美國畢業(yè)生也飽嘗蝸居滋味

The Après-Graduation Apartment

美國畢業(yè)生也飽嘗蝸居滋味

Having graduated from the Fashion Institute of Technology and vacated her dorm room, Danica Ciccariello needed to find a new place to live last summer.

去年夏天，丹妮卡·奇卡雷洛(Danica Ciccariello)從時裝技術(shù)學(xué)院(Fashion Institute of Technology)畢業(yè)并搬出宿舍后，需要找一個新的地方住。

A friend connected her with Teresa Sanacore and Sarah Pascuzzi, newly graduated from Siena College in Loudonville, N.Y.

一位朋友把她介紹給了特雷莎·圣阿科雷(Teresa Sanacore)和莎拉·帕斯庫奇(Sarah Pascuzzi)。她們都是勞頓維爾(Loudonville)錫耶納學(xué)院(Siena College)的應(yīng)屆畢業(yè)生。

 

 

THE RENTERS From left, Sarah Pascuzzi, Danica Ciccariello and Teresa Sanacore have settled in.

租客合影：(左起)莎拉·帕斯庫奇、丹妮卡·奇卡雷洛和特雷莎·圣阿科雷都已搬了進來。

The three joined forces, figuring it would be easier and cheaper to find a two-bedroom to share among three than a one-bedroom to share between two.

三個人一拍即合。她們認為，三人合租一套兩居室會比兩個人合租一套一居室更加容易，也更便宜。

Wandering around the East Village in the early summer, having received no answer to their knock at an apartment they were scheduled to see, the three young women stumbled upon a father moving his daughter into a walk-up building. He invited them to see her place. Four roommates were sharing a three-bedroom “flexed” into a four-bedroom, similar to what they sought.

初夏時節(jié)，她們在東村(East Village)四處游蕩，本打算去看一套公寓，但是敲了門卻沒人應(yīng)。三個姑娘碰巧遇到一位父親在幫女兒搬家。房子位于一處無電梯樓盤里。他邀請她們進去看看女兒的住處。那是一套被“收縮”成了四居室的三居室，有四人合租，跟她們想找的那種房子差不多。

They inquired about the rental agent who had helped the foursome, and were directed to Gina Majore Bonner of Miron Properties. Within hours, the three were meeting with her.

她們打聽了幫助四人找到三居室的租房經(jīng)紀人，由此聯(lián)系上了房地產(chǎn)公司Miron Properties的吉娜·馬約雷·邦納(Gina Majore Bonner) 。幾小時內(nèi)，三個人就跟她見了面。

They weren’t sure where to hunt. “The only places I’d heard of were the East Village and the Upper East Side,” said Ms. Sanacore, who works at a metal trading company. So she left potential locations to her roommates, who selected the East Village and the Lower East Side.

她們不確定該在哪里找房子。“我只聽說過東村和上東區(qū)，”就職于一家金屬交易公司的圣阿科雷說。因此她把其它潛在地點的房源留給室友去找，室友選擇了東村和下東區(qū)。

Their monthly budget was $3,000 to $3,600, which was “ridiculously low” for a three-bedroom in a hot neighborhood, Ms. Bonner said. But they were likely to find a two-bedroom that would “flex” into three. Partitioning a living area, they had decided, was preferable to having two of them share a bedroom.

她們的每月預(yù)算是3000到3600美元(約合人民幣18362到22035元)，邦納說，這個價位對于熱門小區(qū)的三居室來說“低得可笑”。但是要找一套可以隔成三居室的兩居室，還是很有希望的。她們斷定，將客廳區(qū)隔斷，比讓其中兩個人共用一間臥室要好。

If the bedrooms were of unequal sizes, Ms. Pascuzzi, who works at a home décor wholesaler, wanted the biggest bedroom so she could fit in her bed, which had a sleigh frame.

如果幾間臥室不一樣大，那么帕斯庫奇就想要最大的那間，這樣就可以放下自己那張雪橇床了。她就職于一間家居裝潢批發(fā)店。

“I call it my Christmas bed,” she said. She was willing to pay up to $1,500 a month, the amount paid by a good friend who shared a Lower East Side three-bedroom with roommates.

“我把它稱為我的‘圣誕床’。”她說。她愿意支付的最高價格是每月1500美元(約合人民幣9181元)，她有個好朋友，就是花這個價錢在下東區(qū)與人合租了一套三居室。

In general, the women were prepared to make sacrifices. “We are young,” said Ms. Ciccariello, who works at an interior design company. “We can get away with cutting back spacewise in order to get a better price. As long as a living room was a little more rectilinear, there could be a wall set up.”

大體上講，三位女士已經(jīng)做好了犧牲的準(zhǔn)備。“我們還年輕，”就職于室內(nèi)設(shè)計公司的奇卡雷洛說，“只要價錢合適，房子小一點也無所謂。只要客廳里額外的方形空間稍大一點，就可以用一面墻隔開來。”

They visited more than a dozen places, often getting their hopes up. “But each one had that one thing that was wrong with it,” Ms. Sanacore said — tiny bedrooms, railroad layouts, inflexible living rooms.

