Thanks to a properly-legalized form, a short taxi ride, and one HELL of a Fed-Ex bill, Mrs. Shannon Kosman and I are now, once again, legally married in the eyes of God, the Dutch Government, and our Facebook statuses.
Since taking the Kosman Household Tour videos Scottie and I ventured out to IKEA! Yay!
Technically this picture is from the second time I went with Sapna. Who’s Sapna you ask?
Scottie works with her husband Deeps and this us waiting for the metro after our successful venture. Some people have asked if IKEA here is larger/different from those in Canada. I think this one’s a bit larger but the set up is mostly the same with the showroom being on the top floor with the purchasing area on the main level. There’s a few differences in items but the overall feel is pretty much the same. They still have the first shower curtain Scottie and I bought for the 16th floor apartment! Yep, the stick drawn coloured animals, I’m sure you’ve seen it 
They of course have the restaurant and Scottie had his tasty meatballs while I ate my erwten soep. Mmm, split pea soup. Not that you care much about that portion of the journey so let me get to the really reason why I’m writing this post.
Ahh, a soft bath mat and shower curtain that’s a neat fabric so you don’t need the liner! Thanks for the tip Greg.
I believe the word delicious escaped my lips when I got under this duvet Nice neutral colours with no pattern so it won’t keep me awake, I love it! Vargos likes it too. Oh yes, the book on Scottie’s bedside table is The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire thank you Papa. He only brought the first four books with him and wow are they ever heavy!
Thank you once again for joining the Kosman Household Tour. Thank you also for your many reassurances that the stairs are in fact treacherous. They are more treacherous while carrying (clean) cat litter apparently but I lived to tell the tale… or should it be tail? (Boo, Shannie, boo, my jokes will never do!) So long for now from the Kosmans!
While I was working my ridiculous schedule over the last couple of weeks, Shannie went around and made a few nice little video tours of various portions of our apartment. Many of our friends and family back in North America have been asking about the apartment we moved into, so here’s a little glimpse into what we call home.
Just a quick update to say that we’re likely going to be pretty silent updates-wise over the next couple of weeks. We’re successfully moved into the new apartment, all of our stuff is set up, the cats are going insane with sensory overload, and we’re probably 2 weeks out from getting internet access set up there.
I’ll occasionally be checking in while I’m at work, but if you wonder where we’ve gone, there you go.
Pictures of the apartment to come… eventually.
It was my (Scott’s) first day at work today (more on that in a bit), so while I got to trundle off and sit in the office for the day, Shannie got to boot down to the street market that appears right outside our temp apartment on Saturdays and Monday mornings. Saturdays are more “Farmers Market-esque” days, whereas Mondays are more “Flea Market-esque.” Used clothes, antiques, vinyl records, chandeliers, and the like. And, since the market appears out of nowhere only to vanish completely a few short hours later, it’s not exactly… how would you say… “organized.”
Items for sale in haphazard stacks and piles, yet everyone who was there shopping seemed to know exactly where to go and what to look for. People seemed to know that they could “part the sea” and find exactly what it was that they wanted.
Today was also a bit damp, which is why Shannie only spent 10 minutes out at the market, instead of the much longer walk she had originally planned.
Shannie also, through the course of the day, managed to figure out and solve the problem we had in our temp apartment with it always being REALLY STINKIN’ COLD, and why we could feel the wind blowing IN our living room.
I hope the people who own this place don’t mind that we used their placemats to plug the fully 1″ wide gap in the window. Replacing placemats is probably cheaper than the heating bill being jacked up by essentially having no windows.
As was mentioned, it was my first day at work today. I don’t have any photos of the office (yet), which is fine since we’re apparently all moving in a couple of weeks anyways. Seems like a really good group of people to work with, and do we EVER have our work cut out for us over the next little while. Kinda wish I’d been here a month ago to start working on some of this stuff.
Shannie tells me that many of “her people” have been asking exactly what the heck it is that I DO for a living that brought us here in the first place. Long story short, I’m a computer nerd. When you go to a web page on the internet that lets you do all sorts of fun things, that’s what I do. I make things on the internet work. Other people make pretty pictures, I make them functional. The company I was working for in Calgary partnered with a company here to work on a number of advertising campaigns for a small athletic apparel interest headquartered in Amsterdam that you may or may not be familiar with.
Apartment update: We got word back today that we are indeed getting the first place we looked at last Wednesday (Apartment #8, for those of you keeping score at home). Requisite paperwork has been delivered, and we should be moving in on Friday. Anyone in Amsterdam that wants to come and help us haul boxes for 4 blocks just might be rewarded with beer.
For those of you writing to ask us about what’s up with the apartment, it turns out that the owner of the one we thought we were now getting (#8 for those of you keeping score at home) is trying to jack the rent up by roughly €200 per month, which is ridiculous. We’re attempting to negotiate, and we’ll find out on Monday if we get it or not. If so, awesome. If they won’t budge and continue to be stupid, we’ll likely end up with Apartment #3 from our first day of searching unless something else in this area pops up. We’d still like to stay in the Jordaan area, but the De Pijp snobs (Hi Kyla!) tell us that living there is awesome as well, so we’ll see what happens.
We’ll post more details as we find them.
Just got back from our second stop on the Immigration Train, this time to get registered as residents and get our BSN numbers (think Social Insurance or Social Security numbers).
In an interesting turn of events, due to an improperly-legalized form, it turns out that according to the Dutch government, Shannie and I aren’t legally married. Once the form gets filled out properly our marriage can be properly recognized in the Netherlands, but until that time, we’re registered as two single adults living at the same address.
So now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to go pick up chicks.
