The Adventures of Home Searching in Vancouver!

These days, I have been shopping for new place to stay in. Kind of bored with the current place and was thinking of moving closer to my new work and since I have never done this before and the fact that I have got some time before I start at my new job on July 2nd, I started searching on the internet looking for a two bed room apartment in Burnaby. As a result, I have spent the last two days viewing apartments and meeting some of the owners and I tell you something folks, I was in for some weird surprises! To name a few;

1-Some of the owners are WEIRD! or at least switch to "weird mode" when they meet a prospective tenant of their places. It's like a dad looking at his daughter's first boyfriend if you know what I mean! Seriously, I remembered the funny looks and behavior that you typically see on TV shows. Tell you what folks, I have had quite an interesting couple of days (and counting!). Let me tell this one, I met this couple whom are putting their apartment for rent, they looked fine, and the wife was of Iranian descent (or Persian as they like to call themselves here in Canada! LOL - oh, by the way, watch Maz Jobrani's stand up on youtube, look for Persians vs. Arabs, it's hilarious) and the husband looked, well, I thought he was Iranian but when he spoke, his accent wasn’t the typical Iranian English accent that I know (I'm really good with accents by the way) so I just left it there as I don't care really. I was there for a reason and I didn't wanna distract myself by trivial stuff like that. Anyway, I talked mainly to the wife as her English was much better than her husband's (but I can feel that the husband was not very comfortable, you know, a middle eastern man watching his wife leading a conversation with a another man with him standing there, feeling helpless, kind of). Her name was Zahra (so typical!) and we had a chat for about 30 minutes or so talking about Vancouver, the local real estate market, Dubai, the 2010 Olympics and some other small talk subjects. Towards the end, Zahra (having known that I was in Dubai for quite a few years, was very curious to know where I come from)asked me if I was Persian. I was expecting her question, I can see it coming so I paused, looked into her eyes, smiled and told her, no, I am from Iraq and suddenly, I saw lights go off in her husband's face although I was not looking at him (peripheral vision, one skill I acquired playing Basketball for few years and has helped me a great deal in life). So, having felt that her husband's reaction was about to blow the deal, Zahra exclaimed, Oh, Jamal is from Jordan, pointing towards her husband! But he’s been here since he was 12 (he is probably 40+ now) so I turned to him and said, Oh really, "shlonak" (means, how are you in Iraqi dialect), he replied, “Al Hamdulillah” struggling to hide the discomfort expressions shaping like wave ripples on of his face. Following that was a couple of seconds of awkward silence then he jumped to save the scene (or so he thought) and said in his poor English along the lines of "don't worry, you being an Iraqi won't affect my decision, I won't hold it against you" and my jaw dropped! WTF!! Damn, I could not see this one coming but I recovered quickly, took a deep breath, smiled and looked at him and then to his wife and smiled at her (just to piss him off really!) and then said (still looking into Zahra’s eyes) “why should I be worried, you being Jordanian, I should be holding that against you but I won’t this time for your wife’s sake” by this time he was really pissed so I started walking towards the door on the way out having decided to stay away from this place and said good bye and will get back to you folks tomorrow. That was a surprise folks especially here in Canada. Some folks just won’t change! I mean he’s been living in Canada for at least 27 years and his English is so poor which means he has not been exposed to people here and I wonder what he is doing for a living? That was one good shocker!

2-The second one was not as big but still makes you wonder what goes on into people’s minds when they are meeting prospective tenants. Anyway, I agreed to meet this lady in the afternoon at 07:00 (still sunny, sunset is around 09:30 pm these days in Vancouver). I’m usually a punctual person so I arrived on time and found a young lady standing at the main door. I approached her and asked her if she was Elia? And she said yes, I am. Elia is a nice young lady, dressed casually, and has a small mole on her left cheek. She didn't have an accent but she had that glimpse of the traditional Indian beauty features on her that was kind of attractive. So after introducing myself, I asked her if I can see the apartment and she says NO! Perplexed by her reply I asked her why? She says, well I’m waiting for my father and brother to arrive. My father does not allow me to show the flat to strangers! WHAT? Give me a break, are you kidding me? I mean we’re not in New York or the Bronx! Anyway, I bit the bullet as I liked the building so I said "OK, when do you expect him to show up? Is he gonna be late?" Elia apologetically said "I’m sorry but it seems he’s gonna be late for a few minutes, I hope you don’t mind?" I looked at her, she was not bad looking as I said and I thought a few minutes with a fine lady like Elia won't harm, so I said “well, a few minutes won’t be the end of the world!”. I tried to strike a normal conversation but she kept looking at the road and her watch, as if she does not want her dad seeing her talk to stranger kind of behavior! So, having seen that, I just stood silent waiting for DAD and made a couple of calls to waste some time! 15 minutes later, dad shows up with the brother, so we finally went upstairs to see the apartment. I went in, took a look around, the apartment was not bad, 24th floor, NW corner, nice view but the bed rooms were on the smallish side. I have seen a couple of other places in the same building earlier that morning so I was well aware of the specifications and amenities. Anyway, you can see her scanning me, looking at her dad as if she is asking him “what do you think dad?” again, dad looked tired but was also monitoring my moves around the place. I almost felt a burning sensation on the back of my neck while I was checking the place! Anyway, having experienced the weirdness and decided to pass on the place, I did my usual teasing which in this case was asking her if the monthly rental she indicated in the ad is negotiable. Boy, they hate this question but I was trying to tease so I did not really care. She was kind of surprised and looked at her dad again and then looked back at me and said “of course NO, I already dropped the price once” as if I should have known that! So I said, OK, I will get to you tomorrow (Goolee Zeezee), and said goodbye for now and left quickly.

3-Below is a list of some of the questions that the owners have listed on the application forms (yes, you have to submit an application form!):

a-“do you drink?” What the hell that is supposed to tell you?
b-“What was your income in your last job? What was your position?” This is after asking for the current salary and position. These guys want to piece together your complete psychiatric profile, hobbies, what do you like to do you in your spare time, your favorite perfume, ..everything! WTF do you think I’m renting here? Your wife? Give me a break!
c-“what car do you have? Which model and year?” another dumb question to see how well off you are.
d-“How long do you intend to stay in this place?”, this is another one of these stupid questions, the standard tenancy contract here is one year, so what do you think I will tell you? Three moths? or perhaps ten years? Would that make you happy you dumb a$$?
e-“Why do you want to move to this place?” how about because I like it! Now what?
f-“Please list two personal references and two others from work (preferably supervisor)”! Again one of these intruding questions. Why should my employer know if I’m moving to a new place?

Look, I’m not being grumpy here but really, what were you thinking? People watch too much TV these days that they think that they have become some kind of detectives and can read your mind and predict if you will be a good tenant or not. I’m sure that there are many reasons why owners are doing what they are doing but you should be reasonable here. It’s like applying for a top level NASA job! Or asking to marry somebody’s daughter in a traditional arranged marriage in rural areas in the ME.