In the first few days that we were in Shkoder (in Albanian, it's called Shkodra), Edward went with a couple of different agents to look at several houses to rent.
The one that we ended up taking was one that he initially didn't even want to go see. Around here, most rental homes come furnished. This particular one barely had anything in it. It needed minimal work. The agent had it painted for us and made sure to get a few important appliances before we moved in.
We spent a few days cleaning it. The kids and I would walk over from the hostel in the morning and stay through the afternoon. Then we would make the trek back to the hostel, which took us about 40-45 minutes. We would make dinner and rest for the evening.
On the way to the house every day, we would buy some bread at the nearest furrë bukë (literally- "oven bread," a.k.a. bakery) and veggies for lunch.
I did many small loads of laundry to wash the pillows, blankets and curtains that were here as well as some that I had bought second hand.
At different shops, I took photos of tablecloths to see how they would look once I got to the house. The shop owners were so kind as to unroll them for me.
I saw this nice gas stove while I was out and about one day.
Behind it was something unusual for this part of the world- a clothes dryer! I am still hoping to get it, as I know that in bad weather it will be harder to have our clothes dry.
I tried to be strategic about our shopping as we had to carry everything that we bought to the house.
The day came. We were finally ready to move to the house. We cleaned up our two rooms at the hostel and packed up our things. The older boys took a trip with most of the bags the night before moving day using two strollers.
In the morning, we headed out with the rest of our belongings. It was a warm day. It took us a couple of hours to get there, as we tried to do as much shopping as we could along the way. As I became familiar with what was around the new house, I realized that a lot of the shopping options were actually pretty close to the hostel. I wanted to limit dragging all of the kids out for this or that. We took advantage of our last day being close to the shops.
Halfway to the house, we crowded the sidewalk as we took a break to buy and drink some cold, refreshing water.
One boy, struggling with the loaded down stroller.
Finally, we arrived, ready to settle in.
Once inside the gate, it was time to bring everything in the house and settle into our new home.
After living there for a week or two, Edward and I went to a used furniture store that a local man had brought him to. We decided on a four-piece living room set. It included two chairs, a love seat, as well as a pull-out couch. We also purchased a wardrobe from them, as there are no closets in the house.
We asked if they could deliver it. They said that they would bring it that night around 6pm. I thought that I picked up on the word "makina," meaning, "car." Apparently I had heard correctly. Much to our surprise, sort of (Albanians will do whatever they can do to make something happen), we saw a car pull up at 6pm, loaded with the couch and loveseat on roof racks, and the two chairs in the trunk. After bringing them in the house, they went back to the furniture store to get the dolap (wardrobe). They also managed to deliver it with the car.
I just had to take a picture.
Without me knowing it, Edward was doing the same thing.
This was what I saw when I was closing the kids' window that first night.
There are still several things that we are trying to do to get the house settled, but it is feeling like home.
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