Winter has Arrived...

White Christmas coming right up!

You can tell whose cars haven't been moving...

Well-salted roads

No more BBQ

Braving the snow to bring Gaby to the pediatrician

How Gaby spends her 'mun yue' (first month birthday)

My China apple all bundled up

Mum and I

My mum arrived last Wednesday morning. I was so excited about her coming because her presence would change my daily routine and provide much needed company now that I've stopped my German language classes and am in the waiting phase for Gaby to pop.

So what have we two women eligible for priority seats on trains (one senior citizen and one heavily pregnant) been up to? Speaking of giving up seats for the elderly and the pregnant, this is something I have been meaning to mention for a while: Singaporeans are not as bad as the Swiss when it comes to being a caring society. Here, not only do most people not offer their seats to either one of us, the sitters can confidently look you in the eye. In Singapore, at least there is some sense of social guilt (aka. paiseh-ness) and sitters would pretend to be asleep, or at least avert their gaze.

Yesternight, we three gallavanters (Lionel included) went to watch a Cirque du Soleil show, Varekai.

Lionel discovered 50% off tickets while browsing the German newspapers at the gynae

The tram was extremely crowded (like the buses and trains at peak hour in Singapore). One lady, whom I guesstimated was about my mum's age, offered me her seat. I felt so paiseh, but she insisted and I thanked her profusely. Alas, I think she wasn't Swiss (her English wasn't Swiss accented).

These social observations make me reflect, as an educator, on why there still is a place for Moral Education in schools -- as archaic, laughable, and top down many of us think it is. That is partly where norms of a caring society and civic mindedness are established because an individual in such an education system would realise the same message, and hence standards and expectations, are being conveyed to his peers as well.

Anyway, back to Mummy and me. It's so nice to be mummied all over again before I have to do the mummying myself.

Mum has been a busy lawyer running her own sole proprieter firm for the past twenty years. While she is officially retired now, she was going to the office tidying affairs up till the day she left for Zurich. Thus I think it is interesting to document aspects of this sharp transition into housewife/grandmother/retirement-hood as it happens.

In the past week, Mum, who belongs to the generation of computer-internet migrants, has been learning how to operate on my small red laptop. She's learning how to use Gmail (more effectively), check the remnants of her work e-mail, read The Straits Times ePaper, watch episodes of Desperate Housewives and play DVDs on the computer. 

She has also been:

• learning the bus routes to the many supermarkets here (decent Coop, disappointing Coop, Migros with butcher, Migros sans butcher, Asian supermarket, Turkish shop with the only oranges that are edible by our standards), 
• learning the niche of each supermarket (like how the most value-for-money eggs come from Denner, best half-baked bread comes from Migros and how salted butter can only be found in Coop), 
• and developing an applicable affinity with marketing techniques used to modify housewife behaviour (e.g. Aktion = sale, meats based on price/kg, 15% discounts on Saturdays, vouchers offering more customer points etc.)

We signed up for a 45Franc/year library membership at the equivalent of our Clementi Central. With that membership, I can borrow up to 25 items at a time. And these items include English books, children books and games, CDs and DVDs!!!! The DVD part really called loudly out to us. On  our first day at the library itself, even before registering a membership, Mum plonked a chair next to the DVD shelf and selected 8 DVDs with English options. Since the titles were in German, she relied on who was starring in the movie to make her choice. (Names afterall don't get Germanfied.) So we've got Cate Blanchett, Christian Bale, Richard Gere, Colin Firth, Meryl Streep, Tom Cruise, Robert Redford, Judi Dench, Kate Winslet and Michelle Pfeiffer with us right now.

But alas, upon checking out did we find out that while we can hold the books for a month, the DVDs are due in a week and are non-renewable. Mum had chosen so many "in case I went into labour" and she had nothing to do and didn't know how to get to the library. Anyhow, this circumstance gave her another home activity: reading the English synopses of the movies online so she could prioritise which shows to watch first.

Mum has also been finding a rationale everyday to reason why Gaby should come each night.

