MOVING DAY

Even though we moved in yesterday it doesn't totally feel like we're moved in because we have no furniture, except the air mattress given to us by J+B.

We got here early excited to unload our car only to find that someone was parked in our spot. The office told us that if we called security and gave them a ticket then we could park in metered parking for free otherwise we would have to pay for parking (.25 cents for every 10 minutes). We figured we didn't want to make enemies with anyone on our first day here so we just left a friendly note on their windshield and knocked on people's doors asking if they owned the nice Saturn Ion. No one knew whose it was but everyone was friendly. One of our neighbors, an 18 year old undergrad, was very concerned about the whole thing and said she would be on the look out for the mystery car owner.

I ran into a fellow anthropology alum from MHC who is now doing an Anthro PhD here. She told us about a party with some other students from the Anthro department. So after much shopping at the local Salvation Army, Costco, and La Esperanza market, we crashed this party. Christian got to meet some students and I hung out with Emiliano, a 22 month old baby and his mom (the hostess of the party). Both she and her husband lived in Mozambique for 6 years so they speak quit a bit of Portuguese. After we leaving the party and checking the dumpsters we ran into our 18 year old neighbor who was bringing us some dinner.

So far our impression is that everyone around us is rich. There are hybrids everywhere!!! how can these people be full-time students? Not only do we NOT have a swap shop but the free bins in the laundry room are emptied on a daily basis. I guess they have a food pantry every week and so I went and I was the only one there. I got a ton of food such as organic arugula, nice french bread, bell peppers, frozen chicken and all this other stuff that we had just bought at Costco. The person at the food pantry kept on trying to get me to take more stuff.

Now that we've gotten a better look at our place we can tell that it's definitely not the nicest but the location is great. We're the only ones who have a nice gated area where Enzo can play with other people's toys. We are also close to the day care and the office. The party that we crashed was in a much nicer apartment. Nice wooden floors and the ceilings were wooden beams. We have carpet and totally old cupboards, counters and sink. However the place was super clean when we moved in and freshly painted so I shouldn't complain. We have nice high ceilings with sky lights and solar panels!

We really need some furniture. Craigslist hasn't come through for us yet. Someone was giving away a free crib but by the time we called it was already gone. Wish us luck on our Saturday Garage sale adventure.

I think we'll like it here. Chris went surfing this morning and had fun. I like walking around all the redwoods. The town is fun. I guess it's common to talk to the car next to you when you're at at red light, it's happened to us a couple times already. Good atmosphere all around. Today we ran into Musi at the Trader Joe's by our house. We're hanging out with them on Tuesday. I'm glad we have some family near by. Enzo keeps on walking up to people's doors and knocking but no one answers, hummm...he was definitely spoiled to have grammy as a neighbor.

Tomorrow we're going to try and figure out Medi-cal, WIC and our financial aid. I'll keep you updated on our transition.