It takes a long time to move into a house at post. Why, you ask? Well, because life in the Foreign Service contains many peculiarities that just sort of come with the territory. One such peculiarity concerns the movement and categorization of stuff. Anyone reading this who is in the Foreign Service knows exactly what I mean. For those of you not currently in the Foreign Service, I will explain.

Even though you don't know it, your stuff comes in many different categories. First, you have the things that you carry with you on the plane to post. This category of stuff is called Accompanied Air Baggage, also known as your suitcases. These things are the things that you use every day and can't conveniently be separated from. Each adult person is allowed two (2) suitcases, not to exceed 70 pound each, according to international air carrier rules and regulations. In a perfect world, these arrive with you at post. If you will recall, this is precisely the stuff that got left behind in Frankfurt and that we had to do without while we rolled around in our underwear in a pile of rupees that Lufthansa bought us off with.

Anyway.

The next category of stuff is called Unaccompanied Air Baggage (UAB). Under this heading go the things that you pretty much really need but that you don't really, REALLY need and/or things that you really need but are too big to take on the airplane. This shipment, which can be no more than 250 pounds for Christopher and no more than 200 pounds for me, is packed and hauled away by one of the many government moving companies. It is then dumped onto a cargo plane and sent to your new home after you have arrived. Generally speaking, UAB arrives at post about two (2) to four (4) weeks after you do.

Next there is a category called Household Effects (HHE), which includes all of the other crap that you want to eventually have at post with you but that is really not necessary to your survival, like your desk and your favorite futon and that box of stuff that you collected when you were eight but are still attached to, etc. This shipment, not more than 7,200 pounds in total and which generally contains furniture and other large items that tend to make your house really your home, get packed out by the movers and deposited on a ship that then hauls it to your post in it's own sweet time. HHE generally arrives at post ten (10) to twelve (12) weeks after you do.

Last but not least is your permanent storage, which consists of the stuff that you own but can't possibly use at post and probably can't ever possibly use again but since the government was paying for it you stuck it into storage anyway because you couldn't bear to part with it (in our case, at least. In more adult cases, it's where you keep your furniture that belongs in your permanent residence in DC or Northern Virginia, but we're not quite that organized yet). This all just sits in a warehouse in Hagerstown, Maryland until you do a tour in the US and have to move into a house there.