The final completion date of the refurbishment was August 21, but I've officially moved into the flat on the 16th, sleeping on air-mattress and dialing-up on cardboard box. My stuff from San Francisco were supposed to have arrived by the 17th, but the custom clearance took longer than expected and I needed to wait until the first week of September for the delivery.
So, I flew out on the 22nd on a business trip, and returned on September 6th, the day before my stuff from San Francisco were delivered.
The place looks so much a home after my stuff got here, including queen-size bed that looks enormous and a dining table and chairs that I bought on the spot when I first found them at the ECHO Furniture in San Francisco, just around the corner from my former home.
ECHO Furniture was my favorite shop of all time...I bought two chests of drawers (which arrived with the bed and the dining set) there, and I could have bought entire furniture from them, if I had no space (and money) constraints. If I miss anything from San Francisco, one would definitely be the ECHO Furniture.
Among all of my furniture, the biggest obstacle has always been the bed. Compared to what the British calls a double-size bed, mine is an American queen-size bed, quite a bit wider. On top of that, my bed has a headboard and foot-board that curves outward, adding 50cm to the length. The bed-frames are made of cast iron, weighing 5 times more than the pine framed bed...and it requires bed spring under the mattress, which seems not to be common here.
While I looked for a flat to buy, one big criteria was to find a flat that could accommodate my bed. That would not have been a problem in the US, but I found this quite challenging in London where bedrooms are often big enough to place a full-size bed.
I bought this bed when I first moved to San Francisco from New York 10 years ago. I visited San Francisco few times before I made a decision to move there, and I encountered this bed while I strolled down Castro one evening. At that time, I still hadn't made a decision on a move, but I pledged myself that if I did, this would be my bed. While I lived in New York, I had a studio where I slept on a futon that turned into a sofa during the day. Owning a bed meant I was going to have a bedroom that does not function as a living room, and at that time, it was a big deal.
Few months later, I moved to San Francisco, and the first thing I did was to go to the shop in Castro. The bed was still there, but with a label "Final Sale, Display Unit Only". The shop owner told me that the manufacturer no longer made this bed, and this was the very last unit available. I've never seen this bed anywhere after that, so it probably was really the last piece, and I felt I was destined to own one.
My love for this bed never faded. It still represents the ultimate "home" for me, meaning my home is where this bed is. I slept so well the first few nights, I realized how I really wasn't sleeping for the last 2 years.
Of the total 49 pieces (mostly boxes) delivered from San Francisco, almost one fifth were bed/sleep-related, and two fifth were books. My friend Kathy once told me that when she moved, half of her boxes contained cooking-related items. It's interesting how one's priority can be assessed with the number of boxes at the time of moving.
With so many books delivered from San Francisco and more in 8 shopping bags accumulated over 2 years of my life in London, I have to place them somewhere. I have a habit of re-reading the books, and require some mechanism in place to find them quickly when my urge for re-reading gets out of control (which happens quite often.)
So I ended up with one wall of the Reception Room covered with bookshelves. I hope I wouldn't have space problem with my books, at least for a while.
