How Blue Was My Billy?

Since moving into our new flat, we have been short of bookcases. We had lots of these in Dubai - 'Billy' bookcases from IKEA. But we decided not to ship them here because of the cost/bulk/weight thingie. It just would not have been worth it: it would be much cheaper to buy new ones when we arrived. As it turned out, our previous flat was way too small to accommodate such a luxury. The books remained in boxes.

Our new flat is somewhat bigger, and has a perfect space in the dining area to fit two six-foot tall Billys. We checked the IKEA website, and were pleased to see they now do Billy bookcases in royal blue laminate. This would make a pleasing contrast with the light oak flooring and peachy/orangey kitchen cupboard doors. Sadly, IKEA still do not do online shopping, so today we went to IKEA (East) to get them. There are two other IKEAs in Madrid, but we haven't figured out how to get to them by public transport.



It has been well over a year since we visited IKEA East, and since then they have built a massive shopping mall, La Gavia, that connects the formerly free-standing IKEA and Carrefour buildings. It's 45 minutes on the Metro, followed by a 400 metre walk to the mall entrance, followed by an air-conditioned 400m walk to the IKEA entrance, followed by a decidedly dodgy lunch at their cafeteria and probably a kilometre to get round both floors of the store.

I should add that I have not been to a proper shopping mall since we moved to Spain, apart from one or two in England, and they don't count. I really felt like I was back in Dubai for a few minutes there.

All the walking was decidedly knackering. We queued for ages at the checkout, and then went to arrange delivery (you would not believe how heavy these boxes were). That involved another lengthy queue, and I knew from looking at their website that the delivery would cost more than a bookcase. I was quite prepared to have to wait a few days for the delivery, and was amazed when they said it would be this evening.

So, I'm quite pleased with myself. I have assembled one bookcase, without any swearing or left-over screws and whatnot. It stands in the dining area now. It's very nice, but, oh boy, isn't it blue?! I'll do the other tomorrow, in half the time because now I know how to do it.

It is very blue indeed. Blue, blue, blue.

I expect the blueness to wear off when it is full of books (I'll put the blue ones somewhere else, obviously), and MamaDuck is even now plotting to put pots of trailing ivy on top of them.

All good fun.

*This post is not sponsored by IKEA, but it should be.