Tanja has got a job in Bonn, I am studying in Aachen. Cologne is situated somewhere in the middle of the two other cities.

The thought which Tanja and I had was to move in together somewhere in Cologne. Therefore, in late fall last year we started searching for apartments in Cologne. It is not easy to find something which is not too far from the train station (Tanja and I’ll have to commute), reasonably priced and not too ramshackle. We phoned, we drove to Cologne, we visited … without much success.

Then Tanja found this offer for apartments which are owned by the federal government and which are rented only to employees of the federal government (you guessed right: Tanja is employed by our federal government). These apartments are usually pretty cheap (at least for Cologne standards – they are subsidised by the government) and therefore difficult to get. But when we applied it looked like we had good chances to get a 70 m² one with 3 rooms, kitchen, bathroom and balcony. There were two identical apartments with these specifications and two parties (including Tanja and me) had applied.

Unfortunately, between Xmas and the new year a co-worker of Tanja put in a last-minute application and that girl is in a better position because she’s got children. So, Tanja and I were out of the contest. (There is an burocratic manchinery which is in charge of those federal apartments and they assign the flats (if possible) to people who are in need (less children=less need). Which is basically a good thing, even if it turns out to be not in our favour…

You can imagine that we didn’t feel like this was going to be a good start to the new year, with the prospect of more checking “to let”-offers, phoning, arranging meetings and uarrgh…but what can you do?

Yeah, what can you do?

I tell you what: you can receive a phone call from a totally baffled Tanja who tells you that we can have the apartment anyway! Which left me completely baffled, too. But it turned out that the office in charge had gotten something mixed up and given out wrong information. The correct information is: Tanja will get one flat and her co-worker the other one. From May onwards we’ll be renting a completely refurbished flat, with new floor, new wallpapers, new bathroom etc. Three rooms, a large hall, large bathroom, kitchen with balcony facing a nice green backyard (as is the sleeping room, btw) and all that for a price that could usually just get half of the above listed (Cologne is awfully expensive when it comes to housing).

A DREAM HAS COME TRUE!!