• Because she (my mum) has safely arrived already
• Because the house is in order
• Because I have finished packing my hospital delivery bag
• Because she has learnt how to go to the supermarket already
• Because she has learnt how to operate all the machines in the home already
• Because we watched Varekai with all its thrilling theatrics that would excite Gaby

As you can see, most of the reasons hinge on Gaby arriving when everything is in order. Oh well, Gaby, let's see if you're going to do that or if this is just wishful thinking on our part.

And every dinner, she makes sure we cook more so that there is at least one portion left over for her lunch the next day should I go into labour that night.

Besides reading the ePapers, checking her mail, watching Desperate Housewives, enjoying one of our 8 DVD movies with me, cooking red/green bean soups on my special daughterly request, and calling my Dad and her friends, there still is quite a bit of time as a housewife/housegrandma. So she busies herself and finds miscellenous things to do, like this:

Sweeping and collecting leaves off the balcony in her housecoat

I don't suppose any of her clients is going to be viewing my blog and seeing their lawyer in this very unglamourous outfit and position. ;p

Car Rental

A good piece of advice from the pregnancy books Lionel and I use for toilet reading suggest that we take a trial drive to the hospital prior to D-Day. With that in mind, Lionel booked a car last Saturday morning to give the route a try. Of course, we couldn't just go to the hospital and back, could we?

So he took a 4 hour booking and we planned to do the hospital drive, to IKEA (for the umpteenth time) to get Gaby's changing table, and to the hypermart, Coop, located in the same warehousy kind of area of Dietlikon.

Mobility Car-Sharing

Mobility is a massive car sharing company here that has stations all over Zurich with one to a few cars in each station. The closest one to us, with just one car, is but a five minute walk from our home. Even then, there are another three within a couple of bus stops. While Mobility carries several sizes and models of cars, all their cars are red. (So you probably do not want to get a red car here in Zurich, just as how we won't get a white Mercedes in Singapore because it screams out "Taxi!")

With his university, Lionel got a three-month free membership with Mobility. However, he had to get his Singapore driver's license converted to a Swiss one before he could take up this membership.

Getting a Swiss Driver's License

Besides an eye test that had really funky components to them, there was no other test we had to take. (Both of us decided to convert our license because we have to do it within a year of our arrival, otherwise, we would have to take the local test to get a Swiss license.)
It cost us each:

• 12 francs for the eye test
• About 3 francs worth of stamps to send in documents when they came ping-ponging back at us
• 30 francs to the Kreisburo (the office in-charge of each neighbourhood) for a useless piece of certification which was still not what the driving office wanted
• 85 francs for the administration's paperwork

That totals up to 130 francs for each of our license.

Oh, and they seized our Singapore licenses upon our application, returning them by normal (not even registered) mail only when our new Swiss license comes. And see what they stickered to my Singapore license?

Singapore license above, Swiss license below

Pardon the digression, and back to the car rental.

I am amazed at the technology this company uses. The car is just left sitting in a Mobility labelled parking lot. alongside other normal car lots. There is no office or personnel taking care of it. How then do you collect and drop keys off? Ah, this is where that red sticker on the bottom of the windscreen is for.

Lionel flashes his university matriculation card in front of what looks like a sticker -- and Tadaa! The car unlocks itself. This is the same mechanism used to lock the car as well.

Next, we enter the reasonably clean car and a screen from the rearview mirror unfolds downwards:

Here, information about our booking and journey is shown. When the engine starts, the screen automatically folds back under the mirror, so that you do not get a chance to fiddle with it while driving.

So here we are, sitting in the car. I am taking in the feeling of being in a car again after some nine weeks of being carless while Lionel, in his usual engineer-mode efficient chop-chop self, is immediately fumbling around, looking for the car key. The glove compartment? The side pockets at the door? Under the hand brake? Nope, nope and nope.

Then Lionel suddenly feels around the steering wheel, and realises there is no key hole for the engine.

Hehe... that's when I *very I'm-so-proud-of-myself-ly* spot the "Start button" beneath the radio and aircon controls.

