Moving Saga, Day 1

Now that I’ve publicly committed to blogging every day this month (and I agreed to do it with my equally-competitive friend, Gina, which gives me extra motivation), I know there’s no getting out of it. I fear this is going to result in a lot of messy, sleep-deprived ramblings in which my not-so-neat-and-tidy mindset is revealed for all to read. Yikes.
But I’m also somewhat curious to read the written account of this transition time later—for decades to come and to learn and laugh and glean from. SO… here goes.

In typical indirect-culture fashion, the top-notch moving company we hired did not arrive on Thursday, as planned, because (unbeknownst to us) we had not wired the payment from our US bank early enough. So we find out Thursday night that they won’t be coming the next day, and it will probably be another 3-4 days.

Good thing we didn’t have any plans for the next 3-4 days and could just put our entire life of goodbyes, etc. on hold until the company could inform us of their plans. (major eye-rolling over here…)

But in the end, our friends went into high gear on Thursday night and came up with a Plan B, moving all the major items into the house next door, and our landlord’s original furniture back into this house for us to sleep/live on. Thanks to Britta’s master plan and Nathan, Abhishek, Divyansh, and Gina’s help.  So that was finished on Thursday, and we just had a boatload of sorting to do on Friday (thankful this time for my old friend Christina who came to scour and sort all my important paperwork, and my new friend Marissa who managed to teach my son to write his name WHILE sorting 12 tubs of toiletries), all before the movers called to say they’d be here first thing Saturday morning (today).

Well 10am came and went, and there was still a giant moving truck from Delhi driving around the mountainside trying to find a road wide and level enough to park within a half-mile of our home. They found a spot a half-mile away around noon. Then Tyler scootered up to meet them in their random parking spot, and they were in the process of hiring a garbage truck (you read it right!) to haul our things back and forth from our house to the moving truck. Luckily there were five guys as part of the moving team to figure all of this out. Luckily we had paid them to do this and so it was their job to figure it out.

One of the local garbage truck guys looked at Tyler and, seeing him for the white foreigner (extremely good looking one, I might add), he asked him for money for food. To which Tyler said in Hindi, “All my money is in the moving company’s pocket, so if you need lunch you’ll have to get it from them.” And the whole moving team of men cracked up. And there was no more concern from our side on whether it would all work out. Good job, husband! Three years in India has taught you well!

So the day passed uneventfully and these men wrapped and packed every single item securely, then loaded it bit by bit in the garbage truck, and sent it on up the road to the moving truck (which I never saw with my eyes). We headed off to the 70^th birthday party of a friend at 6pm, stopping on the way to pick up medicine and juice for Little Miss who has a high fever and cough today, and returned home at 9pm to sign the paperwork and say, “Ta-ta!” to the moving crew and the last of our stuff.

Now I have to say… After pacing the floor all morning in apprehension and willing myself to stay calm, breathe, and not take any calming medicine that would render me useless, the whole day turned out to be quite a success! I actually pushed through and… we made it!

And in addition to all that, this is one of those days when India wins. A moving company that comes and sorts, packs, labels, insures, and moves your stuff to storage. I didn’t wrap one glass or photo frame. They did it all and I didn’t even have to watch. It’s like pushing the Easy button on packing.

And pushing the Easy button isn’t something we get to do very often here. I’m going to post this and then lay here in a coma for a while pondering the fact that the hardest part of another big move is behind me. *Sigh!*  And the smoothest “move” I’ve ever experienced happened in the mountains of India. Who would have thunk?!

Goodnight moon and city lights.

Goodnight shimmering Ganges below.

Goodnight beating, blaring wedding music on the hillside.

Goodnight little She and goodnight Little He.

Goodnight.