Homeless for Half a Month

It’s official. As of Monday Derik and I won’t have a home for half a month. Technically until October 13th, but heck…what’s two days?

Before you freak out as much as I have over the last few days, I have to say we have a lot to be thankful for.

Remember this from my twitter feed and this post?  

Well you should. Because that was just from two days ago. Anyway the low down is our current housing contract is up on Tuesday. The housing situation in Geoje Island is crazy right now and finding an apartment is little to none. We had a really nice realtor step in to help us (seriously she’s one of the nicest ladies I’ve ever met), and after calling TWENTY different property owners she only found four places available in our area. One of them happened to be brand new and still under construction, and wouldn’t be finished or move-in ready until October 13th. Guess which one we went with. It wasn’t a hard choice, the place is beautiful with lots of natural light. It actually feels somewhat ‘Western,’ and I’ll take ANY PLACE that makes me feel like home. Well this one did it. We immediately called our current landlord who gave us a one month extension to the end of October on our contract if we (of course) paid for an extra month.

That was three weeks ago.

Two days ago (technically four days before our original contract was up) we get a call from our Korean friend who has been helping us with various things throughout the last two years. He said our landlord called and wants us out by the 1st of October or we have to pay six hundred dollars to stay until the 10th. He asked how she could do that to us and she answered unapologetically, “Because they are me-gooks (American foreigners), and she can make a lot more money.”  She then went on to say how no one would ever want to live after ‘white people’ so they would have to completely remodel our current apartment. This is all a load of crap because I’ve seen the other apartments here. We live in the nicest, cleanest, most well kept one in this complex. All the rest house 3-5 men at a time who sleep on the floor and go work at the ship yard.

Our friend (who was talking to the landlord) was so upset over her racist comments and unforgiving attitude towards us (we’ve never asked her for anything and never cause any trouble), it took him a while before he could actually call us and tell us the news.

It got real REAL fast for us.  THANKFULLY our realtor friend stepped in and she’s been an enormous help to us. She immediately told us to get out of our current place and not give in to our landlords wishes. It would be cheaper to hire a moving company and live in a hotel. She’s found a moving company that will move all our stuff and then keep it in storage until our new place is ready.

I’m so thankful for her and our other Korean friend who have been so helpful and patient with us. We also have a lawyer friend whom we met with tonight just in case we have problems getting our key money back (basically a huge lump sum of money you have to put down for a deposit…literally thousands of dollars). I’m thankful for him.

I’m thankful for my husbands calm demeanor. Even when life hands us not one but 100 lemons he’s always a rock to lean on and calm me down. I’m thankful for my friend Jen who said she’d take care of my fluff-ball bunny until we move into our new place. I’m thankful for cheap ‘love motels’ as a place we can lay our head. Sure it’s not the cleanest, quietest, or most sanitary place to stay, but it’s better than nothing.

I’m thankful for being an expat. Life can really dish it to you every now and again. It can be really confusing when you aren’t sure where and who to turn to to help solve your problems, but that’s why it can be one of the biggest growing experiences.

I’m thankful for the good news I received-I went to the eye doctor today to have my eyes checked post LASIK, and he told me my vision has been corrected from being -8.75 and -7.50 to seeing 20/10, maybe better. I could ALMOST read the 20/5 line.

Last thing? I’m thankful for this ginormous bottle of American spiced rum and bag of Lindor chocolates we found at Costco today. Seriously these are going to get me through the next half month. 

Life is grand, it really is. Life is an adventure. Sometimes a little flexibility, ok maybe a lot of flexibility is required, but if you take one day at a time it’ll all work out.

I promise.

Now if you don’t hear from me in the next few days it’s because I’m moving my entire existence in Korea to a storage unit. I’ll be back soon dears.