Seriously, you press this button and the engine starts up sans the "ee hee hee sputter sputter" sound. Very clean, very efficient. The quiet and inconspicuous engine start-up proved really face-saving when our engine died because Lionel was getting used to handling a manual car all over again.

It was so nerve-wrecking for Lionel getting us from one point to another initially. There were so many things to be alert to:

• As mentioned, the car we rented was a manual one. And it is hard to remember to press on, half release, the clutch when moving off, changing gear, and braking.
• Cars here are left-hand drive so besides the change in driver's perspective, one also has to get used to the roads being mirror image in orientation.
• We have never driven or travelled much here. The tram routes are slightly different from the car roads. So it is like driving in a whole new terrain.
• When crossing some junctions, you need to look out for trams coming from in front or behind you. They always get priority no matter what colour your traffic light flashes you.
• The lanes here are super narrow! Trams can past you with just a pen's length allowance.
• The traffic lights are super high up. I think they were made for child or short drivers, because you had to lean forward and squint up to keep an eye on the changing lights.

Traffic lights directly above the windscreen

By the time we arrived at IKEA, Lionel emerged from the car with two triumphant dark grey patches of armpit sweat on his fitting T-shirt. (Did I mention Lionel has lost his paunch here with all the expensive outside food and hence the healthy homecooked food we've been having? So now he has moved one belt hole back and he can wear his tighter fitting T-shirts again. Ooh, I like.....!)

I am so glad I was not the one driving. I would have probably got my 130-franc driving license revoked after knocking someone down at the crossing, crashing backwards when my engine dies while moving off a slope, scraping the car on a tram, mounting eight curbs as I make my turns with poor spatial judgment, turning into a lane and finding myself facing another car head-on twice or thrice, not moving off when the light turns green, lose my way for three out of the 4 hours, and have two trams crash into me.

Anyhow, guess how much our very well-planned 4 hours and 23km cost us? Just 30 Francs! And no add-ons like petrol or insurance!

We were pleasantly surprised, and now we think we may not get a car here in the end. Afterall, on weekdays, it is way easier for Lionel to take a single tram that gets him from our home to his office in under 20 minutes.  And the Clementi Central equivalent for my grocery shopping is just three bus stops away, with the return bus stopping right in front of our doorstep. So if it is just weekends that we MAY want a car, then there is no point sinking money into the purchase of a car (even if they can be three times cheaper than in Singapore), to pay a monthly carpark rental fee, and to pay for the car's regular maintenance.

We're going to rent a car again perhaps in two week's time to do the hospital route once more. This time, Lionel can focus on the route instead of the driving, and do without the sweat.

More Big Deliveries before the Grand One

Guess what made me so happy on Friday when I was, for the first time in Zurich, left all alone at night because Lionel had an office party to attend?

Our Dell Desktop finally arrived after a 1.5 month wait! No more sharing of my small ThinkPad in the evenings with Lionel. No more lousy laptop speakers when we watch our cheap DVDs from Germany. Instead, I now have a huge screen to do my blogging, Facebooking, weather checking, 1000-word e-mail reply writing and prenatal Yoga-ing from.

I spent what would have been a lonely miserable evening taking my time to set up the whole PC, and forgetting about my dinner. Say hello to my new 24-inch screen. We would never have had such a big screen if not for the fact that we're doubling this screen as our TV for movie screenings. We decided that it wasn't worth getting a TV here because there is more or less only BBC we can watch that is in English, and we did not need an additional TV license fee added to our monthly bills. especially when we do not have time to watch TV anyway. Also, Lionel's workplace has two of these big screens attached to his desktop. You know, the kind where he can click and drag a window from one monitor to another, and where his mouse can suddenly cross the air space to the next monitor...

Before the Dell delivery, we had another big delivery all the way from Singapore! Lionel's Mum excitedly bought a lot of clothes and baby-related stuff for our dear Gaby. She had them flown over to us by their SIA pilot friend who was A380ing to Zurich. My own mum threw in 2 tubs of Body Shop Body Butter that I bought at almost half price in Singapore too.

