got an apartment, finally
After about a week of wrangling with various opportunists who are looking to rent temporary apartments, I was able to secure a studio and slept there last night. The owner is a 40-ish woman who apparently is moving elsewhere in Salvador but wants to keep her apartment, presumably to make money off people like me. She was a bit of a wheeler-dealer, and lucky for me the deal was brokered in part by the owner of my pousada, and Irish guy named Sean who has lived here for 22 years. He was able to translate her furiously fast Portuguese for me, and talked her out of making me pay for the electric bill, which she wanted me to do but usually isn't part of the deal with temporary apartments here.
When they were talking, he told me that she said 2 things I should note: 1) careful when pulling down the window shade because it can fall off, and 2) she would prefer that I not have a lot of women coming in and out of the apartment. If she only knew how little she had to worry about regarding 2). I told her this through Sean but she seemed skeptical. When we were walking to the apartment (a block away from the pousada) I asked him what she meant about that, and he was like "I think she doesn't want you to bring a lot of hookers there." Whoa, people - I just met this lady and already I'm bringing hookers in an out every night? Don't I get a chance to prove my trustworthiness before being chastised like this? Aren't I innocent until proven guilty?
Sean went on, "It's really none of her business - you're paying the rent, you can do whatever you want. She can't tell you what to do." I wanted to tell him how much I appreciated his willingness to defend my rights to have prostitutes in my apartment, but we got in the elevator and they all started talking.
The apartment is relatively small, being a studio, and it's a bit girly, which is actually probably a good thing since people are always telling me that my apartment is so clearly a bachelor's, what with the microwave on top of the stove, etc. I would like to note that above the bed is a Picassoesque painting of two naked people in a passionate embrace and kissing. And yet somehow I'm the one generating all the concern about being sexually deviant.
The biggest perk about the place is probably the doorman, whose name is Jorge, who is always shaking my hand and putting his arm around my shoulder, and giving me the thumbs up (we've known each other two days). He was speaking all kinds of Portuguese to me and I sort of nodded for a while, but afterwards I sort of leveled with him and said I didn't understand Portuguese very well. This didn't dissuade him one bit, except when I was moving my last few things in he yelled to me as I was getting into the elevator "Wilkommen!", of course accompanied with the thumbs up. There are tons of German people here.
When they were talking, he told me that she said 2 things I should note: 1) careful when pulling down the window shade because it can fall off, and 2) she would prefer that I not have a lot of women coming in and out of the apartment. If she only knew how little she had to worry about regarding 2). I told her this through Sean but she seemed skeptical. When we were walking to the apartment (a block away from the pousada) I asked him what she meant about that, and he was like "I think she doesn't want you to bring a lot of hookers there." Whoa, people - I just met this lady and already I'm bringing hookers in an out every night? Don't I get a chance to prove my trustworthiness before being chastised like this? Aren't I innocent until proven guilty?
Sean went on, "It's really none of her business - you're paying the rent, you can do whatever you want. She can't tell you what to do." I wanted to tell him how much I appreciated his willingness to defend my rights to have prostitutes in my apartment, but we got in the elevator and they all started talking.
The apartment is relatively small, being a studio, and it's a bit girly, which is actually probably a good thing since people are always telling me that my apartment is so clearly a bachelor's, what with the microwave on top of the stove, etc. I would like to note that above the bed is a Picassoesque painting of two naked people in a passionate embrace and kissing. And yet somehow I'm the one generating all the concern about being sexually deviant.
The biggest perk about the place is probably the doorman, whose name is Jorge, who is always shaking my hand and putting his arm around my shoulder, and giving me the thumbs up (we've known each other two days). He was speaking all kinds of Portuguese to me and I sort of nodded for a while, but afterwards I sort of leveled with him and said I didn't understand Portuguese very well. This didn't dissuade him one bit, except when I was moving my last few things in he yelled to me as I was getting into the elevator "Wilkommen!", of course accompanied with the thumbs up. There are tons of German people here.
posted by n10471 at 3:12 PM
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