Archive for the ‘Visiting our new home’ Category

I actually wanted to write this post way earlier this week, but I have been to tired and overwhelmed to do it. As you may already know we arrived in LA at around noon on Monday. It took us some time to make our way through the airport. Not because we had problems with immigration or anything, but because we sat at the end of our huge plane and had about six handbags to collect after we finally got out of the plane. The immigration officer was – again – totally easy on us and just asked where we lived know and said welcome. I was actually worried about the loads of luggage we carried with us, but customs did not even care.

LA greated us with bright sunshine and we felt so good to finally arrive in the city we now call our home. After a little drive we arrived at the place where we will stay for the next two months which is located in the heart of West Hollywood. We always wanted to move to Orange County, but after two days here in LA I totally fell in love and wanna stay for at least a few months.

Today we went for a little hike in Runyon Canyon and were again amazed by how beautiful it is over here! It is funny that we came over here just in time for Valentine’s Day, because it is the right time of year to fall in love!

For this is our last official holiday before the big move, we decided to relax most of the time and just take little baby steps regarding our actual move. One thing we definetely wanted to get done over here is applying for the Social Security number. We actually thought about doing it in Germany, but you have to do it at the consulate in Frankfurt. For me this wouldn’t have been a huge problem, because I work in Frankfurt. But Flo would have had to take a whole day off from work to do it. And: If you apply for the Social Security number in Germany it takes them up to eight weeks to send it to you.

So we decided to take the chance of being in the US now and applied for the SSN on Tuesday. We got up early, because we had no appointment and arrived at the Social Security Administration Office at 9 am when they opened. We only had to wait about ten minutes to get called up by an officer. She actually scared us first, because she looked like a tough officer, but turned out to be really nice. We only had to hand her our passports, Greencards and the filled out application forms and she began typing.

Flo went first and was kind of shocked when she announced that he had to answer all questions of the upcoming interview clear and truthfully. Interview? We actually didn’t know about an interview at all. But don’t get too scared right now: It is kind of basic questions and not that bad. I actually understood the woman very good and Flo guessed some of the questions and sticked answering “no”.

After our interviews the officer handed us two letters saying that we applied for the SSN on Tuesday and told us that it would take Flo’s number two weeks to arrive and mine a bit longer.

So, in a few days we both will be proud owners of our very first Social Security numbers. This is a baby step in the whole process, but feels pretty big and good!

Officially today is my first Halloween, but for today being a Sunday we went to our first Halloween party, yesterday. Our friends Jeana and Scott took us to their friends party and were also so nice to lend us some costumes. I had to improvise mine a bit, because the dress belonging to the dead bride costume that Jeana gave me, was a bit too tight for me. Flo went as a Ninja and we both felt kind of weird, because we never wear costumes in Germany (except for carnival – but we both are not huge fans).

For us the weirdness actually started pretty early that day when we went for a coffee run and the girl at Starbucks greeted us with Happy Halloween. Afterwards we met our hotel manager with a little girl (maybe his) who asked us to Trick or Treat. I had to give her some german gums, because I hadn’t got anything else in our apartment, but she was fine with it and gave us some candy for a change.

We went to the party in the evening. Actually right before that we drove by a car accident and there was a dead body lying on the street, which was a very creepy way to start your Halloween night. The party we went to was in Newport Beach and the couple that throw it set up everything really nicely. We were kind of stoked about all the costumes. There were Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, a Care Bear, Little Bo Peep and Scott went as the movie character from the film Nacho Libre. We were a bit shocked about how short the girl’s costumes are over here. Not many girls would dare to go to a party with skirts that not cover up their whole behinds in Germany.

But I think we have to get used to this as much as we have to everyone being friendly, interested and really openminded. Today we will treat ourselves to a little shopping trip, but if you celebrate Halloween today: Happy Halloween and have fun times!