Can you spot the difference? I took the first photo without realising my belly had been caught in the shot. Then I remembered the old Nokia phone that we requested from Singapore as well., and included it to take another shot. 

With this spare phone shell, I can put in my Singtel SIM card and leave it on. Now our dear friends and family in Singapore can SMS us and pay local Singapore rates. This is all in preparation for the Big Day when well wishers want to shout us to us from Singapore.

While I am on the topic of Gaby and preparations for her, see the state of her cupboard! It's a little messy now, and it has gotten more filled up with Gaby's new clothes, bedlinen and swaddling cloths from my MIL (mudder-in-law) since this photo was captured. I definitely underestimated the size of Gaby's wardrobe. Lionel and I are now looking for how to increase storage space so that my Mum can put her clothes comfortably when she comes over for three months to help me out. (Aren't Mummies so wonderful?)

We have relocated some of Gaby's stuff to our wardrobe to make room. Since diapers are something she would definitely grow into and will consume faster than she digests milk, we've been stocking up on Size 2, 3, and 4 Pampers when they are on Aktion (sale) here. We save about 30-40% with these buys.

Ah, and we haven't updated you with our, well, some would say obiang or gaudy hall curtains. Lionel and I love colours, and since we probably will not be able to afford sending Gaby to playschool here, we wanted to make home as visually stimulating as possible with bright colours and pictures.

|I see myself carrying Gaby around the house and talking to her about the pictures on the curtains as a daily routine before she starts talking and when she is at the stage where she is content to just being talked to...

Additions to the Home (no, addition isn't Gaby yet)

Guess what arrived last week? Kekeke.. the 20kg box we shipped via SingPost before we left for Zurich. It sailed the seas for about nine weeks before arriving in this state. I'm glad we kiasu-ly did the Scotchtape reinforcements all round the box. I am a little stunned though at the number of stamps the post office put on the box. Surely there is a more efficient way of indicating S$120 worth of postage?

What did we have in this box?

• 
  
  A slow cooker that was given to us by my mates at NIE (National Institute of Education) for our (Singapore) housewarming
• 
  
  Lionel's Food of China cookbook, which he swears he survived his four years in the US with
• 
  
  Two baby carriers kindly donated by Lionel's cousin, Hwee Ling, and my friend, Saiful
• 
  
  Two big vacuum packed bags of winter clothing for Gaby, mostly donated by Hwee Ling too
• 
  
  Cartoon-print reusable cloth diapers for Gaby we bought at a baby fair in Singapore -- I thought I could do my part for the environment since I have the luxury of being a stay-home Mum (but allow me to update you with the reality of reusable diapers several months from now)
• 
  
  Hehe.. a packet of pads -- I know Zurich should be more advanced and well-equipped than Singapore, but I couldn't help putting that in to give me peace of mind
• 
  
  Lots of Watson's pocket tissue packets to pad the slow cooker 

When Lionel went to collect the box in the morning, guess whom he got waylaid by? An elderly lady from the Jehovah's Witness. I am certain it is the same team attacking Asians, especially Chinese looking Asians. I had a couple of women from the sect knocking on my door and ching-chong-ing me in Chinese several weeks back just because we had a Heng and Chen on our door label. These are the publications they try to hand out to people they evangelise to.

After my incident with them at my door the last round, Lionel and I went to read up a bit more about them. Apparently, they are an organisation with very tight social control and norms. Members are obliged to fulfil a quota of new believers they bring in, and it is very hard to leave the group. They do not mix much with non-believers also. Even when I told them I was a Presbyterian, they were still trying to convert me to their particular brand of Christianity.

Jehovah's Witness is a Christian sect banned in Singapore and several other countries because they do not carry arms -- i.e. males in Jehovah's Witness, for religious reasons, would refuse to participate in our compulsory National Service.

Ah, the third mop stick I have broken in my mopping life of six years. I must have some superhuman upper body strength, or these aluminium sticks just aren't made to last.

Our loot from the second trip to Konstanz last weekend! German prices (way better than what we get in Switzerland) plus duty free shopping!  We have enough toiletries, natal supplements, highlighters, colourful Stabilo soft-tip pens, imitation Post-it notes and cleaning detergent to last us at least next six months. *rubs Aunty-hands gleefully* Can you spot the new mop stick?

