End of Week 1...Crazy Rollercoast of Emotions this week.

Tuesday was going to be a good day...we decided this after our horrible Monday.
We had a viewing at a really cool looking place to start our day, and a few more later in the day.  And in between we were going to go visit my friend Andrea (who moved here in September...ALONE!) and get our SIM cards which we had gotten sent to her.

So, we head off, super excited for our viewing...and the trains are delayed. Twice.   We felt SO bad, and were panicking that the agent was going to leave, so we ended up borrowing a phone off a random woman to just call and say we were on our way.
When we finally arrived at the station, Sam's running training began as we basically ran from the platform to the flat.
When we turned the corner onto the road the building was on we fell in love...

We came up to it and the agent met us at the door to let us in.  The inside of the building itself was just as cool as the outside...giant archways and a tower.

We went into the flat and it was big (like apartments at home size, not the shoe boxes that we had been finding here).  The agent was super nice and answered all our questions, told us a lot about the situation and why it was the price it was, and then had to take a phone call.  As soon as he left the room Sam and I turned to each other and said "we have to make an offer NOW!"  We learned our lesson about waiting.
When he came back we said we'd like to make an offer...starting a bit lower than we thought they'd go but saying that if they said no to bump it up to halfway between the asking price and our first offer.  He thought they'd take the mid-range one.

So off we went on our day, filled with excitement, and fingers crossed we'd hear back soon.

We headed up into London, to the little cafe Andrea works at.  Got to visit for a few minutes then she handed us our SIM cards and the wifi password and we got to work activating our SIM cards.
Within 20 minutes WE HAD REAL PHONES!!!  London numbers, unlimited data and texts, free calls between phones with our company, free incoming calls, and 250 other minutes...all for
£12/month (about $21/month)!!!  So cheap and so awesome.  We felt like real people again, and it's SO much easier to be looking for a house, trying to get references, and starting work with a phone that doesn't need wifi.  

We heard back, our first offer was declined...fingers crossed the second is accepted.

We headed back down for 2 more viewings.  We were really early for the first one so we wandered a bit and saw a really cool elementary (primary here) school nearby. 
We got back to the property about 5 minutes early and waited...and waited...and waited...and waited.  We were just getting ready to leave, because we had another appointment, when the agent arrived.  Almost 20 minutes late!  And then the keys he had didn't work. So we didn't see the flat.  
Next flat was the one that we had waited for in the pouring rain the night before.  We met him out front and looked around.  It was nice, nothing wrong with it.  Great location, less than a block from the train station.  Good size, kitchen, 2 rooms, bathroom, living room.  But it just didn't make us want to live there...and we still had our morning place on our minds.  But it was a runner up if the offer fell through.

We finally got a call from the agent saying that our second offer had been accepted, but he had a viewing that night.  We needed to put a deposit down to ensure that we got first dibs. 

Then it was Dixie Chick serious.

We raced back to our place as fast as we could...and of course we weren't really paying attention in our hast to get home and OOPS! we got off a stop too early and the next train was about 20 minutes later.  

We did finally make it back and put our deposit down.  Then came the really fun part...references and forms.  
We had to sign a bunch of stuff and fill out a 9 page document with references, addresses, etc.  We were told that we only needed my form because I was going to be the "leading tenant".  So we start filling it out, figuring out the information, contacting people to make sure information was correct, and we almost finished when it decided to close itself.  So we started over again.  Finished, sent.  Sigh of relief.

OH WAIT!!! NOT YET!!!  Fast forward to mid-day Wednesday.

We're out and about, feeling pretty good, then we got a call saying that they couldn't start processing until they had Samantha's forms...WHAT?!   So we had to get home to use the computer to fill out Sam's 9 page form.  And what do you know...my computer decides that when Sam is almost done, it's a great time to shut off to do some updates.  We were just having all the luck.

So the forms got filled out, they had all the information that they needed from us, now they just needed to contact our references and it was ours!

We were feeling good, headed out onto the town to meet up with Andrea and her friend for dinner and a drink.  So wonderful to be reunited.

Thursday morning (we woke up early again) we decided to have a nice, relaxing morning and watch a movie before we headed out to do some touristy things before going to Meghan and Marina's to check out their place, visit, and get our bank stuff. 

