Looking For A Place To Live in Vancouver!

I have finally found my rooms for myself. Fortunately I met a nice landlord in the end. It has been a kind of hardship for me, especially for my English training or cultural experience. It might be meaningful to talk about my experience.

It is true that I am student at ELI UBC, so I sometimes have advantages of being a student, for example, I get a ticket as a student, cheaper than an adult. At the same time, I am much older than an ordinal student. Furthermore, I am a male, not a female. I don’t smoke. I don’t have a pet. I am a quiet, not a ‘party’ animal. This kind of personal information sometimes works better, sometimes worse when I try to apply for an apartment. Under the British Columbian laws related to renting houses and rooms, people are supposed to be protected their human rights. They declare there is no discrimination among people who want to rent.

I almost had given up after a lot of failures in finding an appropriate apartment, I put the following self-introduction lastly when I applied by email after reading some articles on the Craigslist. You could read between the lines that I became desperate and felt ashamed of myself. I had almost lost hope that I was able to find the best apartment which met my conditions. I exposed almost everything of my personality in it. I was not protective at all.

Hello,

My name is Tetsuro Matsuura (Japanese, male). I’ve been looking for an apartment to live by myself. I am interested in this suite.

I’m not sure it is good or not, but I have never smoked in my life. I’ll keep the room clean. I am 58 years old, I worked as an English teacher at Junior high school in Japan for a long time, but I ‘m studying English at ELI, UBC now.

I’d like to make an appointment to view the rooms. Please tell me what day is convenient for the owner. I’m OK any day and any time after class (after 4:00). Please let me know by email. My telephone number is 7***, but I prefer an email due to my poor listening comprehension.

Regards,

Some owners targeted UBC students from the beginning. They are young students; they would stay longer until the end of their college life. The landlords pretended to keep my name for a while in their pockets without answering my inquiry, and after finding their best tenant, they gave a call telling me, and said,” You are late. Sorry, it has already been rented.” Other landlords said, “We want a girl as we said from the beginning,” Actually their articles had said nothing about that. Some gave me any replies to my emails.

In some cases, their rooms were found to be unfurnished at all. I was sorry that I realized it for the first time after visiting. The rooms were perfect. I should not buy all the equipment to live there only for six months. In general, owners prefer long-stayers to short-stayers like me. I might have had less advantage to be chosen among competitive applicants.

Eventually, I was able to make the best choice. It is fortunate that I met a kind and sincere landlord in the end and made a contract to rent her basement.