When you walk in the door, the first room you see is the kitchen on your right.
We have a small fridge, a mini fridge, a microwave, a toaster oven with hot plates on top, a sink, some super high cabinets that my vertically challenged roommate Vicky and I struggle to reach, and a table that get treated like a counter/storage area. Things worth noting: not oven, no coffeemaker, no toaster. I guess I need to figure out how to use that toaster oven. Also, aforementioned roommate Vicky made me iced coffee this morning using instant coffee and it was surprisingly good. I guess I'll be learning to love the instant stuff... for now, at least.
After the kitchen you walk down this pseudo-hallway that has a little half wall.
This picture was taken in the living room, you can see the half wall and the doors to our bedrooms. The first (left) bedroom is Vicky and Lia's, the one on the right is mine and Jennifer's. To the right of the mirror is our bathroom.
See? Bathroom.
This picture is deceptive, the bathroom is actually really big, especially by Paris standards.
When you walk out of the bathroom, this is what you see.
There's a huge cutout from our living room into the kitchen, which is great. It makes the very cramped kitchen feel much more open, and really helps to make the rooms both feel bigger. Also, there is a plug in the half wall, so people can straighten their hair in front of the full length mirror, rather than taking up the bathroom (4 girls, 1 bathroom... luckily we all have class at different times!)
If you turn to your left, you'll see into our living room.
See the (living) flowers? Jennifer came home with the exact same type that I bought a few hours after this picture was taken! Hers are now on the mantle in our room. But anyway, as you can see we have a couch (that I pretty much set up my computer in front of), a little cafe table that Lia has been using for her computer (these pictures were taken before they moved in) and a larger, dining-sized table that Vicky has been using for her computer. It's worked out really well so far! I put my Paris travel books in the cabinet in the fireplace so that everyone has access to them, too.
At the end of the living room we have a window
My roommates are all smokers, so having the little courtyard right outside our window (we're on the ground floor) has proven to be convenient. Also, we've twice now encountered a cat! Vicky said it was mean and hissing this morning when I was in the shower, but he looked really cute last night through the kitchen window. Maybe I'm just missing Cashmere and Tobias.
Jennifer and I share a bedroom
This is my half. We have curtains that divide the room for privacy, you can see them in the foreground on the right of this picture. Also pictured here is my suitcase: that giant lump covered in pashmina's to the left of my bed. Nice, huh? My bed is so low to the ground that my larger suitcase won't fit beneath it. Vicky and Lia offered to let me store it under their beds, but I'm currently using it as a makeshift nightstand. Another storage issue was solved by using my headboard to hold my scarves.
Storage issue, you ask?
Yep, that's my closet, at the foot of my bed. The shelf is maybe 5 inches deep. Note that I said shelf. Singular. Yep. And the hanging bar is so low that my dresses sit on the floor, which is just weird, unfinished concrete. I keep my dresses in Jennifer's closet, which is a normal-sized wardrobe. My underwear and socks are currently in some boxes bought at Monoprix, sitting on the floor. Please be jealous of my fireplace though! That single dead stem was replaced by Jennifer's flowers, which look beautiful. I use the mantle to keep my books, notebooks, watch, lotion... and Febreeze. Apparently it costs like €8 to do a load of laundry. Febreeze it is!
Remember when I said I used Jennifer's closet to store my dresses?
Mine are the white hangers on the right-hand size. Yeah, it's not like she has an abundance of space, either. Vicky and Lia each got a wardrobe the size of Jennifer's, PLUS another set of shelves the same size! And they also have a built-in mini closet like mine. I guess it's a trade off though, since they don't have a curtain. I'm not sure if their room is actually smaller, or if it just feels that way because their wardrobe is 3x the size of ours.
And speaking of Vicky and Lia's room, I didn't take any pictures of it because they weren't even in it yet. So yeah, there is the tour of my apartment. If you want better pictures of anything just ask and I can take more!