Throughout the movie we got a couple calls...the first was the Inventory Agent saying that he will be meeting us at our property at 2:00 on Saturday to go through the place with us and give us our keys (we got really excited about this), the second was someone seeing if I could work in the afternoon (not in a teaching mindset or was I able to).  We finished our movie, headed out, and that is when shit hit the fan.  First we get an email from our letting agent saying that emails with forms had been sent to our references but hadn't been sent back...nothing can move forward without those.  So we got on the phone and tried to get in contact with our work reference here in the UK...that was a nightmare.  4 people and 4 hours later we finally get a really helpful person who makes sure that our forms are at the top and will be responded to within 10 minutes...and they were.  So we think we're all set...NOPE!  Then we get an email saying that we need to get them basically £2400 by closing the following day (it was already around 4:30 PM) in order to finalize and actually get our keys Saturday.  THAT'S A LOT OF MONEY!!!  It's our first month's rent, damage deposit, and a whole ton of fees that they have to pay here.  Plus we've already put a £500 holding fee which has been deducted from the total amount. 

Neither of us have money in our UK accounts yet because we've just gotten them set up and didn't have our cards yet.  It's all in our Canadian accounts in Canadian currency, so we're thinking it should be that bad to wire the money over into our UK accounts. We'll deal with it in a bit...we needed to get up to the girls' place to get our bank cards.

We had a nice visit with Marina and Meghan, got to see their place (which is really cool), and Sam got her card (mine hadn't come yet).  While we were there though they were saying how hard it had been for them to get the money to pay for their place because it takes 5-7 business days to wire money from Canada!!  UH OH!  So then we became a little frantic...how could we get our money out and over here another way.  How about taking as much out on all our cards as we can?  Sure...nope.  Doesn't work. Limits on machines and cards (in Canadian funds) cause a lot of problems with that. So now we are freaking out.  

Our wonderful mothers and fathers are amazing and were our saviors in this whole ordeal.  They dealt with everything for us on the Canadian end because we couldn't get our phones to make calls to Canada, and moved money for us and eventually wired us overnight money.  We love and appreciate them so much.

So this morning we're feeling better because the money has been wired overnight, and all we had to do was get it out and put it straight in the bank to transfer to our agency to pay for our flat.  We planned to do this in the afternoon.

We had a meeting with our work company here, Engage Education, to start our day.  We had figured out how to get there (1.5 hours on 2 trains) and set out on our first train...get to our transfer spot and it was major busy!  So of course we try to get on the train we need to get, and it is so full the doors can barely shut, and we can't get on.  We just don't have good luck with trains.  

So now we get to figure out a different train (because the direct one only comes every hour), and end up taking about 5 to get there because they ended too early or are delayed or we get off at the wrong stop or whatever else.  It really just isn't working well for us.  We get there on time though (good thing we left ourselves lots of time).  We got to figure out how our jobs are going to work as supply teachers (TOCs) here...it's super weird.  And we met some other girls our age who also came over from Canada and graduated in June.

So work is figured out, we start Monday, we then go to the contracting/payroll company down the road to make sure they have all our information so we can get paid, and then we head back down to Clapham Junction to pay for our flat.

We aged (and so did our mothers probably) about 10 years in these next 2 hours.  Got to the money store, gave them the code, this code is not valid, called and got coded again, right code, still not valid...start freaking out.  So we split up...I go back to our place to get any money we have there (we'd taken chunks out last night) and Sam stayed to try to make some calls and get the transfer figured out.  I made record time from Clapham to our place and back, and when I was about 2 stops away Sam texted and said that it had been figured out (a hold had been put on it because of the large amount and overseas distance, they assumed fraud) so we had money.  I met her at the bank, we deposited the money, made the transfer, and TA-DA we have a place to live in London!!!  Tomorrow night will be the greatest night ever. Stress-free and in our own place, Can't wait.

So we went for dinner to celebrate at the Slug and Lettuce...had a really nice meal and a FABULOUS dessert.

And then headed back to our room for our final night and to write this.

Oh and I got my first call...Monday I will be teaching high school science about as far away from our place as possible...Sam will be getting her first wonderful morning call experience as a TOC...I'm so proud.

To finish on a happy note...funniest moment of our day today was at our Engage Info Meeting this morning.  One of the guys wanted to try to start work early in a different area for next week before he moved in and Joel, our consultant, said something about introducing him to the consultant for that area and then said "he's the one that looks kind of like Ryan Gosling" and pointed and immediately, without hesitation, all 5 of the girls in the room turned around in our chairs to see. 

Thanks for reading and feeling our pain...tomorrow's post will be happy and amazing because you'll get to see our new flat!!!  Can't wait to see what you all think of it!

Lisa and Sam

We out.