30 November, 2005
22 November, 2005
Lessons in Packing (Trade Secrets Revealed)
From my husband's blog:
After six months of living in Luxembourg, we finally have our things from the States. Part of the delay was an argument over whether or not we would have to pay for an extra large shipping container. Now that we are opening boxes, the problem is very clear. Most of the boxes that were packed by the "professionals" were only half full. For the large wardrobe boxes, that means 10-15 sq. feet per box. I know, "Contents packed by weight. Some settling may have occurred during shipping." No wonder our load was almost too big for a forty foot container!
Before this move, I thought that I was unqualified to pack for an ocean move. Now I know all the moving trade secrets. I hope they do not sue me for letting out all the secrets. It is probably a very select few who ever learn those secrets. I will now divulge those very secrets. There is some packing school somewhere that I will put out of business by divulging those secrets on my blog. Do not be surprised if they sue me and make me dismantle my blog. I am not afraid. I will proclaim the moving secrets so all who need them will have the knowledge to pack their own things or even start a moving company. Are you ready? Make sure you follow them very carefully or I cannot be held liable for any malfeasance that may arise as a consequence. (Or is that malapropism? Yes, I'm dangerous with a dictionary.)
Here they are: Get big box. Throw stuff in box. Tape box.
I know this may start a revolution of people packing for themselves. Yes, some movers may lose their jobs, but knowledge for the people is more important. Don't worry about me. Just use this knowledge in your next move. Give this useful information to friends and family. The spread of this knowledge will validate my life. My name may be recorded in history, if not, the revolution which I have begun will live and expand until the end of this very world. People will be set free to pack for themselves. That freedom will be enjoyed by relocators across the globe and for countless generations. That legacy is greater than that which any man could dream, any man could strive, or any man could hope.
And other advantage we have over the professionals. We wash our hands. Of course, packed dishes should always be washed, but it motivates us even more after we noticed that some of the packers were not washing their hands after visiting the restroom. All those germs are probably dead after such a long time in transit, but the thought of it makes us want to clean.
After six months of living in Luxembourg, we finally have our things from the States. Part of the delay was an argument over whether or not we would have to pay for an extra large shipping container. Now that we are opening boxes, the problem is very clear. Most of the boxes that were packed by the "professionals" were only half full. For the large wardrobe boxes, that means 10-15 sq. feet per box. I know, "Contents packed by weight. Some settling may have occurred during shipping." No wonder our load was almost too big for a forty foot container!
Before this move, I thought that I was unqualified to pack for an ocean move. Now I know all the moving trade secrets. I hope they do not sue me for letting out all the secrets. It is probably a very select few who ever learn those secrets. I will now divulge those very secrets. There is some packing school somewhere that I will put out of business by divulging those secrets on my blog. Do not be surprised if they sue me and make me dismantle my blog. I am not afraid. I will proclaim the moving secrets so all who need them will have the knowledge to pack their own things or even start a moving company. Are you ready? Make sure you follow them very carefully or I cannot be held liable for any malfeasance that may arise as a consequence. (Or is that malapropism? Yes, I'm dangerous with a dictionary.)
Here they are: Get big box. Throw stuff in box. Tape box.
I know this may start a revolution of people packing for themselves. Yes, some movers may lose their jobs, but knowledge for the people is more important. Don't worry about me. Just use this knowledge in your next move. Give this useful information to friends and family. The spread of this knowledge will validate my life. My name may be recorded in history, if not, the revolution which I have begun will live and expand until the end of this very world. People will be set free to pack for themselves. That freedom will be enjoyed by relocators across the globe and for countless generations. That legacy is greater than that which any man could dream, any man could strive, or any man could hope.
And other advantage we have over the professionals. We wash our hands. Of course, packed dishes should always be washed, but it motivates us even more after we noticed that some of the packers were not washing their hands after visiting the restroom. All those germs are probably dead after such a long time in transit, but the thought of it makes us want to clean.
Hiring a Moving Company
Our many troubles with two different moving companies are chronicled in a footnote below. (See "Timeline of the Moving Nightmare.") This post lists what we have learned for hiring the next moving company (the one that moves us back to the States).
Sales People
The person who you deal with at the front end, before any contracts are signed, is only a sales person. Before you sign anything, find out who you else you will talk to in the chain (perhaps someone with a title like "moving consultant") and talk to them as well. It would also be helpful to talk to someone who is in charge, a manager of some kind.
Are the other people in the company easy to get in touch with? Do they respond quickly to answering machine messages and email? Do they tell you the same story about the moving process as the sales person?
We found this to be a problem with both moving companies we hired. What the sales person told us wasn't always what the others in the company believed to be true. Not that they were lying (or maybe they were), but it seemed more that the people in the company weren't speaking to each other. We also found that though the sales people were friendly and responded quickly to requests, this was often not true for anyone else in the company.
One thing that impressed me about the Dutch moving company, Dijkshoorn Euromovers, that contracted with Access to take care of the move on this side of the Atlantic was that they understood customer service. We went from weeks with absolutely no information to email and phone calls three or four times a day.
Paper work
The Dutch company seemed very competent. There was a lot of paperwork for Luxembourg, and they handled it all quite well.
We had been instructed by our sales person from both Sea & Air and Access to keep a list of everything that we pack ourselves because customs in Europe will need a list. It didn't need to be too specific, but should be labels such as "clothes", "toys", "dishes", etc. So we did that. I numbered the boxes with a big red marker, and we made the list. We gave it to the guys packing the house who were also keeping a list, using stickers to number the boxes. I didn't know exactly how they were going to reconcile their numbers with our numbers, but I didn't worry too much at the time.
