Wander around a while. Look for signs that say room for rent. Call mobile numbers written on signs. Speak broken English to whomever answers the phone, telling him that you'd like to come by at 2 to see the apartment. Go to the apartment. Wave to the landlord. Have him unlock the door, then follow him downstairs to a huge, brand new three room apartment including bathroom with Western style toilet, hot water, kitchen counter, kitchen table and chairs, beds, dresser, and porch with screen doors (screens are unheard of here). Inspect everything. Ask if you can rent a stove. Misunderstand the answer: you hear no stove, but actually you can have a stove, but the landlord has none for rent (this was a make or break point). Ask the price. Wait for landlord to get all the keys and give them to you. The end.
Renting an apartment consists of getting the keys. The landlord doesn't know our passport numbers, doesn't have a deposit from us, doesn't have our cell phone numbers, and doesn't even know our names. Eventually, we'll pay him a month's worth of rent and give him our passport information, but right now, Nellie, Liz, and I live in an apartment overlooking the valley!
(Ok, really we move in tomorrow, but we put some stuff in and have keys. Also, apartment hunting in India is a lot more difficult than I made it sound because it's hard to understand people on the phone and absolutely no one understands the concept of a reservation.)
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Hooray! Success! Sounds like a palace. Will I get to sleep in apartment with "western style toilet and hot water" when I come to visit?
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