As
I’ve been promising you guys. I have moved to my new apartment in 12 October
2013. Here we go. This is my apartment building and hallways.
I pick the last one on the hallway so that people will rarely crossing my front door, and decreasing chances of hearing noisy sound especially at night. And
finally this is my room!!
View from inside to the front door. Based on this picture, on the left side is toilet, and kitchen.
This is washing machine and shoes rack (+ kitchen utensils rack
since I don’t have any other place to store them. I know a little bit sounds
gross but okay, as long as I’m the only one that used it.)
A
little bit weird for me because in Indonesia, usually
washing machine placed on the back on the house, not in the front near the door
like this. And
below is my kitchen. The kitchen is very small!!! When in my house back then I
always complained that my mom’s kitchen is very small. Now I know that my Mom’s
kitchen is very big. Ugh. I can only store things on the very small rack up
there.
View from from the front door. door on the left is bathroom.
Bathroom
near the kitchen. So small, again.
And
finally my room is next door.
The
bed, the bed board, and kakefuton (fluffy blanket thingy) I bought them all
from Muji. The kakefuton is so damn comfy it makes waking up 10.000x harder
than before. I can store things too under the bed and on the head board.
I can say I’m not regretting
buying things from Muji (this is not an endorsement okay) although it is still
a little bit expensive. And
here is my bookshelves that I used for something else rather than stocking
books. Beside is my cute mirror, wardrobe and hanger. I bought almost all of
the things secondhand. Cheaper of course.
And
this is the famous kotatsu!! (ignore the bucket)
Kotatsu is a table that has a warmer machine under. Usually
Japanese use them on winter to warm the feet and hand. I knew this stuff from
manga wtf. Before I used it, I have to buy the cover first so the cover will
trap the heat properly. Now it still functioned as a common table. If
already have covers, it will be something like this. 10.000x comfier (and warmer!).
The
front balcony, and a little shot of my view everyday.
Roughly
the whole area is only around 17m square which is quite a common size for an
apartment in Tokyo to live individually (what?). The rent is about 58.000 yen
per month including maintenance, not including utilities bill. For overall I
like my apartment very much, just too bad I cannot pin something in the wall
because it is considered as damaging the property and I need to pay for that.
I
spent about 250.000 yen for all this things Including some small things from
vacuum cleaner, brooms, bucket, detergent, laundry hangar and so on). This is
can be included very cheap because most of my friends averagely spent about
350.000 yen for all of their stuff. Here are some tips to move cheaply in
Japan:
- Buy secondhand stuff. Secondhand doesn’t always means that the product is broken or something. In Japan, especially Tokyo, lot of foreigners and students come for just a temporary stay and if they are moving, they cannot throw away their things freely because in Japan, large waste such as bed, wardrobe COST YOU MONEY to throw it. For example, for my kotatsu, if I want to throw it, I have to pay around 3000 yen and after that the garbage company will come to my place and take it. So, rather than paying, they put their (usually quite new) stuff to secondhand store or sell it on internet. Try to search one secondhand store near your neighborhood or try to google “sayonara sale”. Lots of foreigners (that mostly go back to their country after temporary stay) and also Japanese sell their secondhand furniture there.
- If you need moving service, try to search for several moving company which are experts in moving stuffs. I know several of them such as: Tokyo Move , Tokyo Helping Hands , XPS Tokyo , Moving S , 7 Doors, Quoz. I use Tokyo Helping Hands because they are the cheapest of them all (based on my each comparison, I email them one by one and compare) and the owner can speak English, but try to survey all of them first and compare which one is the best for you.
- For small things such as bucket, broom and so on, don’t ever buy it on the big department store. Search for “100 yen store” that sell almost everything that you need for your house, with only 100 yen per item. The difference of price is so damn high sometimes compared to big department store. I myself regretting some things that I’ve already buy in department store and later found it on 100 yen store.
And
for preparation of moving, here are some tips and informations:
- Don’t bring any uneccessary electronic devices from your country to Japan. I see that in Japan here the voltage is very small compared to my country; they have around 110V while my country usually use 220V. I’ve brought my hairdryer and curling iron here to Japan and they just won’t heat. I have to buy some new ones finally.
- Japan, you have to register your electricity, gas and water before you move in. Here is the website for registering gas (english) , electricity and water. However for water you have to search for local water bureu that serves your place. For example, my friend who live in Yokohama, have to register to Yokohama Water Bureau site. In here too you can choose to pay your bill by bill (mail) and pay it on convenience store or directly deducted from your bank account.
- Be patient to search the furniture. Measure your room well, since it is usually very small, you have to be very careful in picking furniture that won’t stuffed up your room until you can’t move. Remember, it takes a lot of cost too to throw all the big furniture.
- For initial payment of apartment, usually you need more money rather than just 1 month rent fee. You have to pay deposit fee (usually cost you 1 month rent fee), “reikin” or commission to the landlord (it’s a common practice here) (usually cost you 1 month rent fee too), fire insurance around 20.000 yen, initial gas payment (I don’t know the exact amount, differ from apartment to apartment), and internet installation around 6000 yen. Each apartment comes with different internet provider so you have to ask the landlord or your agent about this.
I
hope this will help you if you have any interest to move to Japan!
For
the whole process until this point, it was a hell lot of troublesome thing to
do. From waiting for my furniture day by day (they come one by one), my baggage
from Indonesia, internet checking, buying some additional needed stuff such as
cables, and so on, it was really a pain in the ass. Not to mention all the
schedule collide with my training programs.
I
have enough of all the moving thingy so frickin’ grateful it’s finished. See
you on next post!!