As expected, the Luxembourg customs officials wanted to see the packing list, but they wanted it in French. Mark at Dijkshoorn said they would translate it for 150 Euros. We decided that we could do just as well because we knew our stuff, so Mark faxed the packing list to my office. The list from Access had someone else's name printed at the top for the "customer name", but that name was crossed off and ours written in by hand. Most of the items were labeled only as box. It was incredibly discouraging. We spent hours making up a packing list for 267 pieces, and then translating it into French. By thinking back to the list I had done for our packing, and then trying to remember the order they went in packing the house, we managed to come up with a decent packing list. A friend at work helped me fix the French. (He was quite amused at my French translations.)
Luxembourg customs requested a scan of the container before it was unloaded which cost us almost 300 Euros but couldn't be avoided. Mark at Dijkshoorn Euromovers said that would speed up the process at the border. Because of the fudged inventory list, if customs had wanted to find something specific they saw in the scan, it would have taken a very long time.
How much experience do the people you talk to have with customs? If they don't handle that part of the move, ask to speak to the person who knows. Who have they contracted with to work with customs on the other side of the ocean?
Also, make sure that you keep for yourself a list of the contents of the container. It could come in useful.
Packing
In a previous entry (highly recommended), my husband has given away all the trade secrets so that you can pack your own boxes. When we move back to the States, that is what we are going to do. No more hiring packers for our family!
Before the move, before the "professional" packers came, while we were packing our valuables and favorite toys, Darin was making us do an "ocean voyage test" on all the boxes, which meant shaking them and moving them like ocean waves to see if they rattled. The men who packed our things didn't worry at all about breakage. They put in lamps without any protection, which means we need new lamp shades. Though they wrapped the piano and china cabinet in blankets, other important furniture was left completely unprotected. Books were thrown into boxes, not even laid flat, so that a lot of our paperback books now have damaged pages and covers. Almost none of the boxes they packed were full. And then they have the nerve to tell us that our stuff is too big for a 40' container so they need an extra $4,000 for a larger container. They could have just filled the boxes and there would have been no question about the limits of a 40' container.
We are never going to hire packing done again. If you decide that you can't do all the packing yourself, make sure that you or someone you trust is there to watch and protect the most valuable things.
Fortunately, in spite of all the problems, we've seen very little breakage.
Our plans for moving back
We decided before we came that we are going to leave some of our furniture in Luxembourg. Some of our furniture is nothing special and completely replaceable. So our goal is to reduce down to a 20' container for the move back. With the arguments about whether our stuff would fit into a 40' container for the voyage to Luxembourg, we started to have our doubts about the 20' container. But now that we see how much empty space was in the boxes, and we see how much stuff we have already thrown away, given away (kids books and clothes), or recycled, we believe again that we can make it into a 20' container in a couple of years.
So for the next move, we want to contract only for the moving of a 20' shipping container. There are several companies that have prices for "You pack, we ship." We make sure that they are familiar with customs in the States, and we hire a company. I would hire Dijkshoorn Euromovers if they would give us a price for the self-packing method.
We order the container far in advance (a couple of weeks, at least) of the date we fly back. We make sure we have our boxes packed ourselves in advance of the container coming. We make sure that what is left will fit in our suitcases, meaning that we've also packed our suitcases. We load the container ourselves. Anything left in the house we arrange to go to the next tenants or a thrift store.
Of course, before we move back to the States, we have to decide where we'll be living.
Sales People
The person who you deal with at the front end, before any contracts are signed, is only a sales person. Before you sign anything, find out who you else you will talk to in the chain (perhaps someone with a title like "moving consultant") and talk to them as well. It would also be helpful to talk to someone who is in charge, a manager of some kind.
Are the other people in the company easy to get in touch with? Do they respond quickly to answering machine messages and email? Do they tell you the same story about the moving process as the sales person?
We found this to be a problem with both moving companies we hired. What the sales person told us wasn't always what the others in the company believed to be true. Not that they were lying (or maybe they were), but it seemed more that the people in the company weren't speaking to each other. We also found that though the sales people were friendly and responded quickly to requests, this was often not true for anyone else in the company.
One thing that impressed me about the Dutch moving company, Dijkshoorn Euromovers, that contracted with Access to take care of the move on this side of the Atlantic was that they understood customer service. We went from weeks with absolutely no information to email and phone calls three or four times a day.
Paper work
The Dutch company seemed very competent. There was a lot of paperwork for Luxembourg, and they handled it all quite well.
We had been instructed by our sales person from both Sea & Air and Access to keep a list of everything that we pack ourselves because customs in Europe will need a list. It didn't need to be too specific, but should be labels such as "clothes", "toys", "dishes", etc. So we did that. I numbered the boxes with a big red marker, and we made the list. We gave it to the guys packing the house who were also keeping a list, using stickers to number the boxes. I didn't know exactly how they were going to reconcile their numbers with our numbers, but I didn't worry too much at the time.
As expected, the Luxembourg customs officials wanted to see the packing list, but they wanted it in French. Mark at Dijkshoorn said they would translate it for 150 Euros. We decided that we could do just as well because we knew our stuff, so Mark faxed the packing list to my office. The list from Access had someone else's name printed at the top for the "customer name", but that name was crossed off and ours written in by hand. Most of the items were labeled only as box. It was incredibly discouraging. We spent hours making up a packing list for 267 pieces, and then translating it into French. By thinking back to the list I had done for our packing, and then trying to remember the order they went in packing the house, we managed to come up with a decent packing list. A friend at work helped me fix the French. (He was quite amused at my French translations.)
