Our Boston Apartment

Well, here it is....after a week of stressful, grueling searching for an apartment, we finally found one. Renting in Boston is alot more expensive than Matt and I had anticipated. We both really wanted to live in downtown Boston...we are used to Hong Kong and having everything right at our fingertips, it is so much more convenient that way and you really feel like you are part of the city. But, right now that is out of reach for Matt and I, it is just too expensive! Plus, since neither of us have jobs yet, it is sort of hard to sign a lease for an apartment you can barely afford while working, let alone while looking for work! So, we are living in Porter Square, which is in Cambridge. Porter Square is one train stop further than Harvard Square...supposedly we can walk to it from our house, but we haven't tried it yet. The nice thing about Porter Square is that there are tons of students round and it is really cute. It reminds me a lot of Davis...very liberal and progressive, with a small town feel and lots of students and eccentric intellectual-types cruisng around on bikes. Our apartment is on the second floor of the building, and our living room is the circular part of the building with the three windows. We have two bedrooms, a living room, a kitchen and one bathroom. Since it is an old buildign, there is not much storage space but the landlord said that we can use as much of the basement as we want. That will come in handy for our skis and other sporting equipment....we have tons of stuff. Matt is pushing me to get rid of lots of Dad's furniture, but I am going to wait to see how much I can cram in to the apartment, and put the rest in storage in the basement. Dad's house wasn't that big, so it might end up fitting. The other good thing about our apartment, is that it is right next to the T (Boston's subway system). The T stop is literally one block away...also, the main street is one block away, along with the grocery store. We are right next to Mass Ave, which is the main street and it has tons of restaurants and cute stores. The bad part about our apartment is that it is not in the city. I think Matt will end up moving into the city next year...we both like the city life. Laid back college towns are great, but I like to be right in the thick of it in the city. In the end though, the price was right for this apartment...it was the cheapest we found, plus, we are renting directly from the owner so there is no realtor fee, which is a ridiculously high...one month rent!

To celebrate, we went to the Union Oyster House for a lobster dinner. Supposedly it is the oldest restaurant in the US. The lobster was yummy, but expensive. I am always saying how I rarely eat meat, but that is not entirely true...when it comes to lobster or shellfish, if I get the opportunity I can gobble down as much as is put in front of me. I love it!