tonskudaigle.info

It’s time

Obviously I'm talking about the departure day which is tomorrow, but as the hours count down, it's getting harder and harder to understand the move I'm making. I spent 2 hours last night reading articles related to my working environments from the work site newsletters I found online. Good stuff mostly, but for some reason they haven't published another one since summer 2009 which makes me a bit worried. But then again, my blog went on without an update for months until I said something again and although things have changed, over the years I've come to realize how hard it is to maintain regular updates to a content driven website. So the bigger part of me understands why the newsletter has either gone AWOL or just lazy.

So the day is here, tomorrow at 8:35am I will be leaving from the Oulu airport towards Helsinki where I'm supposed to wait for like 3+ hours for the flight to Dublin. From Dublin I'm planning to get a cab to Leixlip where my bed&breakfast is before I will start hunting down the flats to move in. Despite the rent prices being amazingly high over there, I must admit the flats are also damn nice. Superb conditions and already mostly furnished which takes the edge off of anyone who's about to move there.
I my case though this isn't what's happening. I'm planning to find an apartment to share as this will give me the chance to get to know people a bit instead of staying in my own flat and just going to work or groceries whenever I go out. I've found 4 very nice places that I'm currently considering, each of which have 2-3 other people living in already. Notice that these aren't the kind of normal flats that students move into, but instead they are actual houses that are shared between 3-4 people (myself included). So there's plenty of space and the feeling of being part of a community like you have when living in an apartment building where there are people living just across the hallway or on the other side of the wall, doesn't really exist. I would compare this to living with a family in a own house.

The good thing about moving to Ireland (or at least Co. Kildare) is that there are more flats available than there are takers. So you can actually get some really nice deals compared to what you'd have to pay for living on your own. Your own, very own, flat would cost around 800 euros and more excluding bills. But with a shared apartment the price is between 250 to 400 euros which I think is very reasonable. Currently I've 4 options, 2 in Celbridge which is around 3-4km from HP and Leixlip which is just over 1km from HP. For some reason I'm more drawn towards the Celbridge area.

So tomorrow is my day and I will be flying to Dublin and around 2:30pm local time I will take the cab to Leixlip and once settled in, I will try to arrange viewings with the options I've printed out. Right now I've no idea how to get around, but if nothing else works, I will just take a cab to Celbridge and then back to Leixlip. My goal is to move in somewhere on Friday at latest and then figure out rest of the arrangements. While looking for apartments, of course I will use any spare time to get for example a dongle to my computer so I get online and a mobile phone sim card. And most of all, I need to get a PPS number which will ensure my taxation being correct once I start working. I read somewhere that if I have all the bureaucracy stuff figured out in time, I will get to use the low tax rate Ireland has, but if I don't, I will be paying like 40%+ taxes.

Well that's all for now, holla back at ya once I get to Ireland and have settled down :)