June 29. II. Laundry

Before I came here, I did not think too much what kinds of technology are available here. It would have been funny if I had asked, “Is there air conditioner? Is there laundry machine? Is there supermarket?” Those things could be easily known at one time once I get here. The answer is everything is available in Freetown, Sierra Leone.

The last laundry machine did not work.

In my home area, there was a public laundry machine room. I had no doubt that it should be working. It took one week to find out where it was, because whenever I asked, security guard said, “It is closed now.” My last solution was to ask Amadu. He showed me a laundry room and said that only one laundry machine works. But that machine looked also strange. There were filthy water inside the machine, and Amadu bled all that water by scooping up one by one.

I wished that laundry machine worked well, and I waited for three hours until it finished. Oh no… It did not work! It never refreshed in clean water, and all my laundries were submerged in the same type of dirty water. I could not even open the machine door. One housekeeper helped me to take them out and said, none of the laundry machines worked for a long time. So then, how residents here do the laundry? To my surprise, all residents have hired housekeeper, and they did not even know whether laundry machine works. The housekeeper asked me, “Can I work for you?”

I asked myself. Do I need housekeeper or person who cook for me? My neighbor Nephas suggested that his maid could also do my laundry and clean my room, because he pays her well. I felt awkward about this situation that it is common to have housekeeper in Sierra Leone. My life will be easy if someone cook, clean, hand wash, and iron for me. But I am fine, I can manage on my own. I would rather live in a little dirty(?) place and skip breakfast, as I always do. Also, there is a beauty of 손빨래, hand-washing; you can exercise by scrubbing and squeezing out water of the wet clothes.

However, for the second time, I brought my laundry to the Family Kingdom hotel and asked, “I don’t stay here any more, but can I use the laundry machine here?” Thank you so much, Magnus! He made it possible. I am happy with the machine that works for cleaning my clothes.