Kindness of Strangers

As we were planning this trip, one of the things I worried about most was doing laundry on the road. Should I pack soap?  Should I pack one or two laundry lines?  How do you effectively do laundry in a sink?  Back at home, doing laundry is one of the most pedestrian tasks you can imagine; most of us could it in our sleep, and it’s a part of our weekly routine that happens like clockwork.  On the road, though, laundry is elevated to a status that is rarely achieved in household tasks:  it’s an experience.  First, there’s the unpredictability factor.  You never know when you’re going to have the opportunity to do laundry, and when you do, who knows how the washing machine will operate. 

I had my first laundry experience yesterday.  I’ve been putting it off since arriving a few days ago.  Our first night, I studied the machine’s complicated diagrams and concluded it would be next to impossible to figure out.  But the weather is hot and humid here – in fact, Lisboetas are saying this is the hottest it’s ever been here – so we are quickly running out of clothes to wear.  Therefore, we decided to take the plunge (literally). 

We stuffed nearly all of our meager wardrobe in the washer.  Next, we had to determine water temperature (calculating from Celsius to Farenheit, of coruse).  Then, we had to figure out what setting to use, with each choice simply numbered one to ten.  Each number corresponded to a different picture:  there was one that looked like bow-tie shaped pasta, and another that looked like a striped dress.  I think I might have figured out that the stripes denoted various shades – from dark clothing to light.  I randomly chose number two (mixed colors?).  Next, I had to choose a start button:  was it the circle with a solid line, or the spiral with a line through it?  I went with option number one, which set the washer in motion.

The machine began whirring around, but no water was entering the basin.  Finally, a trickle began.  It seemed safe to leave it for awhile.  I returned in an hour, but the the washer was still going as strong as ever.  I went to the front desk.  “Um, excuse me?  I’m having trouble with the washer?”  “It doesn’t work?” the guy said.  “No, it works, but I think I’m doing something wrong.  How do you use it?”  “Well, you put the clothes in, and then the soap, and then you start it.”  I felt like a real moron.  “Choose five.”  Uh-oh.  I had chosen two.  My guess was that this corresponded to the length of time needed for the cycle, and sure enough, my laundry was still spinning after two hours. 

The laundry finally stopped spinning, but I was unable to open the door.  The sign on the door said to turn it off and wait ten minutes.  After waiting, the door still didn’t open.  I realized I had to manually turn the machine off (but which button?) before the 10 minutes would start counting down.  Sure enough, I had wonderfully clean clothes two and a half hours after starting the wash!  Then begins the art of hanging an entire wardrobe on a laundry line and any available space.  Our only saving grace is that things dry quickly here.  I shudder to think what will happen when we move to wetter climes.  I’ll leave that worry for another day.