Luxembourg customs requested a scan of the container before it was unloaded which cost us almost 300 Euros but couldn't be avoided. Mark at Dijkshoorn Euromovers said that would speed up the process at the border. Because of the fudged inventory list, if customs had wanted to find something specific they saw in the scan, it would have taken a very long time.
How much experience do the people you talk to have with customs? If they don't handle that part of the move, ask to speak to the person who knows. Who have they contracted with to work with customs on the other side of the ocean?
Also, make sure that you keep for yourself a list of the contents of the container. It could come in useful.
Packing
In a previous entry (highly recommended), my husband has given away all the trade secrets so that you can pack your own boxes. When we move back to the States, that is what we are going to do. No more hiring packers for our family!
Before the move, before the "professional" packers came, while we were packing our valuables and favorite toys, Darin was making us do an "ocean voyage test" on all the boxes, which meant shaking them and moving them like ocean waves to see if they rattled. The men who packed our things didn't worry at all about breakage. They put in lamps without any protection, which means we need new lamp shades. Though they wrapped the piano and china cabinet in blankets, other important furniture was left completely unprotected. Books were thrown into boxes, not even laid flat, so that a lot of our paperback books now have damaged pages and covers. Almost none of the boxes they packed were full. And then they have the nerve to tell us that our stuff is too big for a 40' container so they need an extra $4,000 for a larger container. They could have just filled the boxes and there would have been no question about the limits of a 40' container.
We are never going to hire packing done again. If you decide that you can't do all the packing yourself, make sure that you or someone you trust is there to watch and protect the most valuable things.
Fortunately, in spite of all the problems, we've seen very little breakage.
Our plans for moving back
We decided before we came that we are going to leave some of our furniture in Luxembourg. Some of our furniture is nothing special and completely replaceable. So our goal is to reduce down to a 20' container for the move back. With the arguments about whether our stuff would fit into a 40' container for the voyage to Luxembourg, we started to have our doubts about the 20' container. But now that we see how much empty space was in the boxes, and we see how much stuff we have already thrown away, given away (kids books and clothes), or recycled, we believe again that we can make it into a 20' container in a couple of years.
So for the next move, we want to contract only for the moving of a 20' shipping container. There are several companies that have prices for "You pack, we ship." We make sure that they are familiar with customs in the States, and we hire a company. I would hire Dijkshoorn Euromovers if they would give us a price for the self-packing method.
We order the container far in advance (a couple of weeks, at least) of the date we fly back. We make sure we have our boxes packed ourselves in advance of the container coming. We make sure that what is left will fit in our suitcases, meaning that we've also packed our suitcases. We load the container ourselves. Anything left in the house we arrange to go to the next tenants or a thrift store.
Of course, before we move back to the States, we have to decide where we'll be living.
21 November, 2005
Schooling and Homeschooling in Luxembourg
We have been homeschooling our girls in the States since our youngest was 5. She's 12 now, so we are on our 8th year of homeschooling. I have been working full-time, and my husband teaches them at home. I help with some subjects in the evenings, and I'm in charge of scheduling and shopping for schools/curriculum.
We've been told by many Luxembourgers about the very high quality of the schools in Luxembourg. One person in particular, a graduate of the system herself, told us that the public schools in Luxembourg are the "toughest" in the world, and that when the kids finish school here, they can go to "universities in the States and skip the first two years" since US high schools are so terrible.
I've talked to lots of kids in this country, both in the Luxembourg schools and in the European schools about what they are studying in math -- my personal yardstick to measure against what my kids are doing. Kids at the European school are behind my kids by more than a year, and the kids at the Luxembourg schools are even farther behind in math. So maybe a student from Luxembourg could skip two years of foreign language requirements, but they couldn't skip any math, and they probably would need remedial English classes.
Luxembourg children in the public school system learn first Luxembourgish and then German. I've been told by Germans living here that the German they learn still isn't "hoch Deutsch", meaning they can't communicate in formal German. When they are about 10 years old, they start learning French, and eventually they will learn English as their fourth language. Most Luxembourgers, if they can speak English, do not speak it well enough to go to a university in the States.
I went to the UNESCO web site, after talking to some people at church, to compare the scores from Luxembourg to the rest of Europe. The trend in Luxembourg is for more and more kids to drop out of school as soon as they are allowed, and for fewer and fewer to go on to a university. Test scores are dropping. The Luxembourg schools are designed to produce ployglots, but not necessarily even good linguists.
Several of the British families I know at church have kids who are grown or at universities in England, and their kids did very well in the Luxembourgish school system. Their kids did very well in the universities and the work force, but partly because they were speaking English at home, and I know of several who took extra classes in math and computers outside of school when they were young.
So when someone tells me that the Luxembourg schools are "tough," in a way they are correct. It's very difficult to learn four different languages before you are allowed to graduate. But tough in this way doesn't translate into good, and it doesn't translate into skills that someone would need to get into a good university or to get a good job.
We thought briefly about putting the girls in public schools here. There are fewer religious issues here (with Luxembourg being officially Catholic), and fewer safety issues. Most people's advice was to put them in and let them "drown" for a while because in a couple of years they would be speaking all the languages you need to survive in Luxembourg schools, and then they will be doing really well. The problem with that is that we'll be moving back to the States in a few years, and the girls would be behind in everything except Luxembourgish, German, and French. We decided we needed to keep them on the American system. And since the American school here would cost us more than my salary, homeschooling was our only option.
