My Argentinean Apartment!

I must admit I’ve been preoccupied with finding an apartment since I arrived in Mendoza, and I guess rightly so since I moved out of my temporary living situation into my new apartment the day my two week contract was up. Found my new place just in the nick of time!

The whole process was a very up and down process. Before I got here, I assumed an apartment would be dirt cheap since the cost of living here is slower. But I soon came to find out that my high American standards for a good kitchen and bathroom came at a higher price. Additionally, most apartments in Argentina are contracted for two years and there are very few available apartments that are available for shorter time periods. And finally, I arrived a few weeks after out of town college students rented the few available temporary apartments. Odds were against me.

But God is good and I found my perfect spot. I came very close to settling on another that didn’t have ANY windows, an archaic kitchen and bathroom and only one bedroom. And although it was well located, security was iffy and it was on the first floor outside a busy plaza (read: increased crime).

But alas! I held out. Here are some photos:

I’ve spent the last 48 hours cleaning and buying things for the apartment. Something you might not think about is if you don’t have a car and you go food shopping, etc., you can only buy what you can carry. And at my stature, that’s not really much. Today I bought a rose plant and a little pepper plant to add some color to the apartment. I so did not realize how heavy the rose plant would be. I didn’t want to stop because then I’d have to lift it up again and because that would be kind of embarrassing, so I walked ~10 blocks carrying it. Then I had to get out my keys carrying it in one arm to get into the building, get onto the elevator and then do the one arm trick again to get into my apartment. I thought I was going to die—but on the bright side, I guess I’m building muscle.