I had to buy new highlighters because I fell asleep while doing my German homework one day with my highlighter caps detached. And unlike in Singapore, the humidity here is lower, so that sapped the life of my highlighters.

And more stuff for Gaby:

• 
  
  The cheapest car seat we could find (since we already splurged so much on the baby vehicle they call the pram, and since we are not planning on yet owning a car)
• 
  
  Yellow cot pads to prevent Gaby from bumping her head on the bars of the cot
• 
  
  A waterproof sheet for the mattress
• 
  
  A baby nail clipper (which really is no different from an adult nail clipper, except for the plasticky colourful add-ons which supposedly makes it more ergonomic for cutting baby finger nails -- oh, curse the profit-making baby industry that feeds on naive parents' excitement and trust!)
• 
  
  Pacifiers -- for crying emergencies. I hope not to use them, but at the same time, my own mother has taught me to be less idealistic. And baby books (at least the ones I am reading) are quite sympathetic to the use of pacifiers and reassure me that my child will not end up having buck-teeth nor remain addicted to it past societal norms of the pacifier-totting age
• 
  
  That white dress looking item is what they call a sleeper. I would probably never have heard of that if I had not been living in this winter-susceptible country. Apparently, you are not supposed to put any pillows, blankets or loose items in the cot when the baby's small because they increase the risk of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. So how do you cover the baby in winter then? The sleeper is a stiff padded dress you wear over the baby while she's sleeping in the cot. Since it is stiff, it is less likely to get entangled in baby's face, neck and limbs.

And this ends my themeless update for now!

My Favourite Things

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens,

Bright copper kettles and warm wollen mittens,

Brown paper packages tied up with string,

These are a few of my favourite things...

So it is about nine on a cool Sunday morning. I am feeling calmly happy because:

1. 
   
   
   The weather's cooled down. And Zurich is a lot more beautiful when I am not a heaving sweaty Pregosaurus.
2. 
   
   
   I only woke up once last night! Ever since I got pregnant, I have not had a single uninterrupted sleep through the night. After waking up at 2am because my pregnancy heat rash was acting up, I slept all the way till 8.20AM. That is a solid 6 hours that does a lot for my mental well-being.
3. 
   
   
   The house is more or less set up and there are no unsightly dirt sections of floor.
4. 
   
   
   Lionel washed the toilet with me last night and he did a pretty good job of getting the metal bits to shine. (I did read that men who helped out in the housework get more and better you-know -- and I can see the logic behind that. Man helps out, woman is happy --> Rolling and tumbling activity)
5. 
   
   
   Lionel's still sleeping -- so I get my quiet morning spending time with myself doing all sorts of mundane things that keep me happy. e.g. emptying and keeping the dishes from the dishwasher, taking more photos for this blog, walking around my home and feeling pleased with it...

In this cheery mood that I am in, here are a few of my favourite places at home:

Upon our fifth trip to IKEA yesterday (no car lah, so the number of trips we make depend on how much we can carry up the bus and tram each round), we finally got Lionel's dream high table and high chair for the kitchen's "balcony". I am taking quite well to this table too since that means I can chop garlic, cut fruits or marinade the meat while without being on my feet for too long at a stretch.

Did I already mention how well-designed the kitchen is? (=

I love this pull-out. Even the trays have adjustable heights which I have made use of, because I am not as tall as the ang mohs here. Can you spot our dozen packets of Bak Kut Teh Spices preciously brought over from Singapore?

I love my utensil drawer!!! We bumped into this assemble-your-own-utensil-tray section at Manor (it's a very affordable Metro, but with much nicer things). Lionel insisted on getting a Silit utensil set that was half-priced, which I still thought was really indulgent initially, but I love the shine it has after being in the dishwasher (because the water is so hard here with the minerals from the Alps or one of the mountains, only dishwashers do a fantastic job of getting all watermarks off).

