Episode1-1: Rent a room in Shikoku Takamatsu

Miscellaneous reports from a man who was transferred to move from Hiroshima to Takamatsu.

A part of “Correspondence from Shikoku island in Japan”

01

Even though I know that Shikoku is an island in my head, my impression of Shikoku is that it is too big to feel it. Even when I crossed the Great Seto Bridge, which gave me a breathtakingly beautiful view every time, Shikoku was so big that once I landed, I felt like I was on the continent. Since Japan itself is an island country, Honshu is also an island. However, if you live in the Seto Inland Sea, you may not feel that the countless small islands are real islands, and that the other large islands are not likely islands. With that in mind, I moved to Takamatsu City, where I was transferred.

02

I like rooms with a view. "Good view" is really abstract, and it doesn't mean in the narrow sense that the scenery you can see from the window is superb. I really want to avoid a room where I can see the outer wall of another building as an environment to live in. Even if I don't stay in the room during the day due to work, the appearance, or the freshness of the space, in my sense, is connected to that feeling. That's why when I rent a room where I live, I choose a place with a good view, or rather, a place with a clear view or "openness" in the view.

Even if you are not an expert of spatial design, you should be able to understand the goodness and badness of the basic environment such as sunlight and ventilation that effect on your body through your room/house, but in modern times, "convenience" and "easiness" are more important than such basic "goodness". When I see how the general public's priority is higher, I'm worried that society is finally okay. The same goes for the floor plan. In particular, when it comes to rooms where people live alone, in other words, what do people think about the fact that most of the so-called one-room flats with general-purpose "product names" have truly disappointing layouts?

It’s like this, as soon as you open the entrance, there is a kitchen, and residents or guests can access the private room through the kitchen's work space as an aisle. There is a unit bath on the wall on the opposite side of the space, and when you open the door, a small space assembled with resin panels that compactly houses the toilet, washbasin, and bathtub appears like a bathroom in a business hotel. That's the typical layout. Bathrooms could be reasonable. However, what makes me feel uncomfortable is the impossibility of the previously mentioned kitchen work space serving as an aisle, and the wonder that it is so widespread.

It is understandable that this may be unavoidable in some ways. When the economy begins to dominate people's lives, the structure of everything is rebuilt based on economic efficiency. Ultimately, things converge to a situation where there are no alternatives. Here, as a result of trial and error, how to create a functional one-room room with the smallest possible area, they probably settled on a floor plan that threatens the dignity of the people who live there. In the midst of this, even the most conscientious ordinary people have to convince themselves that they are either numb, or that they cannot afford the extra effort and money to go against the tide here. Yes, that’s a great compromise.

However, that compromise is unacceptable to me, so I will naturally find an alternative. For example, the company I work for in Takamatsu City provides a rent allowance of 45,000 yen. And there is also a condition that it is within 3 km, which is the prescribed range where transportation expenses are not paid. In other words, the baseline is a property within 3 km from the workplace and within that budget (in fact, if you have this much budget in Takamatsu City, you can easily find a room). In addition, as I wrote earlier, it is preferable to have a good view and be as wide as possible. In that case, several candidates will come out if it is a room that has been built for many years.

03

Among them, I found a property with a balcony facing a wide estuary near the sea with 2LD + K. It looks like it's been built for a long time, but it just fits in the budget. Check out the area on Google Maps. The building itself is also designed so that each dwelling unit lined diagonally, and the central corridor is designed to let in light and wind, giving it a very tasteful appearance. A few rooms in it seemed to be vacant. The view and clearing seemed to be perfect along the river, and I could see the sea. However, I felt that the 2nd floor would be best because it faces the southwest, and the west sun seems to be strong, and the balcony is wider than the others and has a railing that allows you to see the river. I was wondering.

I contacted the person in charge of the real estate agent appointed by my company, researched several via the Internet, and sent the information of the room I was interested in. The young person in charge, who had only been with the company for two years, enthusiastically sent me about 10 other candidates. While I was very grateful for his dedication to his work, I smiled wryly at the fact that all the candidate properties that were added were all the NG properties for me that I have explained so far. To be honest, if I add conditions such as "I don't want to enter the room through the side of the kitchen" or "I'm looking for a place that is as large as possible and has a good view," He got it and said, "It would be very few” Yes, that’s what I said to him.

Furthermore, when I asked for the measurements of the 41-year-old 2LD+K property that I was most interested in, I received the following response. “I have the impression that the entire building, the room, and the room equipment itself are quite old. There are some things, so please check the videos and photos." It's like saying, "Are you really going to have here when there are many other new properties?" That's right, at your age, this might be an NG property, I thought.

The person in charge kindly took a video, so I was able to get a belief check of ​​the room even via the Internet. It was the first time in 20 years that I had rented a room, but I found that thanks to the Internet, I was able to know the details well in advance. Even so, when it came to the atmosphere, the atmosphere of the city, and actually living there, I thought that I had to visit once, so I went to see the room on a day trip. The person in charge just refrained from checking the room while imagining my own life and watching silently. I ended up choosing a room on the 2nd floor. Still, in the car that sent me at the end, he asked me, "I think it's old, but was it okay?"

Rather than a shiny small “one-room”, I wanted him to understand that having a 2LD+K, although it was old, facing the river and seeing the sea from the balcony. I tried to speak a little eloquently about how important something is. In fact, the apartment was more like a condominium rental. I'm pretty sure It has a well-designed layout. However, he seemed to have little interest in my lecture, just giving a business-like remark, "I see." That's right, you can't do real estate sales without that. If you have a conscientious heart, there will be many rooms that you will not want to show around.