With a little help from my friends

It’s been a busy few weeks- the past five weeks I have been commuting back and forth between Wageningen and Brussels – opening and closing accounts, making and maintaining contacts, shifting boxes and furniture and - just to make a hard rod for my back - organising a leaving party. Trying to ensure I have all the necessary adapters, chargers, the right sets of keys and a supply of clean underwear with me at all times.

There have been (more than) a few white knuckle moments. The first came when the band that I booked for my party dropped out due to their lead singer and banjo player having slipped a disc. A friend stepped up to the table and organised a very good band of musicians who had actually never played together before (though I don’t think anyone noticed). The problem was that they were electric and the band I had originally booked was acoustic and - because there is restaurant above the venue - they couldn’t start playing until 10.30, (which, being Sunday night meant, they played their second set to a near empty room).

The second white knuckle moment came when handing back my flat in Wageningen. Initially it all went smoothly. I handed in my notice, the Woningstichting (housing association) found a new tenant who came round and we agreed a price for the fittings and fixtures. The next week the official from the Woningstichting came round and told me that the insulation (the Dutch always say isolation) under the flooring didn’t meet their standards and they would have to get approval from the downstairs neighbour that there were no noise issues. I waited. And waited. A week before the hand over date I called the Woningstichting and asked if they had done the job yet. ‘Um no’. But they did get on the job and let me know within 24 hours that there was no problem. That problem solved I tried to contact the new tenant to get a transfer of fittings form signed. He didn’t answer his e mails and his mobile number was permanently unavailable. Frantic phone calls to the Woningstichting revealed that he hadn’t even yet been in to sign the contract.

Tuesday evening the officials at the Woningstichting advised me to clear out the flat as otherwise they would charge me (quite a lot) to do it themselves. That would mean two days (minimum) extra work to rip out the flooring / shelving and other fittings - and I had something much more fun planned for the weekend. I started to accept that I might lose the transfer fee - and my weekend - and have to take that high quality flooring, etc. to the dump. Wednesday morning I phoned the refuse service and asked them to collect a washing machine, fridge and hob from outside my flat on Thursday morning. Wednesday evening I went to the flat with a trolley to put out said items for collection the following morning. When, by stroke of chance, I met the concierge of our block of flats who told me the contract had been signed and to keep the things in the flat. I hung in there – at risk of having to take the washing machine to the dump myself, a task I was trying to avoid, and eventually on Friday evening the new tenant turned up – pissed as a fart- signed the papers and greased my palm with a few hundred Euros.

While all this was going on the clutch on my van starting to show signs of distress. I‘d put it through its APK (MoT) the week before and had got off relatively lightly. Now, whenever I went to change gear, there was a worrying whining sound. I went into my garage and discussed this with them and they identified the problem. ‘Do you think I can make Brussels and back?’ The answer was not reassuring. The next day –on my last run from the flat to the dump – the clutch gave up altogether. I couldn’t change gears. My van limped from the dump to the garage in first gear – thankfully only 500m or so. ‘I think this needs fixing sooner rather than later.’ But- being a big job - they couldn’t fit in that week, so another round of rescheduling was required – involving buying a return train ticket to Brussels and trusting that the new tenant would actually come good, which he eventualy did at seven o' clock on Friday night. By nine I had fallen asleep on my friend’s sofa.

There was one more white knuckle ride – involving hiring a van from a depot on the outskirts of the city which, I found out two days beforehand, involved having (or finding someone with) a Belgian residence permit. Again a relative stranger stepped up to the table and saved the day. ‘With a little help from my friends’ - I couldn’t have done all this without their help. This week I have been inert – remarshalling my resources… getting my things together in the same place – for the first time in months.