エジンバラ家探し（その1）

(English follows Japanese.)
とある研究プロジェクトを円滑に進めるため，今年の秋から2年間，家族全員でエジンバラで暮らすことになりそうです（この研究プロジェクト，内容的にとっても面白く，斬新なものなのですが，まだ論文になる目処はないので，もう少し先に紹介したいと思います）．暮らすためには何が必要？そう，住居です．このコロナ時代，海外で暮らすための家探しは一体どんな感じでしょう？これから海外で暮らす人，以前海外で暮らしたことがあるけどコロナ時代の家探しはどうなってるのかに興味がある人，もろもろ．．．誰かの役に立ってほしいと願い，筆を取りました（とはいえ，物理的には筆で書いてないけどね）．

今から1週間強前，娘の学校探しのためには「まず住所がないと転校手続きが開始できない」という事実に直面し，急遽ちょっと時間に余裕があった夫にお願いして家探しを開始．夫がまず使ったのはrightmoveというページ．日本のスーモみたいな家探しページの模様．ベッド数と予算の上限と下限，希望のエリアなどの条件を入れてまず検索．すると出るわ出るわ．今すぐ住みたい物件がわんさか出てきました．

「なんだ，選びたい放題じゃん」それが私たちの第一印象．

この後，この第一印象はこっぱ微塵に打ち砕かれ，眠れない日々を過ごすことになるのです．そして，SNSとかで英国の友人が「フラット（日本でいう１フロアのマンションのこと）をゲット！」と高らかに宣言し，そのまた友人が「Conguraturation!（おめでとう！）」と盛大にお祝いしていることの本当の意味を知ることになるのです．．．

つづく．

In order to facilitate a research project, the whole family will be living in Edinburgh for two years starting this fall (this is a very interesting and innovative research project, but there is no paper in sight yet, so I will introduce it a little later). What do you need to live in Edinburgh? Yes, housing. In this Corona era, what is it like to find a house to live abroad? For those who are going to live abroad, those who have lived abroad before but are interested in how house hunting is done in the Corona Era, etc., etc.... I took up writing in the hope that it might be of use to someone (though I didn't physically write it with a brush).

A little over a week ago, I was faced with the fact that in order to find a school for my daughter, I needed to have an address to start the process of transferring her to another school. My husband first used a page called "rightmove". It seems to be a house-hunting page similar to "Suumo" in Japan. We entered the number of beds, the upper and lower limits of our budget, and the area we wanted to live in and searched. Then, a lot of listings appeared. I found a lot of properties that I want to live in right now.

Our first impression was, "What a lot of choices!

After that, this first impression was shattered to pieces, and we spent sleepless days. Then, a friend of ours in the U.K. announced on a social networking service that he had "gotten a flat! and another friend of mine is celebrating with a big "Conguraturation! and then you will find out what it really means... ....

To be continued.

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)