Laundromat bafflement

This morning I went by a lavanderia that I found an advertisement for. The clean clothing situation is going to get a bit grim in a couple of days, and I'll have to resort to wearing my sheets as a toga. (They do that here, and it's OK. I swear.) I have no concept of how this lavanderia place works. There is a large switchboard on the wall. The machines have no coin slots but big signs that read so-and-so-many kilos. There is a man that rushes about opening and closing the washers and dryers (I assume they're washers and dryers, but there is no discernable difference between the two). I asked the man in pathetic Italian how to use the laundromat (warning him in advance that I spoke poor Italian - not that he needed any warning). He rattled something off in an absolutely unintelligible language, them laughed HA HA HA and winked at me. HA HA HA wink? What the hell does that mean?

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