Home is getting bare

Today (Well technically yesterday, but I haven't gone to sleep yet, so it feels like today even though its 5:30am Monday) the packers packed up our curios & glass shelves & essentially all the small stuff in the hall & dining rooms. Some of the books got packed oo.

Essentially, these packers are used to packing house from one corner to the other (During one of my transfers, the maid had kept her lunch box in the kitchen & gone to clean up some stuff in the neighbours flat. Being completely unaware of the fact, I let the packers pack the kitchen, when she came back she made a hue & cry over her missing lunch box, but they had no idea which carton they had put it into & weren't about to undo all the work they had done) SO I moved with the tiffin box after giving her some compensation to calm her down.

At my destination, imagine my horror when I realised that her lunch was still in that box. A good 30 days from the date it was packed. I had to dispose a lot of items from that particular carton. But I still get nauseous when I see lunch boxes in that particular shape & size) Ok digresion complete. Coming back to the point :

We have been trying to get them to slow down the packing since the cartons are essentially of 7 types
1. in laws place keep packed
2. inlaws place to be opened & used
3. parents place to be kept packed
4. parents place to be open & used
5. aunts place to be kept packed
6. aunts place to be opened & used
7. Not to be touched since international packer will handle that later
This means a good 6 variables more than they are used to or comfortable with. Since they have a serial cum parallel processing system. It was getting complicated.

Ergo, I have been up the whole night splitting my whole kitchen into 7 subdivisions seperated by innovative dividers. Colorful plastic bags, unwanted glass jars et al. Kitchen currently looks like squatters have been thrown out of their house or something to that effect. If the metaphor doesn't sound right, blame it on my lack of sleep.

Same goes for the study too. Just that here its all about papers & books.

So hope tomorrow will go faster. I had specifically requested that only 2 of the packers come in today.(They normally come in groups of 6 or so) So that I could pace out the packing. But 4 of them landed up & hence some confusion. Only hope not more than four come tomorrow. (oops actually today) & then I can ensure that they are packing according to my instructions.

On the other frontier, inlaws bade a teary farewell to us & returned to their hometown quite reluctantly. Their son has always been closeby & although the direct flight from India to Egypt is just 5 hours & return fares are about 25k (I remember flying delhi bangalore returns for 18k before the price wars erupted between airlines) they still feel that "beta aur bahu videsh jaa rahe hain" And although they are trying their best to put up brave fronts, we know that its hurting them inside. But they will never say it or try to hold us back. Thats what makes both our sets of parents so cpmpletely & amazingly wonderful.

My Father in law summed it up best when he said "do u think it is the right decision for you guys to go there ?" "Have you considered all the aspects the pros & cons?" "Are you both happy about the move - new company, new country, new culture ?" When we answered in the affirmative to these questions, he just said "You are both mature adults, if you have considered all aspects & think its the right decision to move then by all means do so. We just want you to be happy & successful" That was just so sweet of him & it did give us the comfort that they had accepted our decision. & yes it did lessen the guilt (a feeling most indian women are born with & which continues through life in varying intensities but always pervasive)

Now I need to shut my eyes for at least 2 hours before the packers come in again.