are both inexpensive.

Most of the flats here have large window seats, to make the space bigger. Chinese people seem to be very efficient with their space, and the use of space is quite a big deal here. I'm realizing just how much I DON'T need to have. Most of the places have a separate, closed off room for the kitchen, without ovens or hot water heaters for the sinks. The kitchen also has a small built-in washer/dryer combo, where I can wash about 2 shirts and a few pairs of underwear at a time.

So, home sweet home. I plan to make one trip to IKEA this weekend, which is one train stop away. It is one of 5 in the city, which makes me stop and realize just how big of a city I'm now living in!