My girls also wanted very much to continue in their Missionettes Bible clubs, clubs for girls sponsored by the Assemblies of God. They have been in the clubs since they were tiny (our oldest started at five, the youngest at three). They have made the "Honor" distinction in all the clubs they have been in so far. I got permission from our church in Virginia and the Potomac District to start Missionette clubs in Luxembourg -- homeschooling for Missionettes.
I had tried for ages to email the AG missionaries/pastors here with no luck, to tell them about our Missionettes clubs in English (their church is in French). Then one evening I was talking on the phone to an American who lives up the road, and she said I needed to call her friend Debbie because Debbie is an American with two girls and she homeschools. I asked Melanie Debbie's last name, and it was Reynolds, the AG missionary. So I called Debbie Reynolds, and I got all the scoop on how to homeschool in Luxembourg.
The entire key to homeschooling is to never use the word "home."
In Luxembourg, they allow "home" school for kids that have some kind of disease or handicap that won't let them be around other people. So they bring the list of things to teach the kids to your house, and then you teach them from the manual for that grade. Then at the end of the year, or maybe more often than that, they test the kids, and the entire thing has to be done in the languages here. No English.
So the key to being able to homeschool the American way is to explain that you want the kids on an American system because you're going back to America someday, so you're using the curriculum from a school in the States. Use the word "correspondence" frequently because it's a word they understand.
It will be a bit strange for us because the younger girls are in a transition from one school's curriculum to another school/curriculum. Also, we are about three months behind because they weren't doing school back in March-May when I was here in Luxembourg and they were with their father. (I didn't understand how completely dependent my husband was on my scheduling and organizing abilities.)
Our next step is to find a way to get letters from the schools and have them explain what we are doing. I have some hope that we can make it work.
There will be no summer vacation this year. We still need to make up those three months. And no living apart again either, because it's clear we need all of us together to make homeschooling work.
We've been told by many Luxembourgers about the very high quality of the schools in Luxembourg. One person in particular, a graduate of the system herself, told us that the public schools in Luxembourg are the "toughest" in the world, and that when the kids finish school here, they can go to "universities in the States and skip the first two years" since US high schools are so terrible.
I've talked to lots of kids in this country, both in the Luxembourg schools and in the European schools about what they are studying in math -- my personal yardstick to measure against what my kids are doing. Kids at the European school are behind my kids by more than a year, and the kids at the Luxembourg schools are even farther behind in math. So maybe a student from Luxembourg could skip two years of foreign language requirements, but they couldn't skip any math, and they probably would need remedial English classes.
Luxembourg children in the public school system learn first Luxembourgish and then German. I've been told by Germans living here that the German they learn still isn't "hoch Deutsch", meaning they can't communicate in formal German. When they are about 10 years old, they start learning French, and eventually they will learn English as their fourth language. Most Luxembourgers, if they can speak English, do not speak it well enough to go to a university in the States.
I went to the UNESCO web site, after talking to some people at church, to compare the scores from Luxembourg to the rest of Europe. The trend in Luxembourg is for more and more kids to drop out of school as soon as they are allowed, and for fewer and fewer to go on to a university. Test scores are dropping. The Luxembourg schools are designed to produce ployglots, but not necessarily even good linguists.
Several of the British families I know at church have kids who are grown or at universities in England, and their kids did very well in the Luxembourgish school system. Their kids did very well in the universities and the work force, but partly because they were speaking English at home, and I know of several who took extra classes in math and computers outside of school when they were young.
So when someone tells me that the Luxembourg schools are "tough," in a way they are correct. It's very difficult to learn four different languages before you are allowed to graduate. But tough in this way doesn't translate into good, and it doesn't translate into skills that someone would need to get into a good university or to get a good job.
We thought briefly about putting the girls in public schools here. There are fewer religious issues here (with Luxembourg being officially Catholic), and fewer safety issues. Most people's advice was to put them in and let them "drown" for a while because in a couple of years they would be speaking all the languages you need to survive in Luxembourg schools, and then they will be doing really well. The problem with that is that we'll be moving back to the States in a few years, and the girls would be behind in everything except Luxembourgish, German, and French. We decided we needed to keep them on the American system. And since the American school here would cost us more than my salary, homeschooling was our only option.
My girls also wanted very much to continue in their Missionettes Bible clubs, clubs for girls sponsored by the Assemblies of God. They have been in the clubs since they were tiny (our oldest started at five, the youngest at three). They have made the "Honor" distinction in all the clubs they have been in so far. I got permission from our church in Virginia and the Potomac District to start Missionette clubs in Luxembourg -- homeschooling for Missionettes.
I had tried for ages to email the AG missionaries/pastors here with no luck, to tell them about our Missionettes clubs in English (their church is in French). Then one evening I was talking on the phone to an American who lives up the road, and she said I needed to call her friend Debbie because Debbie is an American with two girls and she homeschools. I asked Melanie Debbie's last name, and it was Reynolds, the AG missionary. So I called Debbie Reynolds, and I got all the scoop on how to homeschool in Luxembourg.
The entire key to homeschooling is to never use the word "home."
In Luxembourg, they allow "home" school for kids that have some kind of disease or handicap that won't let them be around other people. So they bring the list of things to teach the kids to your house, and then you teach them from the manual for that grade. Then at the end of the year, or maybe more often than that, they test the kids, and the entire thing has to be done in the languages here. No English.
