House Hunters International, Turbo Edition

Since we moved into our house, through several conversations with local expats, we’ve realized that we’ve been grossly overcharged on rent. Sure, it’s a “pimp house,” as one of our friends calls it. But as things started to break down and our landlord didn’t fix them, and after many disputes over shoddy grounds keeping, this house was not living up to his insistence of its top-of-the-line label.

 

That fountain stopped working four months ago. Then the water turned foul, a crack appeared in the basin of the pool letting most of the water seep out, and we had six inches of dirty water sitting there until Nick bailed it out with a bucket.

One could say, “Well, that’s Thailand for you,” but we were not being charged Thai rent. Seeing the shock on people’s faces when we told them what we were paying was humiliating. We felt like fools. 

We gently approached our landlord, a British stockbroker, about ending our lease early, citing the lack of kids in the neighborhood as our excuse (actually true). He said that would be fine if the real estate agent could find another renter. The real estate agent said it was very hard to find another renter because it’s so expensive. You think?

About three months went by with no word. I was bitter, but resigned. And then:

Saturday: Realtor brings prospective client to see our house. She says this is only one of five houses he’s seeing. Even though the guy is from Amherst and I pretend to be a Boston sports fan, I get the hunch that he’s not into the house. Mentally, I move on.

Sunday: Skype Mom. Barely mention that someone looked at the house.

Monday: Realtor calls. The guy wants the house. How soon can he move in? I say SOON. Yes. Tomorrow. Okay, this weekend. Can you find us another house?

Tuesday-Thursday: We look at several houses and pick one.

Saturday night: We’re sleeping in a new house. 

Old house: $1340/month. New house: $564/month. 

And oh. What a house. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Tuscany in Thailand:

 

I love it. It’s small but it feels big. The style is more my speed, free of flash and ego. All of the floors are rough wood-look tile instead of the shiny white Miami Vice marble we had in the other house that was very slippery and impossible to keep clean. It is so quiet, except for the bird riots in the mornings. It’s the dry/crop-burning season here now, so the air is hazy and the hills are yellow as you can see in the video, but it is going to be even more stunning once the rains return. Up the hill is our cool French landlord who has two daughters (half Thai), ages 10 and 7, who are not too shy to let themselves into our house. Neither are their cats, which of course I love. 

Now, if you know me at all you know there are some reality disclaimers coming. It’s not convenient to any shopping if we need groceries, as you can see by the long dirt road in the video. Food takes planning ahead. All of the lighting in the house is awful overhead lighting (yes, fixable with lamps, but nice/plain ones are hard to find). The water is well water, and even though it’s safe to drink, the soil around the house is that red tropical stuff so the water smells like rust. The well pump also makes a pretty obnoxious sound every time we turn the water on, so there's no flushing in the middle of the night. We bought a not-cheap water cooler for drinking that I really like. 

The house is FULL of bugs. Fortunately, none of them have been bigger than a dime… yet. The few spiders I've seen are small enough to be almost cute. There are ants everywhere (tiny non-biting kinds) as well as small crickets and roaches. Yeah. I comfort myself with the idea that they are clean country roaches instead of disgusting rotting-trash city roaches. And they’re not as fast as the ones I knew in Texas (my only other roach experience). That makes a difference.

The upside to the wilderness is that we’ve encountered some creatures we’ve never seen before. I’ve noticed at least five different types of ants. The other day, a little bug that looked like a piece of turquoise flew past me in the driveway. It was matte, like the gem. Even its legs were turquoise. Crazy. Today we came home to some cows grazing on the hill above the house. Of course we’ve seen cows before, just not in our yard. I love it. 

We have doubled our commute time. It's now12 minutes instead of 6. Heh. 

Our school is getting ready for its first accreditation evaluation next week, so between that and moving, we've been very stressed out. I realized a few days ago while drinking a little too much wine with dinner (my former go-to stress method, "too much" being the former part) that I was this stressed out all the time back home. However, back home there was more to do, I was handcuffed to the inside of that car for a good part of the day, and my phone would ring and buzz with endless crises, almost always during my kids' witching hour while they were melting down and I was trying to make dinner. No wonder I felt like it was doing physical damage to my body, like my cardiac muscle fibers were unraveling. This time, I know that it's a temporary stress, I get to end my days in a silent house, and when all of the dust settles I can afford to go spend a couple hours in a spa. (Who am I kidding, we still have another week of this and I'm going to a spa tomorrow.)