她們看了不下六套房子，每次都滿懷希望。“但是每套房子都有這樣或那樣的缺陷。”圣阿科雷說——有的臥室太小，有的是列車式戶型(沒有走廊的狹長公寓，各房間像火車車廂般連成一條，因此如果不通過一個房間就無法到其他房間——譯注)，有的客廳布局不能靈活調(diào)整。

At first glance, a two-bedroom on Stanton Street seemed suitable. The rent was $3,595. The place was easily convertible to a three-bedroom. It had a nice kitchen and good light.

乍看之下，斯塔頓街(Staton Street)的一套房租3595美元(約合人民幣22004元)的兩居室似乎很合適。這里很容易改成三居室，廚房很不錯，采光也好。

But then there was the bathroom: tiny, with a toilet topped by a minuscule wash basin topped by a mirrored medicine chest. All were dumbstruck.

但看到浴室，問題來了：面積太小，里面的馬桶上方有個極小的洗手池，洗手池上方是個帶鏡面的壁櫥。三人目瞪口呆。

“You could fit, like, one dish if you did dishes in there,” Ms. Ciccariello said. “It was the oddest thing. If we washed our face, water would be dripping everywhere.”

“如果在里面洗碗，估計大約能放下一個盤子，”奇卡雷洛說，“這是最怪異的。要是我們洗臉的話，水就會濺得到處都是。”

They just couldn’t live that way.

她們真的沒法那樣生活。

“That apartment cracked us up for hours,” Ms. Bonner said.

“那套公寓讓我們低落了好幾個小時。”邦納說。

An actual three-bedroom on Avenue B, with new appliances, was everyone’s favorite. At around $3,340 a month, it had a dining area but no real living room.

B大道(Avenue B)有一套真正的三居室，配了新家電，三個人都很喜歡。房租大約是每月3340美元(約合人民幣20443元)，公寓里有一片用餐區(qū)，但是沒有真正的客廳。

The women, who all had parents as guarantors, rushed to apply. But someone else was given the apartment. “Seeing how quickly it slipped through our fingers was discouraging,” Ms. Pascuzzi said.

三位女士都有家長作為擔(dān)保人，于是趕緊著手申請。但是有人捷足先登了。“看著它很快就被搶走了，我們感覺很沮喪。”帕斯庫奇說。

On they went to a place in the East Village for $2,800 a month, substantially less than most of what they had seen. The kitchen was comparatively big, with counter space and room for a table.

她們接著去看了東村的一套房子，每月房租是2800美元(約合人民幣17138元)，比她們看過的多數(shù)房子的租金都低很多。廚房相對較大，有櫥柜空間和放一張桌子的地方。

The two bedroom spaces, mirror images, had no windows. Or closets. Or doors, though they did have doorways.

兩間臥室空間就像彼此的翻版，都沒有窗戶，也沒有壁櫥，也沒有門，只是有門廊而已。

But the living area was rectilinear, allowing the creation of a third bedroom.

不過客廳區(qū)是直線型的，可以隔出第三間臥室。

Ms. Bonner encouraged them to take it, saying that, with the low rent, “you are going to have money to spend to experience the city.” So they signed on for a year, paying a broker fee of 12 percent of a year’s rent, or a bit more than $4,000. Because all the rooms are comparable in size, they split the rent evenly, at $933 each, with one paying $934 on a rotating basis.

邦納鼓勵她們租下房子，她說，租金這么低，“你們就有錢體驗這座城市的生活了。”于是她們簽下了一年租約，支付給經(jīng)紀人年租金12%的酬勞——略高于4000美元(約合人民幣24483元)。由于所有房間的大小都差不多，三個人平攤了租金，兩人支付933美元(約合人民幣5711元)，一個人支付 934美元(約合人民幣5717元)，多的那部分大家輪流出。

The kitchen is not as large as it seemed. “We thought there was so much space, but we ended up filling up the counter,” Ms. Sanacore said. It holds a microwave, a coffee maker, a wine rack, a dish rack, a toaster and, because that’s where the most daylight is, two plants.

廚房并不像表面上看起來的那么大。“我們以為空間很大，但結(jié)果還是把櫥柜都塞滿了。”圣阿科雷說。柜面上放了一個微波爐、一臺咖啡機、一個酒架、一個餐具架、一臺烤面包機，在陽光照射最充足的地方還放了兩盆植物。

Ms. Sanacore has a living-room window in her spot, which is sectioned off with a shoji screen and thick curtains.

圣阿科雷的地盤，是用一面日式屏障及幾塊厚窗簾從客廳里隔出來的，里面有一扇客廳窗戶。

Ms. Ciccariello and Ms. Pascuzzi (whose Christmas bed didn’t fit after all) have curtains instead of doors.

奇卡雷洛和帕斯庫奇(她的圣誕床根本放不下)的房間則掛起了窗簾，沒有門。