So the key to being able to homeschool the American way is to explain that you want the kids on an American system because you're going back to America someday, so you're using the curriculum from a school in the States. Use the word "correspondence" frequently because it's a word they understand.
It will be a bit strange for us because the younger girls are in a transition from one school's curriculum to another school/curriculum. Also, we are about three months behind because they weren't doing school back in March-May when I was here in Luxembourg and they were with their father. (I didn't understand how completely dependent my husband was on my scheduling and organizing abilities.)
Our next step is to find a way to get letters from the schools and have them explain what we are doing. I have some hope that we can make it work.
There will be no summer vacation this year. We still need to make up those three months. And no living apart again either, because it's clear we need all of us together to make homeschooling work.
18 November, 2005
Electricity: Lamps, Transformers, and Microwaves
OK, we got our stuff. That means we can start using our lamps. "Wait," you say, "will American lamps work in Europe since the voltage is different?" Actually, yes. A lamp is just wires to supply the bulb with power.
One might think that since the voltage is higher in Europe (220 volts, only 110 in the US) that you would need larger wires, but the opposite is true. The wires here are smaller because it is more efficient to transmit 220 volt electricity than 110.
That also means the plugs are bigger because the electricity can arc across a gap better, as evidenced when we plug an American plug into an adaptor. The girls were frightened to plug in the American computer because of the arc when they did. Now we have the computer plugged into a surge protector type outlet, so we can cut the power before we plug in the adaptor or the American plug.
Someone in America who had lived in Europe told us that we could use US lightbulbs in Europe. Early on, Darin tried a regular light bulb in a lamp from the States. That did not work. He blew the circuit and the bulb. (Now the hall lights won't work, but they are on a different circuit, so he tells us that it's not related to his light bulb testing.) He tested some compact fluorescent bulbs. They didn't blow any circuits, but they didn't last long with the 220 voltage.
Darin changed the plugs on the lamps, especially since we didn't intend on moving them back to the States anyway. The lights I had on the wall when I was a kid had very old cords on them, and the wall lights here mount directly to wires coming out of the wall, so Darin cut off the cords and will put new cords back on when we get to the States.
Lamps are about the only things that don't need a transformer to work.
However, we finally did something right when it came to moving, though it happened accidentally. I had ordered some transformers from a company in the States to be delivered so they could be packed with our things. But because of problems with the credit card (that weren't our fault, not like we were at the limit or something), the order was canceled. Then the stuff arrives, but the girls can't listen to their CD players because no transformers. Darin mentioned this to our neighbor who works for NATO, and his wife picked up some used transformers for us at the Thrift Shop on base, and very cheap. So now we have transformers, at about a tenth of what we would have paid in the States!
Microwave ovens and some clocks are the only things affected by a change in the hertz (50 cycles instead of 60). Transformers only change the voltage (110 in the US and 220 in Europe), not the hertz. We are borrowing a small microwave from another neighbor until we can buy one for ourselves.
One might think that since the voltage is higher in Europe (220 volts, only 110 in the US) that you would need larger wires, but the opposite is true. The wires here are smaller because it is more efficient to transmit 220 volt electricity than 110.
That also means the plugs are bigger because the electricity can arc across a gap better, as evidenced when we plug an American plug into an adaptor. The girls were frightened to plug in the American computer because of the arc when they did. Now we have the computer plugged into a surge protector type outlet, so we can cut the power before we plug in the adaptor or the American plug.
Someone in America who had lived in Europe told us that we could use US lightbulbs in Europe. Early on, Darin tried a regular light bulb in a lamp from the States. That did not work. He blew the circuit and the bulb. (Now the hall lights won't work, but they are on a different circuit, so he tells us that it's not related to his light bulb testing.) He tested some compact fluorescent bulbs. They didn't blow any circuits, but they didn't last long with the 220 voltage.
Darin changed the plugs on the lamps, especially since we didn't intend on moving them back to the States anyway. The lights I had on the wall when I was a kid had very old cords on them, and the wall lights here mount directly to wires coming out of the wall, so Darin cut off the cords and will put new cords back on when we get to the States.
Lamps are about the only things that don't need a transformer to work.
However, we finally did something right when it came to moving, though it happened accidentally. I had ordered some transformers from a company in the States to be delivered so they could be packed with our things. But because of problems with the credit card (that weren't our fault, not like we were at the limit or something), the order was canceled. Then the stuff arrives, but the girls can't listen to their CD players because no transformers. Darin mentioned this to our neighbor who works for NATO, and his wife picked up some used transformers for us at the Thrift Shop on base, and very cheap. So now we have transformers, at about a tenth of what we would have paid in the States!
Microwave ovens and some clocks are the only things affected by a change in the hertz (50 cycles instead of 60). Transformers only change the voltage (110 in the US and 220 in Europe), not the hertz. We are borrowing a small microwave from another neighbor until we can buy one for ourselves.
02 November, 2005
Timeline of a Moving Nightmare
First, we had hired Sea and Air Cargo International, based in Miami, who did nothing except come into our house and make a mess, call the police that we had abandoned our cat (which we hadn't), and kept our down payment for the move. So we had to find a new company. The next lowest bid was Access International, and to be honest, it was the only other company that we could afford.
Sea and Air Cargo International was the real disaster of the move, though I feel fortunate to have escaped with minimal damage. Basically, we paid them $1800 and they did nothing. In hindsight, it could have been worse, because as far as we can tell, nothing was stolen from the house.
