Found a Place

Good news! I spoke to my parents last night and they just signed a lease for an apartment! Woohoo!

I was worried there for a little bit, since there weren't any new prospects and it looked like they would have to stay longer in the hotel. But Ms. Zhang, the nice agent who showed us the roof-top apartment, found this place and my parents didn't hesitate to get it.

It's a 1 + 1/2 bedroom apartment, fully furnished, with living room and kitchen, on the second floor of an apartment building with elevator access. They will be paying NT$20,000 a month.

So the apartment is located in the Xinyi district, near Xinyi Rd. (Section 5) and Wuxing Rd. It's not the most optimum location, as I heard they have to take a minibus (NT$15) to get to the nearest subway stop, the City Hall station. Looks like it's pretty close to Taipei 101, which you can see in the photo above that I took on Jan. 21.

I'm not sure if they will be staying that long, but for what it's worth, Taipei is building an MRT line down Xinyi Rd. I checked the Taiwan tourist website and they said it won't be completed until 2011. Looks like it will connect with the Blue line at Guting.

I asked my dad what he thought of the apartment and he said that it was "OK," so I'm not expecting a new apartment or anything. But he did say it was clean and had everything so all they had to buy were new sheets and blankets.

My dad sounded good today. He told me that he's been really uncomfortable the past few days because of constipation. But he increased the frequency and dosage of magnesium oxide tablets he's taking to three times a day, and that's helping.

"My head, I still can't move too quickly. Otherwise, I get dizzy," he added.

My mom's spirits seem good, as one big hurdle has now been passed. They have an appointment with the cancer specialist again tomorrow morning, so I'll report later on that.