Below and next to this drawer is our Corelle set shipped all the way from Singapore. It was a lovely wedding gift from Lionel's Cochlear hearing aid provider. Corelle plates look elegantly like glass, yet are deceptively light, chip resistant, unbreakable and dishwasher safe.

For the first time, I find myself using teacups. I have always avoided teacups because of how brittle the handles are, but with Corelle, I love eating my cherries in two teacups. One teacup with my cherries, and the other teacup in the other hand to spit the seeds in. *Red toothy cherried grin*

I am loving the electric stove because it is so easy to clean. I use a sponge and dishwashing liquid to just give it a wipe after cooking. It is unlike the gas stoves with the black pot holders that you have to remove and the nooks and crannies. We hope to get one like this in our new kitchen when we get back to Singapore.

Situated nicely below the stove is a drawer where we keep all the cooking utensils. Yes, Cui, I brought over the white garlic chopper I got you for your birthday but you left behind in Singapore. ;p It is working very well for us here.

Little things make the kitchen experience so much more wonderful. I like having that little white IKEA bin next to the sink, and my hand towel just above the sink so we don't drip handwater all over the kitchen floor. Because we have to pay for our rubbish disposal bags here, we usually have to keep the same bag for about 3 days before it fills up. So to keep the stench at bay, we tie up every day's food waste into little plastic bags (that come when we purchase vegetables and fruits at the supermarket) and put them in the larger paid trash bag.

And Lionel's 25kg gas grill with the 7kg gas tank sitting on our balcony. That door leads to the baby/guest room. Another door (not in the picture) leads to the hall. We're going to have our first BBQ at our place this evening with a fellow bunch of poor Singaporean students. We BBQ on a Bring-Your-Own-Meat basis and discuss where we can find the cheapest meat and sausages.

It's 10.30AM now. It takes that long to get these photos up on Blogger. The sleeping monster has just stirred, scratched his rear, then the top of his head, and lumbered into the toilet. Finally, Breakfast Time!

Lionel Loves his Grill

While a bachelor in Pittsburgh during his undergraduate days, Lionel got himself a gas BBQ grill, which he claims he used almost every week.

He sold the idea of owning one so he can make his burgers, steak and tandoori chicken on it, while adding that it is very easy to clean -- just scrape off the burnt bits into a container and there you have it -- good as new! No washing required.

Hm.

So now that we're back in another ang moh country with the four seasons, a balcony with no HDB ruling about open fires, and a BBQ culture here that does not necessarily involve an occasion, he had had had to get his grill -- even if that meant that lugging all 25kg of it from town to home on public transport. 

And now, at almost 10.30pm, he is still attending to his new toy, trying to put it all together.

So here I am, widowed by a BBQ grill at couple twilight time, writing a blog post about my husband's new love affair.

Ah, he just came in to announce the birth of his grill.

Our New Home!

My apologies for the lack of updates over the week. We have been so occupied building up our lovenest all over again (It has been less than a year since we built our lovenest in Singapore). We collected keys to this lovely 80 sq metre apartment on Thursday. It is considered to have 3.5 rooms. I do not know how that figures out but we basically have a large master bedroom, another room, a nice hall with a fireplace (with chimney and all!), a well-equipped kitchen and a toilet for the whole apartment.

Without a car, moving in our luggage bags, furniture and home accessories has not been easy. It took Lionel and I three trips to bring everything over from our serviced apartment -- that means [down 5 floors, drag bags to tram stop, change tram, climb out of underground tram stop, climb up one level to apartment] x3. We have also made, I believe, some four trips to IKEA and another three trips to this other furniture mall called Conforama. We paid 400 francs to a private company for the delivery of our furniture which came up to about 3000 francs. (You really have to pay to get the Swiss to carry anything for you.) Even then, the ATAX van came with just one nice Turkish man and Lionel had to help him carry some 700kg of furniture up the stairs to our apartment on the second level. The heaviest package was at least 40kg.

During the big move on that fateful hot Friday, all I could do was give the poor men cold drinks and biscuits in between a few trips up.

