Funky Couches

It is time for another edition of funky European basketball living. If you were around for my first post on Funky Beds, you will remember that not only does European style tend to be a little different, but most of the time our apartments are put together by male employees of the basketball team Joe is playing for, which usually leads to an interesting mix of furniture. So up next is a look back at the interesting couches we have had over the last 7 years of living overseas. Our first overseas experience in Athens, Greece brought the arm-less couch. Not only were they not exactly comfortable to sit on due to having no arm rests, but Joe took one look at them and refused to sit on them for the whole 5 months we lived there simply from a hygienic standpoint.

Next up was our couch in Wloclawek, Poland. The whole apartment was really struggling, but the couch especially looked like it had never really seen a good day. Once again, it wasn’t sat on very often by any of us. Thankfully, there was an arm chair in the living room that was decent.

Next up on our travels was Teramo, Italy. This couch was the lone sitting area for our whole living room (you can imagine the trouble that brought whenever we wanted to have anyone over). The first day we sat down on it, we knew it wouldn’t last long. A few months later the one arm rest just broke completely off the couch.

Unfortunately, the team replaced it with this bad boy that you can see had a serious sinking issue in the middle of the couch (I may have been 39 weeks pregnant in this picture, but I don’t think my weight should have caused this much caving in)

In our next apartment in Zaragoza, Spain we had the nicest home interior workings. This couch was pretty modern and functional. It was an L-shaped sectional couch that unfortunately would never stay locked together. So movie nights on the couch would usually be spent standing up and pushing the couch back together every 30 minutes or so.

Then we moved onto Bandirma, Turkey. Now don’t get turned off by the interesting color and design of this couch. Pretty much everything in Turkey is very patterned or distinct looking. But the comfort of this couch actually wins out for me of all the couches we have had. Our bed in that apartment was awful and since I was pregnant with Naomi during that season, this couch was a refuge for me during many sleepless nights when I could not get comfortable on our bed.

The next season we were back in Bandirma again, but in a different apartment and here are the beauties we arrived to after 24 hours of travel. Yes, they were as uncomfortable and un-functional as they look in the picture.

Last year in Brindisi, Italy, the furniture was rather sparse in the apartment, but they did give us two decent couches.  They were simple, good for naps and provided enough seating for us all.  Not much more you can ask for than that!

And now finally this year in Barcellona, Sicily.  This apartment ranks second in the decor category of all of our apartments (after our stellar place in Zaragoza).  A woman associated with the club put the apartment together for us and provided us with another clean, modern white couch (they must like their white couches here in southern Italy).  It is not the easiest to keep clean with the kids, but it is comfortable, fresh and much better than a lot of the above options we have had!

Happy sitting,