Jan 2005: I sign a contract with a company in Luxembourg.
Feb 2005: I quit my government job.
Mar 2005: My contracts with Eurostat begin. I move to Europe without Darin and our three girls.
30 April 2005: We sign a contract with Sea and Air, and my company pays them $1800 as a down payment for our move, scheduled to load on 18 May from Virginia to Europe. Our sales person, Maria, tells us to relax because everything is under control and we have hire full-service packing, etc.
17 May 2005: Eleanor calls to tell us that the container is scheduled for 23 May. I explain that is incorrect because we are leaving for Europe on 21 May. I tell her we want to cancel. She says we can't cancel without 12 days notice, even though they have "postponed" our date with less than 24 hours notice. I talk to Idan Ohana who promises to personally oversee the move. He gives me his cell phone number and tells me I can call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. I tell him we will leave the keys with our neighbor across the street. He says he will arrive on Sunday to pack the house, and that loading will begin when the container arrives on Monday.
22 May 2005: I try to call Idan from Europe. His phone is off. I call my real estate agent and my pastor. No one from Sea and Air is at the house.
23 May 2005: I call Idan from Europe again. He says that he was able to get the keys, but they can't pack the house because it's too messy and there is too much stuff. I tell him that it wouldn't have been a problem if we had been there because we could have told them what to leave out, if it really doesn't fit. He says he will call me again later.
24 May 2005: I call Idan again. He gives me a long story about how they couldn't get the container in the driveway and that the police told them they couldn't be there. So now there is too much stuff, and they will need a truck to carry the stuff to a container at some other location. Our driveway is much longer than 40 feet, and straight, and I can't understand why the police care that we have a container in our driveway. There is no neighborhood association, or anything like that. Idan says they will need more money.
25 May 2005 - 31 May 2005: Idan's phone is turned off.
1 June 2005: I talk to Idan again. He is back in Florida. He really still wants to be our mover, but he needs more money. They had to send the container to someone else since it didn't fit in our driveway, so he will have to schedule a new container and he needs more money because our house is really messy. He says that he looked at our furniture and realize we had nothing of value, so he's afraid to pack our house and put it in a container because we will decide that we don't want our belongings since we have nothing of value. (Maria had told us that we should pack everything of value ourselves, which we did.) I don't want to list for him everything we do have that's valuable, so I tell him we are canceling the move. I ask him why, when he left to return to Florida, he didn't leave the keys with our neighbor. He said it was because he still wanted the job.
2 June 2005: Friends of ours go to the house to capture the cat. The house is messier than when we left. There are pieces of metal and empty boxes everywhere.
2 June 2005: I call Idan and cancel the move. He says that the $1800 will NOT be refunded because he spent that money going to Virginia, and it wasn't his fault that the police wouldn't let them load the container. He says he will mail the keys overnight to our real estate agent in Virginia. I file my first complaint with the Better Business Bureau in Florida.
16 June 2005: Idan Ohana replies to the BBB that he will refund our money minus expenses and that the keys are already in the mail back to us.
13 July 2005: We send our deposit to Access International. They agree to be at the house on 27 and 28 July to pack the house.
27 July 2005: The men from Access arrive on time with a 1300 sq ft Budget Rent-a-Truck. Things seem to be doing smoothly. They pack the house and take the boxes and furniture to storage somewhere. Because of problems with Sea and Air Cargo, we tell Access that a container won't fit in our driveway. Later we discover that Sea and Air did have a container in the driveway. If Access could have brought in a container, this could have saved a lot of trouble later on, we discover.
28 July 2005: As the men leave, we are told that the container will cost an extra $4000 because we have 600 sq ft too much. This was a bit of a shock to us, and if it had been explained as we were packing the truck, we could have told them what to leave out. We assume that we can work it out later.
I'm going to skip some details here (for now), but we eventually come to an agreement to get back to the original estimate.
We talk to our neighbor across the street about the container. He says that Idan arrived on Monday for the keys, and the container was there Monday also. It sat in the driveway for two days, but there was no activity at the house except for a truck from Florida and came and went occasionally, but it was clear no one was really at the house or working. And still no keys from Sea and Air Cargo.
13 Sept 2005: I mail checks for all the charges to Access. In full. For the next few days, I ask for confirmation that they've received the checks. I finally get a message.
22 Sept 2005: I see that the checks have cleared by checking my bank balance. I write to ask for my receipts and for a date for the move. Nothing. I send email every day for a week. They don't answer my email or my phone messages. And it's difficult to get through on their voice mail system because we don't have a touch-tone phone at home, so I must call from the phone at work.
27 Sept 2005: I file a follow-up with the BBB in Florida for Sea and Air Cargo because we have still no refund and still no house keys.
28 Sept 2005: I finally am able to get through to Dan at Access, and I'm promised receipts. I think the past week bodes very badly for the rest of the move, but at this point, I'm afraid to change moving companies again. I explain that besides the receipts, we also need a date for the packing of the container so that we can have a friend there who will pull out the stuff we don't want packed so that everything will fit into the container.
29 Sept 2005: The receipts did arrive by email.
I had also requested the location of the storage unit so that we can send some friends over with a truck to pick up the things we want left behind. We've been told that we have 600 sq ft over the limit, but I think it's less than that, and there are some things that we don't need in Luxembourg, so we are confident we can make it fit into a 40 foot container. All my requests for the location of our belongings have been ignored. Completely. I have thought all along that the $4000 was a scam, and it's looking more and more like that.
