The endangered Asian Tigers

I fell in love with my apartment instantly, and as is too often the case with me, I tend to overlook certain practicalities when I'm smitten.  Like the sole means of access, for example.

"But it's a lovely shade of blue, and look -- I can reach out from the 15th step
and pluck a mango from the tree!"

Never mind about coming in or out after three glasses of wine, or when I have the flu, or when I have a gazillion bags of groceries...  or when I want to move in my household furnishings. I dealt first with the movers who brought my stuff from the US to KL, and although I included photos, I couldn't seem to impress upon the representative that no -- his men would not be bringing anything up the stairs.  Friends recommended Asian Tigers, and they seemed to understand that there were some challenges involved in this delivery, but they didn't actually come to do a site survey until the day before they brought the furniture. Only then did they realise that they could not use a mechanical hoist or crane because of the mango trees in the front courtyard.  So at 8.00am on Friday, 25 April, a yellow, striped truck pulled up in front of the gates, and six men got to work unloading the 54 cartons which contain all my worldly possessions. The landlady observed, slack-jawed. I think she's used to the sort of expat who comes to Phnom Penh and buys nothing but flip-flops and food for a one or two year contract period.  This production made it look as if I intend to stay a while. Maybe a long while.

"Wait, wait...  there's more?"

T. S. Eliot must have been sitting in a Phnom Penh bar when he wrote "April is the cruellest month".  It's the hottest month in Cambodia, with hellish daytime highs near 40_C/105_F.  In other words, it's not the ideal time to hoist 54 cartons over a first-floor balcony. Much cruelty to Tigers ensued.

Two stayed on the ground, and four came up to the balcony with a stack of ropes and nylon cables. When I could bear to open my eyes and actually look at what was going on, I was suitably impressed with the strength of the fellows doing the hoisting and the knot-tying ability of the older guy on the ground. Not a single carton dropped and smashed, and the balcony railing survived, as well.

The Empire sleigh-bed headboard, baulking under the lip of the balcony.  Tigers leaned
WAAAAY out over the railing to free it and yet did not take a header into the courtyard.

Next came the piece that gave me fits of worry:  the early 18th-century pine sea captain's trunk, which weighs several hundred pounds empty.  Because the knotsman knew it would get jammed under the balcony, he attached a guide cable to it; his colleague pulled the trunk out away from the building while the four men on the balcony nearly perished hauling the thing up.

Notice the smile on the face of the fellow holding the guide line.
The four blokes on the balcony will exact their revenge on the next job, I'm sure.

For my Chinese friends, I would like to note the carton number on the pine trunk that nearly immobilised FOUR Asian Tigers, permanently.  (You know the crew leader in KL was Malay, right? No Chinese person would assign this carton number, and certainly not to the heaviest, bulkiest item in the lot.)

Unpacking and removing all the packing materials was part of the deal, but alas, hanging the artwork was not.  

The landlady's son has a handyman-friend with a power drill and a ladder, so I hope to have everything hung properly before the week is out. One day I'll think about replacing the shiny, synthetic, sea-foam green curtains that hang on every window. But not today.