We went out to the Caulfield area today with another mission similar to yesterday’s. Only the subject has changed. We’re searching for a house to rent.

Today’s Objective: Room in a House/Apartment For a Couple.
Budget: $150 max (utility bills included).

We searched the online real estate portal and found some nice rooms, some without photos, but nice prices attraced us. There’s one which stands at $100/week for two including bills. That sounds interesting. We decided to have a look. The owner is generous enough to pick us up from the train station to inspect the house. We were like, WOW, that’s really a good service huh, that should be a good sign. But, Damn! I mean, that house is haunted! Well, I don’t mean to exaggerate here, but if that’s not haunted, then it’s gonna be one of the candidate house for those from The Underworld. It’s a 60-80 years old house. Creepy, worn, broken. It’s like something from the movie “Haunted Mansion”. Well, I told Paul, the house owner, that we would like to see another room. He had another room in another place not far from here. Off we go to the next one. Same story, haunted. I go like, “Hmm…We’ll think about it and if we decide on stuff, we’ll call you.” He then dropped us back to the train station and after that bye-bye, we act like nothing ever happened. Did we see something?

Next up, we went into the Monash campus and look up for their notice board, where we find lots more than that of the online portal. First we’ve got this 50’s old house, just opposite of the campus. Despite its age, it’s clean and bright, and well managed. The plus side of it, is that it has a very spacious room. Big enough for 3 even. Priced at $125/wk/room, it’s a great deal. It’s also ADSL-ready. For me, that’s a bonus. We’re like 80% sure that we’ll live there.

We’re not really satisfied yet. We called up some more and got another one at Murrumbeena. That one’s just 5 minutes off the train station. It’s a brand new townhouse which has 4 units in a building. It’s pretty much new and shiny the place and that’s what we were looking for all these while. The room’s like 1/4 smaller than the previous one, but for it’s rental of $100/wk, it’s worth the money. Bills are shared. No ADSL, that’s a negative. But no worries mate, we’ll get that in no time. Friendly housemates with an Australian born Chinese speaking fluent English. Advantage for me as I’m attempting to improve my linguistic skillz. She has a boyfriend, Chinese Cantonese, probably, guessing from the mahjong table. Canton people like to play mahjong a lot lah. There’s another tall, young caucassian by the name of Simon who’s in another room. It’s a cultural rojak here. If everything’s okay, we might move by tomorrow or Monday.

Too bad I didn’t manage to take any photos of those properties, including the “Haunted Mansion” that we’re trying very hard to forget. But there’ll be plenty of my future accomodation soon. Stay tune mate!

Oh yes, some photos on our dinner in chinatown in the Photostory.