4 Oct 2005: At around 6 pm, the phone rings. It was a guy with a fairly heavy Spanish accent. He said he was with our movers and needed Darin's social security number. When anyone asks for a social security number, it is probably a scam. So Darin had him tell the name of the moving company. He got it right, but Darin wanted more confirmation, so Darin talked to me and then called them back at the Access number. It was really Dan at Access and not a scam. Dan said that he personally oversaw the packing of our container and they squished everything in. After all that bickering over them raising the price for an oversized load and the company not wanting to pay and not trusting American movers and the extra European (expensive) bids, they got it all in. We had worked out a list of things to leave out if things did not fit, but we never sent it because they never communicate with us. We did not know when they were packing the container. We wanted to have someone there to help decide what to leave out and to haul stuff away. I don't think they wanted anyone overseeing them.
Now the question is: Did they really get everything in or did they leave some stuff out? We would rather have chosen what to leave out than have a few, possibly important, boxes missing. We had a list of unimportant things they could have left out -- big things that could really have created more room. We have to wait for about six weeks plus however long it takes me to unpack everything to see if anything is missing.
20 Oct 2005: Our goods have arrived in port in Holland. So far I like the Dutch moving company. We have gone from absolutely no information to email and phone calls three or four times a day. Luxembourg customs wants a packing list in French, and Access (the company that packed for us and was supposed to have the list) lost our list.
24 Oct 2005: We've been getting the paperwork together for customs. Our state-side movers must have lost the original packing list, because three-fourths of the items on the list we got to translate was "box". The town officials have been very professional. I went down for residency papers to prove that we actually lived here, and she printed, signed, stamped, tax stamped, and let me purchase them immediately. We also had to send copies of our rental agreement and my work contract. I don't know how many times we've had to give Luxembourg a copy of that contract. Maybe someday they will believe that I really work here.
26 Oct 2005: The stuff arrives. The Dutch movers are polite and efficient. The girls were concerned about having a bunch of guys in the house who could only speak French. I told them that the movers are from Holland and speak better English than I do, at least with more of a British accent than I have. There seems to be minimum damage to the goods, despite lousy packing from Access.
2 Nov 2005: Things are in pretty good shape. Moving has taken its toll on things, but no total losses confirmed as yet. Darin taped the lampshades back on, and it turns out that masking tape matches the shades really well! No, they did nothing to protect them. Darin's toolbox is suspiciously light. The visegrips, an impact set, and some other things are missing. The toolbox was not in another box or taped shut in any way.
The tools seem to be our biggest loss so far, though we still haven't found everything or finished unpacking.
Sea and Air Cargo International was the real disaster of the move, though I feel fortunate to have escaped with minimal damage. Basically, we paid them $1800 and they did nothing. In hindsight, it could have been worse, because as far as we can tell, nothing was stolen from the house.
Jan 2005: I sign a contract with a company in Luxembourg.
Feb 2005: I quit my government job.
Mar 2005: My contracts with Eurostat begin. I move to Europe without Darin and our three girls.
30 April 2005: We sign a contract with Sea and Air, and my company pays them $1800 as a down payment for our move, scheduled to load on 18 May from Virginia to Europe. Our sales person, Maria, tells us to relax because everything is under control and we have hire full-service packing, etc.
17 May 2005: Eleanor calls to tell us that the container is scheduled for 23 May. I explain that is incorrect because we are leaving for Europe on 21 May. I tell her we want to cancel. She says we can't cancel without 12 days notice, even though they have "postponed" our date with less than 24 hours notice. I talk to Idan Ohana who promises to personally oversee the move. He gives me his cell phone number and tells me I can call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. I tell him we will leave the keys with our neighbor across the street. He says he will arrive on Sunday to pack the house, and that loading will begin when the container arrives on Monday.
22 May 2005: I try to call Idan from Europe. His phone is off. I call my real estate agent and my pastor. No one from Sea and Air is at the house.
23 May 2005: I call Idan from Europe again. He says that he was able to get the keys, but they can't pack the house because it's too messy and there is too much stuff. I tell him that it wouldn't have been a problem if we had been there because we could have told them what to leave out, if it really doesn't fit. He says he will call me again later.
24 May 2005: I call Idan again. He gives me a long story about how they couldn't get the container in the driveway and that the police told them they couldn't be there. So now there is too much stuff, and they will need a truck to carry the stuff to a container at some other location. Our driveway is much longer than 40 feet, and straight, and I can't understand why the police care that we have a container in our driveway. There is no neighborhood association, or anything like that. Idan says they will need more money.
25 May 2005 - 31 May 2005: Idan's phone is turned off.
1 June 2005: I talk to Idan again. He is back in Florida. He really still wants to be our mover, but he needs more money. They had to send the container to someone else since it didn't fit in our driveway, so he will have to schedule a new container and he needs more money because our house is really messy. He says that he looked at our furniture and realize we had nothing of value, so he's afraid to pack our house and put it in a container because we will decide that we don't want our belongings since we have nothing of value. (Maria had told us that we should pack everything of value ourselves, which we did.) I don't want to list for him everything we do have that's valuable, so I tell him we are canceling the move. I ask him why, when he left to return to Florida, he didn't leave the keys with our neighbor. He said it was because he still wanted the job.
2 June 2005: Friends of ours go to the house to capture the cat. The house is messier than when we left. There are pieces of metal and empty boxes everywhere.
