The last few weeks have been stressful as we got closer to our moving date on Nov 1! Our immigration lawyer was hired to help us with our business creation (check! We’ve had an office space, accountant, and an official gov ID since July), relocation services, and visa application. We were intending to have a place secured before moving, but our lawyers dropped the ball. We can’t apply for our visa until we have a permanent residence, so housing is crucial. As the Netherlands also has a housing crisis, and for business research, we wanted to see how they approach securing housing for newcomers. In lieu of having a place, we had to scramble at the end of October to find a place to land for the first month. Thankfully, after a few tries on Airbnb, we were able to secure an apartment in Amsterdam Oost (east, pronounced oh-st). Of course, it was way more than we hoped or intended to pay, which as an aside, has felt very frustrating being upcharged plus the conversion fee from USD to EUR for everything that we’ve paid for thus far. It gives us that much more appreciation for the resilience and lived experiences of unhoused people, and the immigrant experience.

We arrived on Sunday, Nov 2 and were relieved to have an easy time getting to the place with all our luggage (the rest of our possessions that fit into 2 checked bags, a carry on and a personal item)! Now we will be spending the next few weeks looking at apartments (our requirements are: close to transportation and fully furnished, within our budget) that our lawyer finds for us, although it will probably be further from Amsterdam than we initially thought. We are so relieved to be here, but won’t be able to fully soak it in until we have a more permanent residence. So for now we are adjusting to the time difference and happy to be one step closer in this chaotic process. The Airbnb is in a charming location, just along one of the many canals of Amsterdam, so it’s nice to start in such a great neighborhood!