Moving Day
So I'm writing this from our new apartment. We were able to get one of the keys on Friday afternoon, which was a relief as otherwise the office wouldn't be open again until Monday and that would mean no help with the move. The previous tenant moved out on Saturday, so late that evening Kati and myself carried a few of the lighter things over by hand as it's only about 150 metres or so from our old apartment. I also had to dismantle our bed ready for transport the next day as it's too big to fit through the doors.
We woke up early on Sunday and carried a few more things across by hand until Kati parents arrived. They were such a huge help it's almost impossible to describe. We loaded up their car with as much as we could each time, but it still took a good 8 trips to get everything moved. And I thought we hardly owned anything!
It was all going really well. Then after most of the stuff had been brought over, and just the heavy stuff remained, washing machine etc, Kati's mum started to clean the windows for us. See, how nice is that? :) Only slight problem, the lady that lived here before us had a dishwasher, which she of course took with her. Which would have been fine except she forgot to close off some pipe or other, so when Kati's mum poured the water down the sink, unknown to all of us, it didn't make it all the way down the pipes. Instead it was cascading through downstair's ceiling, right into one of their kitchen cupboards! Not the best start with our new neighbours! Thankfully the neighbours were good about it and knew it wasn't our fault. The flat's handymen came around really quickly and fixed the pipe, and so far we've seen no sign of a bill. Fingers crossed we never will!
One thing we find very annoying to live without these days, is the internet. Which is why we gave our ISP, Sonera, a good 6 weeks notice that we would be moving. They assured us that our internet would be ready and waiting for us by 6pm on the day of our move. Of course it wasn't. Bastards. So Kati rang them at 6pm, but of course all the people who could sort the problem had finished work by then, so all we could do was say we had a problem and hope they would fix it the next day. The next day comes and they ring us back. It turns out that Sonera had sent the internet connection to the wrong address. Whoops, they said. That happens now and again apparently. Not a huge problem you would think. I know from experience that you can get internet access in England almost instantly. In Finland that's not the case. Personally I think that's down to the laziness of the companies. Anyway, they guy on the phone said that he was working on the problem now, and that all being well, it should be solved very quickly. A little while late he rings back. Sorry, he says, but it's not going to be fixed until NEXT THURSDAY! That's a week and a day! What on Earth can they need to do that takes so long?! I was furious. I can still see no reason why, with 6 weeks notice, they couldn't get such a simple thing right. So we told Sonera where to stick their internet and how terrible their customer service is. (I'm still going to write a letter lol) The next day we went into the town to the Elise store, which is a direct rival to Sonera, and we got ourselves a new connection. This one is brilliant though. The modem is a USB stick, the same size as a memory stick, and it works using mobile phone technology, so you can use the internet anywhere you have a signal, which in Finland is anywhere but in a tunnel. It even works on the move, like when you're on a bus or train. And it's 1mb connection too, so it's not slow We could have gotten a bigger one, anything upto 5mb but this is only 20€ a month, and they said we could upgrade at anytime. Go Elise! And Sonera, you can just go to hell.
Anyway, moan over with. I'm gonna go take some pictures of the new place now that everything is looking good, then I can upload them somewhere. We're quite pleased with it :)
We woke up early on Sunday and carried a few more things across by hand until Kati parents arrived. They were such a huge help it's almost impossible to describe. We loaded up their car with as much as we could each time, but it still took a good 8 trips to get everything moved. And I thought we hardly owned anything!
It was all going really well. Then after most of the stuff had been brought over, and just the heavy stuff remained, washing machine etc, Kati's mum started to clean the windows for us. See, how nice is that? :) Only slight problem, the lady that lived here before us had a dishwasher, which she of course took with her. Which would have been fine except she forgot to close off some pipe or other, so when Kati's mum poured the water down the sink, unknown to all of us, it didn't make it all the way down the pipes. Instead it was cascading through downstair's ceiling, right into one of their kitchen cupboards! Not the best start with our new neighbours! Thankfully the neighbours were good about it and knew it wasn't our fault. The flat's handymen came around really quickly and fixed the pipe, and so far we've seen no sign of a bill. Fingers crossed we never will!
One thing we find very annoying to live without these days, is the internet. Which is why we gave our ISP, Sonera, a good 6 weeks notice that we would be moving. They assured us that our internet would be ready and waiting for us by 6pm on the day of our move. Of course it wasn't. Bastards. So Kati rang them at 6pm, but of course all the people who could sort the problem had finished work by then, so all we could do was say we had a problem and hope they would fix it the next day. The next day comes and they ring us back. It turns out that Sonera had sent the internet connection to the wrong address. Whoops, they said. That happens now and again apparently. Not a huge problem you would think. I know from experience that you can get internet access in England almost instantly. In Finland that's not the case. Personally I think that's down to the laziness of the companies. Anyway, they guy on the phone said that he was working on the problem now, and that all being well, it should be solved very quickly. A little while late he rings back. Sorry, he says, but it's not going to be fixed until NEXT THURSDAY! That's a week and a day! What on Earth can they need to do that takes so long?! I was furious. I can still see no reason why, with 6 weeks notice, they couldn't get such a simple thing right. So we told Sonera where to stick their internet and how terrible their customer service is. (I'm still going to write a letter lol) The next day we went into the town to the Elise store, which is a direct rival to Sonera, and we got ourselves a new connection. This one is brilliant though. The modem is a USB stick, the same size as a memory stick, and it works using mobile phone technology, so you can use the internet anywhere you have a signal, which in Finland is anywhere but in a tunnel. It even works on the move, like when you're on a bus or train. And it's 1mb connection too, so it's not slow We could have gotten a bigger one, anything upto 5mb but this is only 20€ a month, and they said we could upgrade at anytime. Go Elise! And Sonera, you can just go to hell.
Anyway, moan over with. I'm gonna go take some pictures of the new place now that everything is looking good, then I can upload them somewhere. We're quite pleased with it :)