From graduation until 2018, I’ve moved 8 times - truly a drifter. In 2015, I switched from drifting in Beijing to drifting in Shenzhen. Here I’ll document some details about my 8th move:

Finding an Apartment

Almost as soon as I started my unemployment, I began paying attention to apartment hunting. My general requirements were:

• Larger room, a big one-bedroom or small two-bedroom
• Normal layout
• Quiet community
• Within two kilometers of subway or served by shuttle bus
• Budget about 100 yuan more than last year’s rent
• Direct contract with landlord, and landlord should be easy to communicate with

Following these requirements, I found three candidates in three days:

• Apartment A: Pros are quiet community and cheap rent. Cons are 2.6km from subway, and no commercial area nearby.
• Apartment B: Pros are newer apartment. Cons are empty without appliances - adding everything would add about 1k monthly rent.
• Apartment C: Pros are quiet community, large room, and landlord is easy to communicate with. Cons are older building, no elevator, and some furniture is seriously worn.

After various trade-offs, I chose Apartment C.

Moving

Looking back at the entire moving process, it took exactly one week.

Monday: Rented a car to move simple clothes, mattress, bedding, and cleaning supplies. Aired out the mattress and bedding, set aside. Tuesday: Organized items at home, ready to move. Wednesday: Moved pots, pans, bowls, and other fragile items. Thursday: Moved some small items. Washed and dried sofa covers. Arranged broadband transfer. Friday: Booked moving company, packed and organized all items. Cleared furniture. Cleaned and disinfected Apartment C. Saturday: Morning followed moving company to move items to Apartment C. Afternoon rented a car-share vehicle, moved remaining items in three trips. Negotiated a price for the wardrobe with a shady furniture buyer, and between the second and third trips arranged for someone to mount the TV on the wall. Finished all three trips after 1 AM. Sunday: Morning made another trip for kitchen items and refrigerator contents, sold the wardrobe. Replaced bathroom shower head, showered and rested. Had lobster for dinner, done.

Lessons Learned

Apartment hunting: If your requirements are clear, quickly filter down to two or three suitable options, then make trade-offs among them. Driving: I rarely drove after getting my license and was timid about it. But this move involved seven round trips by car, navigating through the harsh environment of the residential complex. The timidity about driving is gone - I can even listen to the radio to relax in congested traffic now. Wonderful. Organization: Prepare plenty of boxes. For walk-up buildings, medium-sized boxes are better - a heavy box carried up several floors will make your back ache.

Moving: Observing the moving crew, I suddenly appreciated the importance of work.

I had moved things up and down the stairs several times before - compared to the efficiency of the moving crew, I was way behind.

On one hand, it’s the use of various tools, and on the other, the difference in physical fitness. Only the concept of “work” can gather such a group of professionals together, and through the process of repeated work, they’ll summarize many techniques to improve efficiency.

The driver in charge of the moving truck only drove the truck in and out and operated the cargo lift, but didn’t help with the actual moving.

Different division of labor allows people to spend more time deepening expertise in vertical domains, avoiding dispersed learning effort.