147 Nguyen Tri Phuong

On Monday, Steven and I met with Phuong, our real estate agent, and the landlords for our new apartment, Viet and Nhung, a married couple in their 50s. Phuong had a lease written up that was clear, fair and to the point, which both Steven and I appreciated and Viet and Phuong went out of their way to be sure that we would have everything we needed - offering to buy pots and a new mattress - as well as making sure that we checked to see that everything worked and that we checked the readings on both the gas and the water meters to be sure we were only charged from the day we moved in. Steven and I were impressed with their hospitality and thoroughness. We paid our deposit and rent for September and left with a promise to return on Tuesday at 11:00 a.m. to move in and get our keys.

On Tuesday morning, we packed up our hotel room and had our last buffet breakfast, before loading all of our things in two cabs and heading to what would be our home for the next 10 months.

When we arrived, Viet and Nhung were hard at working making sure all of our new appliances were working and that the apartment was clean. They had bought a new fridge, washing marching, stove-top, microwave, and mattress as well as a set of pots to join the already stocked kitchen. Wanting to thank them for their kindness and generosity, I left Steven in the apartment, hoping to find a flower shop nearby. I wasn't able to find a flower shop, but I did find a "flower pot and vase" shop and bought a simple, pretty flower pot as a gift for our new landlords.

After I returned and we presented our gift to our new landlords, we shut the door behind them and set about exploring our new place. I was all set to unpack and settle in, but Steven had his heart set on seeing a movie and the only one in the theater we were remotely interested in began at 1:00 p.m., so we set off for the movie theater.

The only problem was that we didn't know exactly where the movie theater was. We knew it was called Hung Vuong Plaza and we live two blocks from Hung Vuong Street, but we didn't know where on the street it was. We asked a taxi driver, but he didn't understand us, so Steven called a friend, but she didn't answer. The movie was a 1:00 p.m. and at 7 to 1:00 we decided to just keep walking in the direction we were headed, hoping to see something familiar. The street we were on is called, An Dong street, and is a beautiful, wide, tree-lined street with a seemingly endless park in the median between two directions of traffic. Before we even reached the end of the park, Steven looked up, to our delight, found that the park led straight to Hung Vuong Plaza where Hung Vuong meets An Dong. Steven was thrilled and we made it into the movie at 12:59 p.m.

After the movie, we returned to our apartment and set about unpacking our bags and settling in. I love organizing new apartments and putting up decorations. It was a great feeling to be in our new place and settled, at least for the next 10 months…