Moving Day

On May 28th I moved in to my 1 bedroom apartment. (And by “I” I mean the taxi driver and building guardian. They schlepped my 3 suitcases up to 4th floor walk-up apartment in seconds). Furnished with modern amenities such as 2 (count them 2) air conditioners, 2 ceiling fans, fridge, stove/oven and a washing machine, I am a happy little Djiboutian camper.

I live smack dab in the center of town, surrounded by street cafes and shops. I am mere blocks from the main square (Place Menelik/Place du 27 juin) and the markets. I am also right in front of a mosque, but with all do respect Allah, my AC blocks out the first call to prayers, which is at 4:30 am.

As recommended, when renting an apartment in Djib City, you must ensure that your apartment has a “groupe electrogene” (a generator group). Because outages/blackouts are so frequent and occur for hours (sometimes up to 12 hours a day) you should only rent an apartment that has its own generator. In most cases, when a blackout occurs, the generator kicks in immediately, and you are good to go. I quickly discovered, however, that neither the AC in the living room, nor the washing machine is hooked up to the generator. So you just have to hope that when load your washer, you’ll have a good hour without a blackout. I was not so lucky on my first try. Stupid westerner loaded her machine at 12:30 in the afternoon (prime time for the first blackout of the day) and shortly thereafter Djib lost electricity. My full side-load machine wouldn’t work for hours and leaked water until 5pm when the power came back on. I was stranded at my house like a dumbass sopping soapy water off my bathroom floor (indoor pool) for 5 hours. I’ll learn…

Overall, I am very content in my new digs and had a mini-housewarming on Friday the 29th in the afternoon. Some friends from UNHCR and UNDP came over after I found the black market. Muslim country that it is, you cannot buy/sell booze on Fridays (think Sunday in Massachusetts…I mean Newton and Djibouti have so much in common). My sneaky friend and I hopped a cab on a Heineken mission and were informed “Ici, c’est le ghetto”. Ghettos are the perfect spot to find women selling ice cold Heineken for 400 francs (approx $2.50), which for Djib is REALLY cheap…all on the holy day (sorry Allah). With the exception of a minor ant invasion that occurred, people are excited to have a friend with a sweet apartment. (Translation: YOU should be excited too and come visit. Djibouti truly is the Boston, Paris, or Mineola of East Africa).