This is our new home in Leuven for the next six months, until we find a place to buy. We have rented a partly-furnished one bedroom flat on the first floor of an apartment complex, and the movers have already delivered everything we had sent over from the US and Australia. So now we are all unpacked, and this little place is our new home. The cupboards are filled with books, and we have even put up our photos. We have some large travel photos framed on the wall, and on the cupboards we have two montages of small photos – the black framed wedding photos, and the white frame filled with smiles of Amy, Katharine, Fleur, and Sarah. There are large panel heaters in every room, as well as under-floor heating, so the temperature is always pleasant and easy to control with a turn of the knob. The bedroom is through the door on the left, and the entrance and bathroom through the door on the right. Adrian bought me the tulips on his way home from work.

The kitchen is still small, but larger than the kitchenette we had in Seattle. We have a stove top but no oven, and the convection microwave that I bought does not seem adequate. Mum’s painting of the Australian beach sits beside my iMac that I use to keep in touch with the rest of the world. You can also see our coat rack hanging by the door. We have some lovely lamps that we brought with us from Seattle, but they have US plugs, and the power-boards that we brought with us are only rated to 125 V, so the computer usually wins ownership of the only electrical adaptor in the house. My sneakers indicate that I’m just about to head off to the gym – a fantastic place a few minutes walk from the apartment. All the classes are in Dutch, but they are expertly taught and fun to take.

This is the view from our balcony. We are only minutes away from the supermarket, the train station, and the bus to the hospital where Adrian works. The streets are lined with delightful stores, and fascinating sculptures are to be found around every corner. I am still waiting for our marriage certificate to be legalised before I can get permanent residency, but Adrian is already at work due to his UK citizenship. We don’t have any friends in Belgium yet, and it is daunting and scary to build a life anew, but I am glad that we can do it in a country as charming and fascinating as Belgium.