And from Friday through the weekend, I have been occupied cleaning, organising the apartment and unpacking our stuff, while Lionel has been busy putting furniture together. Fortunately on Saturday morning, Lionel had some help from a Singaporean colleague-cum-friend, Gim Hee, while I have had the lovely company of his wife, Grace.

Before we knew it, the weekend was over, and work started all over again for Lionel. Monday also brought with it the start of my intensive German course. My first two-hour lesson yesterday was the most mentally tiring two-hours I have had in Zurich so far. I am excited that I have a scheduled daily activity that leads to mental stimulation and growth. I am also excited at the prospect that I can soon understand a lot more of what is going on around me -- the sign boards, what meat I am buying, brief exchanges with the cashier, junk mail and all.

Random nugget of information: Burger King does not have the Mushroom Swiss in here, even though it's Switzerland!

OK, enough talk. I know most of you are just waiting for the pictures, if you have not already scrolled down ahead of my rambling.

The home is not fully completed yet, but we are almost there thanks to Lionel's dogged insistent persistence (that I notice is a common attribute among those in the field of Computer Science).

Here is how it starts: You enter from the main door straight ahead to face our short corridor. The entire apartment is effectively a square with this short corridor separating all the rooms.

The first door on the picture's right is the toilet. Opposite the toilet is the master bedroom. Walk a few steps forward. On the picture's right comes the kitchen with the black tiles. Opposite the kitchen is the entrance to the hall. Where this picture was taken from is the other bedroom.

And opposite the toilet is the master bedroom...

Back to the corridor and on your left would be the kitchen. Oh, I love this kitchen. Lionel vows to have our kitchen in Singapore done up like this when we return some four years later.

Lionel plans to have a high table here with two high chairs, so that we can have breakfast by the garden with the morning sun rays streaming in.

Yes, that's me, the fitting the image of the proverbial roleplaying wife -- pregnant and barefoot in the kitchen.

Oh hail the washing machine, dryer and dishwasher! This dryer is so cute. It blows clean dry air out of that holey grill at the bottom. The lint is collected on the inside filter (no surprises here), while the moisture from the clothes -- ah, the water collects in a container on the top left hand corner. We didn't realise it until we found our clothes not drying and an error sign in German and French. Using a mix of Lionel's little German and my little French, we figured we had to empty that container of water.

The kitchen's fittings are all a year old and made of very good stuff. The wood is real solid and well sandpapered with no rough or sharp edges.

Let's get out of the kitchen now and go straight into the hall.

Ah.. That's before all the furniture came in. The rental culture here is such -- the ex-tenant has to remove all his furniture and even light fittings. We told this guy he could leave his lightings behind -- we didn't mind having them and he could save removal costs.

See how close we are to the road! Because of the full length window and our proximity to the ground, I can no longer prance about habitually without being fully clothed. Since I can no longer wear any of my shorts now, I have taken to wearing Lionel's boxers.

Here is what our hall looks like now.

Before we get our curtains, I am using the cardboards from all the furniture to keep out the sun and the stares.

Like our crooked bookshelf? I wanted to have a splash of colours here and there everywhere. So we've got this green backing on the bookshelf, and a bright red clock opposite.

Below the red clock is the fireplace!

Let me tell you about the bargains we got here. That black leather sofa bed cost us only 200 francs. It makes a nice extra guest bed and it is milk and drool proof because it is not made of fabric. The neat glass dining table cost us only 100 francs.

Did I mention the owner of this apartment cum several other units in these few blocks is a contractor? He surprised us by appearing in tattered shorts with paint splotches all over on the day of the keys handover. A very down-to-earth man, I am sure his personality must have played a part in the layout of this flat. The 80 square metres is so well planned that there is a feeling of space and yet plenty of well concealed storage space.

And now, after touring the hall and returning to the corridor, we finally arrive at the other room -- Gaby's room, or our guest room.
  

This room is far for from ready, but there you have it -- a glimpse of it. Baby cot frame and single bed frame.

This post took me the whole day to get up. The photos take a really long time to upload, but I hope you've enjoyed the tour of our humble abode that we hopefully will call home for the next four years.