Moving House in Luxor!

Apologies in advance if this is a bit long winded, it was hard to leave things out! Sorry!

I had to move from my flat and it all happened very quickly.  Search parties were sent out to look for something I would like and I ended up temporarily (well, for the summer anyway) in a lovely flat on the West Bank with a view of my favourite river, the River Nile in Luxor,Egypt.

We found the flat on Monday of this week, and moved out on Wednesday.  I had one day to pack completely. What a nightmare!  I had started to organise myself a few days prior to that, and had a couple of suitcases and some boxes of stuff that I knew I would not be needing over the summer months, and stuff that I knew I could live without for the time being.

However, I had no idea how much “stuff” I have accumulated over the last 4 years!  And then a well-meaning “other half” decided to get involved in the packing procedures.  After all, “it’s easy”!

Following that statement, at 3pm on Tuesday, I was told that the “car”would be coming in an hour for the first run to the new flat! What???????  Mania took over and the packing frenzy increased. Anything and everything began to be thrown into boxes! But we had enough for the first run and off they went. At this point, I had no idea anymore what I had in the old flat and what had already gone to the new flat.

Eventually, by 4pm on Wednesday we were ready to go!  A good friend of mine and her husband brought us over the river in his taxi, with the roof rack full and every inch of the taxi packed to the hilt!  My friends and I squashed in, and our task was to clean the flat before the bulk of our stuff arrived.

We opened the door to be greeted by a living room that had disappeared under the boxes delivered here on Tuesday.  My requests that everything be placed in the second bedroom had been totally ignored and things had just been dumped inside the door, spreading out over the floor.  So we dug in, moved them to clear some space and off we went!

Hmmmmmmmmm  now where was the cleaning stuff bag??  Oh oh......... still in the old flat! So off to the shops I went to get enough cleaning materials to tide us over. While I was gone, my friends decided to make tea.  Now where is the kettle that I purposely left out, so that I could make endless cups of tea for the workers????  Yes, you guessed it. Still in the old flat!

And no gas bottle either, so we couldn’t even boil water on the gas stove!

Oh well, a quick phone call meant I could at least bring cola and sprite back from the shops!

So the cleaning started, a second taxi load arrived. You guessed it, still no cleaning materials and still no kettle. But we did find a small travel kettle. Not exactly conducive to “mashing” tea for the 5000, but better than nothing.

Oh and my nice rug flew off the top of the taxi somewhere between East and West Banks!  If you see it anywhere...........

Then we began the wait for the main load coming.  Due at 7pm at the East Bank flat, the car failed to turn up until 9pm, then it had to be loaded with the sofas, and my big wall cabinet as well as other bigger stuff.

Eventually, the car arrived.......  and the whole load was dumped downstairs.  The “carrying” men had gone for tea, and had not returned. The driver was already reversing away from the building and my “other half” was complaining how tired he was. So we took a decision to leave it where it was, it was safe and locked inside the building, and we hoped no-one would want to steal one of my sofas.

Then he got bored and decided to bring in the wall unit. So he rang a friend, got him round and they carried it upstairs, put it together and then expected me to fill it.  No way, it needed a good clean  by this time, and I had no idea where anything was!

So that was the end of the move...... or so I thought.....   more about that soon.

“Time for bed” said Zebedee, eventually.   Hmmmmmmm great idea, but where is the mattress??  My Habitat mattress that cost me a fortune?  Downstairs, buried behind sofas and big chairs!   A quick “throw everything on the floor” session in the second bedroom cleared the big single bed, and we spent the night trying desperately to sleep.  

The mosque called the early morning prayer, and I was still awake.  I gave up trying to sleep, got up, made tea and toast, and sat on the balcony watching the sun come up.  It was magical and serene and I knew in that instance that there was a reason I had to leave the flat I was in, and move back to the West Bank.

I still do not know that reason, but whatever it is, it was time to move.