Stoveless

I know the New York rent laws, if stacked together in a big pile, could probably go to the moon and back, but I'm beginning to suspect that there might be a rule in there somewhere that I never thought about. In that maze of regulations, is there anything that requires landlords to furnish an apartment with a stove and refrigerator?

The reason for asking is this: in South Africa, it seems to be standard practice that apartments come with neither. Are Katie and I the ones who are being unrealistic here? Are we pie in the sky dreamers for thinking that such things are appliances, not furnishings?

Obviously, I didn't cram a stove into my carry-on, so the need to find a furnished place is even greater than we thought. The thing is, when we see listings for “semi-furnished” apartments, describing how big and nice and airy they are, and we get all excited about where they're located and how cheap they are, inevitably, the “semi-“ part of that will mean that there's a stove. And that's it.

It's a start, I suppose.