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Moving on up
Friday, June 6, 2008When I arrived here in Cambodia on April 2004, I only had a luggage, which was just natural because I was just on holiday. Three months later I went back to Manila, decided that I would give life in Cambodia a try. It was my first time to live away from my family, my first time to be on my own.
I lived with friends for a while until saving enough to find my own apartment on November of the same year. My first apartment was a one-room flat that was on the second floor (the equivalent of the third floor in the Philippines). I immensely enjoyed shopping for things I needed for my new home. But aside from the basics, I didn’t dare purchase anything else. My freelance career was just budding, and I had a feeling that my flat wouldn’t be my flat for a long time.
Eight months later I moved into my second flat. This was bigger than my previous flat, with two bedrooms, lots of windows and an L-shaped verandah that faced the quiet street. I had with me three boxes of household and work stuff and a luggage containing my clothes.
Four years later, I found myself moving again to a new flat. A friend is moving back to Manila to study and the flat he shared with another flat was too much to resist for me. I had, after all, lived in it in my first few months in Cambodia, and I liked my time there. Also after 4 years of living alone, I found myself wanting to share a household (not in the romantic sense) with someone. I just didn’t realize that moving would be such a colossal production.
Think of how Cecile De Mille must have felt while The Ten Commandments was being made. Or Mother Lily when Peque Gallaga was making Once Upon A Time.
My present work schedule allowed me just a few days to prepare for this move. In between travelling to the provinces for field work, I packed four years of my life into cardboard and plastic boxes that defied my calculations. My procrastination slowed me down as well, as I tried to sort things that I wanted to get rid of and those I wanted to take with me. I ended up taking them all.
Of course, it didn’t stop me from playing with the meters of bubble wrap I used in wrapping my things.

When I finished packing, I had 9 cardboard boxes filled with books, bed & table linens, glass/ plastic/ ceramic ware, kitchen implements, shoes & bags, 3 luggages filled with clothes, scarves, and what-not, 2 plastic boxes of pirated CDs & DVDs, and countless plastic & paper bags of stuff. Not to mention the appliances, paintings, and pieces of furniture that I had purchased.

Unfortunately, I was off to another province barely a day after moving into the new house. So I left the house looking like an evacuation center. I wasn’t even able to set up my computer. And 5 days later, the situation hasn’t improved much. Good luck to my room-mate when he arrives on Monday.

Previous Comments
uh! good luck talaga. last week end i moved out of the hotel to my new flat bitbit isang maleta and a carry on… eh kasi wala pa ang 15-20 boxes of the stuff that you and daden are supposed to get me. eeee!!!
Posted by joy oh at June 9, 2008, 3:35 pmgibo: thanks! kahapon lang ako natapos sa pag-aayos ng haus.
mz joy: bongga. dang & i are waiting to receive your schindler’s list of things to buy. miss ya!
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mike…this is a good reminder para sa akin as i’m moving out of malaysia by october. i have 4 months to sort out my things at sisimulan ko na sya. goodlak sa pag-aayos ng bagong bahay!
Posted by gibo at June 7, 2008, 9:29 pm