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Hello and welcome to the blog! It’s a a bit of a work in progress so bare with us. But I thought I would share some photos from our first month living in the big city. Expect more up to date posts in the future. So here we go:

It was such a pain finding an apartment in this city. When we first came up to Chicago searching, we had little knowledge of the various neighborhoods or the street grid system. So most of the days were spent driving around in circles and always being mere miles from our destination yet having no idea how to get there. Without fail, every street we wanted to go down seemed to be a one way going the opposite direction. And the constant four ways stops were making Apryl rather queasy. It didn’t help that once we were shown an apartment, it was either in a bad location or had very little space (or both). In fact, it took two trips to Chicago before we found our apartment. Our new home is a two bedroom in a nice neighborhood (Bucktown). And only a five minute walk to the Western Blue El Stop. Plus, we are only a few blocks away from the interstate. The photo above shows our apartment complex. There are six units in the building and we are on the first floor on the northside.

This is a photo taken a few moments before we started to unload the truck. Notice Eva on her hind legs checking out the neighborhood for the first time.

It might have taken two days to cram full but it took less than four hours to unload everything from the Budget truck into the apartment. On the first night, we did have the bedroom bed set up but that’s about it.

That first week was a bit rough. Nothing seemed to go right. For me, the most frustrating part was having to get around the city. Now, it’s true that the city has good public transportation. But it seemed everytime I had to get something done, I had to jump in the Accord or Corolla. Below is a photo of typical traffic congestion:

And here is my reaction:

I might look calm in the photo but really I’m close to getting out of the car and just walking back to our apartment. Not that I would have been able to find it. On this day, I was literally driving in a circle around our neighborhood. I just couldn’t seem to get out of Lincoln Park! I am too embarrassed to tell you how long I was lost for but I did finally break down and run into a Walgreens for a Chicago street map. It seems I was about a mile and a half away from our apartment.

Even when we decided to have a relaxing dinner we ran into problems. In Memphis, we enjoyed eating Indian food about once a week. One of our favorites was two blocks from Apryl’s apartment. In Chicago, there is an entire Indian district in the West Rogers Park neighborhood. So it seemed like a no brainer for some true authenic Indian food we should venture over to West Rogers and the famous Devon Avenue, home to literally hundreds of Indian resturants. One thing that I wasn’t expecting was a street that was as busy as the Chicago interstate during rush hour!

We chose to eat out at Udupi Palace, which I had read some favorable reviews on Yelp. Well, we weren’t too thrilled about our meal (Apryl’s was too spicy and mine was an odd khorma served green).

You can read my review of the dining experience here.

After leaving the restaurant, we witnessed a car wreck right in front of us! We were happy to get home alive. Still, the neighborhood was fascinating to experience with all those curry smells, Indian families, and late night shopping at jewelry stores.

Another extremely busy street is Clybourn which is where we were able to use several of our wedding gift cards. And while getting around here was another stressful test, there were things like below that just made you smile:

Next week was much better than the first. We even have furniture in the living room:

We even make it out to our first show, M.Ward at the Metro:

Check out the size of the bus hogging the right lane of the street:

That night, M. Ward puts on one of the best performances I’ve seen all year.

Since we were in the neighborhood, I decided to snap a photo of Wrigley Field though we didn’t actually make it to a game this season. Just as well, seeing as the Cubs were having quite an embarrasing season.

We DID however make it to the last home game of the Chicago White Sox. This was a disappointing season for last year’s World Series champions, but the guys did give their fans something to cheer about with a 12-7 victory over Seatle. We even saw a total of nine homeruns including back to back homers and a grand slam! Check out the view from our seats:

And since the Sox are right across the street from Apryl’s school, I guess we’re Sox fans!

What could be more exciting than the Sox game? A trip to Ikea in Schaumburg of course!

This store is four stories of AWE! I could spend the whole day checking out this chain. There is even a food court inside serving the Ikea speciality: Swedish Meatballs. My favorite feature of Ikea, though, is the people/cart esculator. You ride down one side while your cart full of Ikea goodies takes its own route:

Last week, I went alone to see “post rock” pioneers Tortoise play their only show in the States this year. I took the bus (the first time for me in Chicago) which was an easy trek down Western Ave to the infamous Empty Bottle club. Here is the line outside:

While standing in line, I noticed a little bit of home sticking to the glass window:

I was thrilled to catch this show, especially after finding out that it was sold out. I might write a review of this show (on Loconotion) but right now, I’ll just say that I couldn’t get this performance out of my head for days!

(more to follow…)