How (not) to find an apartment in Sofia

There's nothing positive in my attitude towards apartment-searching. I hate it. Well, hate might be a strong word, but it's definitely close to what I feel when I'm on an apartment-hunt mission – it makes me anxious, nervous, stressed out and it normally includes at least one meltdown. I have never been in a position when I could be very picky when choosing an apartment. It has always been more or less the same situation of having to find an apartment in a few days which has basically forced me to take the first quite nice, kind of well-located and reasonably expensive/cheap (trust me, if the rent is suspiciously low, you have every right to assume there's something seriously wrong) apartment. Now, try to imagine you've just moved to a 1,5 million city (= Sofia), you don't speak the language (= Bulgarian) and you've never lived in such a big city, so you have no real perception of how big the city actually is and what seems close to you, is actually so far away the distance is manageable within a reasonable time frame only by public transport. Yes, that's exactly the shitty situation I was in a few days ago. Considering I am working nine hours a day (including a one-hour lunch break) there's no way I can daily spend more that 30 minutes travelling to work, so there weren't so many available apartments to chose from. I knew from the very beginning I wouldn't be able to find an apartment on my own, so I got myself an English-speaking real-estate agent, who will probably never forget searching an apartment for me. Why? Well, it all started with the first viewing she had arranged. Having sent me the address where we were supposed to meet, I have looked it up on Google Maps, found the location (which was, judging by the map and my real-estate agent's experience, supposed to be 10 minutes from where I work), and left work a few minutes earlier just to be on time. Of course things didn't go as planned. Firstly, Google Maps was completely wrong and gave me the wrong location, then having got lost a few times, I asked a passing-by man for directions. He didn't speak English, but I still managed to ask him for directions, but that didn't really help as he showed me the wrong direction. Then, I got a taxi hoping I would finally end up in the arranged meeting point, but I was wrong again. The taxi brought me to the wrong location, but at least my real-estate agent knew where I was, so after having had waited for more than half an hour at -5°C, we finally met. We showed up at the apartment with a one-hour delay and when I saw the apartment, I was just sad. I don't mind if the apartment is old or if it's furnished in a communist- or socialist-like style, I like it actually, but this apartment was old, dirty and absolutely not ready to be moved into. The only thing on my mind was, oh dear, there's no way I can live here, it'd be impossible to sleep at night and not think what would be creeping up my bed. I was just waiting for a cockroach or something similar to show up. Ah, well, I guess having seen that made me make up my mind really fast when I saw another apartment. Located in the centre, close to the main shopping street, not too big, not too small, within a manageable walking distance to work, clean (it smelled like freshly disinfected, sort of like in a hospital laboratory), and with a wardrobe that reminded me of my grandma the apartment seemed just what I was looking for. When I signed the contract the following day and met the landlady (who is, FYI, one of the kindest, warmest and loveliest people I have ever met) I was incredibly relieved. I slept like a baby that night and the night after and the night after. No more being-homeless nightmares, no more searching, asking, comparing, calculating. I finally have a place called home.