Laundry, Thanks to Lirra
As I have found myself sans-internet for the past several days, in order to describe the brilliant dance that is laundry in Germany, I bring to you the work of the infamous cooking companion Lirra Schiebler:
Laundry. What was once a 3 hour affair has turned into a two-day spectacle. The laundry room is behind an unmarked door in the catacombs beneath our wohnheim complex. The tunnels have lights that turn off after about a minute, so if you take your time perusing the graffiti, cigarette stubs, bicycles, and beer glasses that adorn the pathway, you’re immediately stuck in a dark cave with the German version of Jack Nicholson in the Shining waiting to slit your throat with a personalized Wusthof. Providing you make it safely to the grey metal door, you have to dexterously finagle the lock into letting you pass through, perhaps after bribing the gnome who resides within with fresh bread and nutella or a maß (liter) of weissbier (white beer=wheat beer).
Behind the door, you behold the grandness that is three identical metal contraptions and a dusty grey room with an iron and ironing board hiding in one corner. After cramming in as much clothing as will fit in the small, horizontal barrel, you pour a small amount of super concentrated detergent into a soap drawer – typically foreign, yet manageable. You then insert your previously-purchased (from the Hausmeister, who’s only open from 9-1, M-F and not on holidays, of which there are many in this catholic state) 1.5 euro token, and the 40 minute cycle should begin. This entails much stopping and starting of the barrel spin mechanism, a hyper environmentally-savvy energy and water saving method (I can only assume). Your clothing comes out in an extremely knotted bunch that’s free of the winter-grime, pub-smoke, and dinner-splash collection that has clung to every natural and synthetic fiber that you own over the past week. The whites now have a decided grey tinge, and the colors have lost their brilliancy, as they, too, have been convinced of their wastefulness by the European laundering method. They have abandoned their liveliness and succumbed to a life of efficiency and use, rather than frivolous adornment.
After unraveling the uncannily squeaky clean and efficiently-spun mass, you must then devote every available surface in your room to air drying – mechanical dryers are entirely too inefficient and something only the wasteful Americans find essential. This aerates your room with a pleasant aroma of clean, while leaving your clothes crunchy and wrinkle-ridden. You fall asleep, hoping that at least one pair of socks will be dry for the next day. They are, but only because they had been placed on top of the heater, for this desired effect.
Fastforward to the following afternoon, it has now been an entire 24 hours since first embarking on this uncertain mission. The clothes are now dry, but beckon for the warmth of an iron…
And that, my friends, without exaggeration, is how it truely is.
Laundry. What was once a 3 hour affair has turned into a two-day spectacle. The laundry room is behind an unmarked door in the catacombs beneath our wohnheim complex. The tunnels have lights that turn off after about a minute, so if you take your time perusing the graffiti, cigarette stubs, bicycles, and beer glasses that adorn the pathway, you’re immediately stuck in a dark cave with the German version of Jack Nicholson in the Shining waiting to slit your throat with a personalized Wusthof. Providing you make it safely to the grey metal door, you have to dexterously finagle the lock into letting you pass through, perhaps after bribing the gnome who resides within with fresh bread and nutella or a maß (liter) of weissbier (white beer=wheat beer).
Behind the door, you behold the grandness that is three identical metal contraptions and a dusty grey room with an iron and ironing board hiding in one corner. After cramming in as much clothing as will fit in the small, horizontal barrel, you pour a small amount of super concentrated detergent into a soap drawer – typically foreign, yet manageable. You then insert your previously-purchased (from the Hausmeister, who’s only open from 9-1, M-F and not on holidays, of which there are many in this catholic state) 1.5 euro token, and the 40 minute cycle should begin. This entails much stopping and starting of the barrel spin mechanism, a hyper environmentally-savvy energy and water saving method (I can only assume). Your clothing comes out in an extremely knotted bunch that’s free of the winter-grime, pub-smoke, and dinner-splash collection that has clung to every natural and synthetic fiber that you own over the past week. The whites now have a decided grey tinge, and the colors have lost their brilliancy, as they, too, have been convinced of their wastefulness by the European laundering method. They have abandoned their liveliness and succumbed to a life of efficiency and use, rather than frivolous adornment.
After unraveling the uncannily squeaky clean and efficiently-spun mass, you must then devote every available surface in your room to air drying – mechanical dryers are entirely too inefficient and something only the wasteful Americans find essential. This aerates your room with a pleasant aroma of clean, while leaving your clothes crunchy and wrinkle-ridden. You fall asleep, hoping that at least one pair of socks will be dry for the next day. They are, but only because they had been placed on top of the heater, for this desired effect.
Fastforward to the following afternoon, it has now been an entire 24 hours since first embarking on this uncertain mission. The clothes are now dry, but beckon for the warmth of an iron…
And that, my friends, without exaggeration, is how it truely is.
posted by Andrea at 4:51 PM
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