With just under 6 weeks left in Taiwan (ever!), I am starting the somewhat terrible and somewhat fun process of relocating to another country once again. Yes, it has started already. I came to Taiwan in three suitcases, and I will not be able to leave with just that! It's amazing how much stuff one person can accumulate in the course of two years.
I had heard from other coworkers who went through this same process last year that shipping boxes home by "slow boat" (meaning your package is literally shipped on a barge instead of flown in the air) is pretty easy to do from Taiwan and relatively cheap. So a few weeks ago I set out on the quest to find boxes to put my "life" in. I went to grocery stores, hardware stores, stationary stores, looking for the perfect discarded pieces of cardboard to safely house my things back to the U.S. The biggest requirement I was in search of was box dimensions big enough to pack enough in while still being able to fit on my scooter (how else would I get it to the post office?! I miss my Civic...and it's trunk space). It was a challenge.
Little by little however, I managed to gather three good boxes to meet my very specific size requirements. Then I began compiling the heaviest, bulkiest stuff I owned here that wasn't going to be used in this last month. I packed up DVD's, books (too many!), nail polish (many bottles = surprising amounts of weight), extra t-shirts, sweatpants, and all types of jackets- professional and recreational. In my scooter sized boxes and with three separate trips to the post office, I packed the excess baggage of my life. And now it's gone...hopefully not for good!
The post office is pretty easy to navigate here and my coworkers from last year were right, it was cheap to send those boxes. All three cost me just over $100 total which is nothing compared to the $700 allowance my school gives me to move home. The only problem? It takes 3 months for them to reach their destination. Slow boat, remember?! Yikes, so I guess I'll find out in August if I still own several bottles of shockingly pink OPI nail polish and a twentieth anniversary edition of Bambi on DVD. I will keep my fingers crossed that they show up but I sure won't be holding my breath until then!
Countdown until my departure from Taiwan: 39 days
No comments:
Post a Comment