2 June 2005: I call Idan and cancel the move. He says that the $1800 will NOT be refunded because he spent that money going to Virginia, and it wasn't his fault that the police wouldn't let them load the container. He says he will mail the keys overnight to our real estate agent in Virginia. I file my first complaint with the Better Business Bureau in Florida.
16 June 2005: Idan Ohana replies to the BBB that he will refund our money minus expenses and that the keys are already in the mail back to us.
13 July 2005: We send our deposit to Access International. They agree to be at the house on 27 and 28 July to pack the house.
27 July 2005: The men from Access arrive on time with a 1300 sq ft Budget Rent-a-Truck. Things seem to be doing smoothly. They pack the house and take the boxes and furniture to storage somewhere. Because of problems with Sea and Air Cargo, we tell Access that a container won't fit in our driveway. Later we discover that Sea and Air did have a container in the driveway. If Access could have brought in a container, this could have saved a lot of trouble later on, we discover.
28 July 2005: As the men leave, we are told that the container will cost an extra $4000 because we have 600 sq ft too much. This was a bit of a shock to us, and if it had been explained as we were packing the truck, we could have told them what to leave out. We assume that we can work it out later.
I'm going to skip some details here (for now), but we eventually come to an agreement to get back to the original estimate.
We talk to our neighbor across the street about the container. He says that Idan arrived on Monday for the keys, and the container was there Monday also. It sat in the driveway for two days, but there was no activity at the house except for a truck from Florida and came and went occasionally, but it was clear no one was really at the house or working. And still no keys from Sea and Air Cargo.
13 Sept 2005: I mail checks for all the charges to Access. In full. For the next few days, I ask for confirmation that they've received the checks. I finally get a message.
22 Sept 2005: I see that the checks have cleared by checking my bank balance. I write to ask for my receipts and for a date for the move. Nothing. I send email every day for a week. They don't answer my email or my phone messages. And it's difficult to get through on their voice mail system because we don't have a touch-tone phone at home, so I must call from the phone at work.
27 Sept 2005: I file a follow-up with the BBB in Florida for Sea and Air Cargo because we have still no refund and still no house keys.
28 Sept 2005: I finally am able to get through to Dan at Access, and I'm promised receipts. I think the past week bodes very badly for the rest of the move, but at this point, I'm afraid to change moving companies again. I explain that besides the receipts, we also need a date for the packing of the container so that we can have a friend there who will pull out the stuff we don't want packed so that everything will fit into the container.
29 Sept 2005: The receipts did arrive by email.
I had also requested the location of the storage unit so that we can send some friends over with a truck to pick up the things we want left behind. We've been told that we have 600 sq ft over the limit, but I think it's less than that, and there are some things that we don't need in Luxembourg, so we are confident we can make it fit into a 40 foot container. All my requests for the location of our belongings have been ignored. Completely. I have thought all along that the $4000 was a scam, and it's looking more and more like that.
4 Oct 2005: At around 6 pm, the phone rings. It was a guy with a fairly heavy Spanish accent. He said he was with our movers and needed Darin's social security number. When anyone asks for a social security number, it is probably a scam. So Darin had him tell the name of the moving company. He got it right, but Darin wanted more confirmation, so Darin talked to me and then called them back at the Access number. It was really Dan at Access and not a scam. Dan said that he personally oversaw the packing of our container and they squished everything in. After all that bickering over them raising the price for an oversized load and the company not wanting to pay and not trusting American movers and the extra European (expensive) bids, they got it all in. We had worked out a list of things to leave out if things did not fit, but we never sent it because they never communicate with us. We did not know when they were packing the container. We wanted to have someone there to help decide what to leave out and to haul stuff away. I don't think they wanted anyone overseeing them.
Now the question is: Did they really get everything in or did they leave some stuff out? We would rather have chosen what to leave out than have a few, possibly important, boxes missing. We had a list of unimportant things they could have left out -- big things that could really have created more room. We have to wait for about six weeks plus however long it takes me to unpack everything to see if anything is missing.
20 Oct 2005: Our goods have arrived in port in Holland. So far I like the Dutch moving company. We have gone from absolutely no information to email and phone calls three or four times a day. Luxembourg customs wants a packing list in French, and Access (the company that packed for us and was supposed to have the list) lost our list.
24 Oct 2005: We've been getting the paperwork together for customs. Our state-side movers must have lost the original packing list, because three-fourths of the items on the list we got to translate was "box". The town officials have been very professional. I went down for residency papers to prove that we actually lived here, and she printed, signed, stamped, tax stamped, and let me purchase them immediately. We also had to send copies of our rental agreement and my work contract. I don't know how many times we've had to give Luxembourg a copy of that contract. Maybe someday they will believe that I really work here.
26 Oct 2005: The stuff arrives. The Dutch movers are polite and efficient. The girls were concerned about having a bunch of guys in the house who could only speak French. I told them that the movers are from Holland and speak better English than I do, at least with more of a British accent than I have. There seems to be minimum damage to the goods, despite lousy packing from Access.
2 Nov 2005: Things are in pretty good shape. Moving has taken its toll on things, but no total losses confirmed as yet. Darin taped the lampshades back on, and it turns out that masking tape matches the shades really well! No, they did nothing to protect them. Darin's toolbox is suspiciously light. The visegrips, an impact set, and some other things are missing. The toolbox was not in another box or taped shut in any way.
The tools seem to be our biggest loss so far, though we still haven't found everything or finished unpacking.
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