Wednesday, June 16, 2010

Laundry


(PICTURE: See anything strange in this picture?)

I'm usually quite a good packer but on this trip I made a big mistake -- I didn't pack enough undies or socks. The other day, I decided to use one of the skills I've learned in Vietnam -- hand washing clothes. I took a pair of boxers and two of my favorite socks and scrubbed and washed them in my hotel sink. After ringing out the now-wonderfully smelling clothes, I hung them on our hotel balcony to dry. The clothes were still damp later in the day so I decided to keep them outside over night. It was a bad move.

Cape Town apparently has hurricane-like winds. When I awoke in the morning, I could hear the wind swirling outside. I got out of bed and went to the porch and discovered that my undies and one sock were gone. This didn't really make sense because the balcony was surrounded by a three foot high wall of glass. Using my best detective skills, I looked over the balcony's edge and saw my boxers sunk at the bottom of a small algae pool on top of a covered electrical unit:


(PICTURE: One of my favorite boxers.)

I decided to give up on the boxers but wanted to rescue my lone lost sock. Dave and I went to the ground floor and looked everywhere for the sock. Alas, we came up empty handed. The sock blew away to, I can only assume, Antarctica.

2 comments:

Huyen-hand-wash Teacher said...

That is so halarious Ben!!!

I think you need to learn the skill for hanging your clothes washed by Vietnamese way.

Justin said...

One of the many things my wonderful brother Adam has done for me over the years, aside from being one of my childhood heroes and teaching me about sports, and how NOT to react to sports games on television, is marrying his wife Rachel. Now this is important because it was Rachel who gets the credit badge for their gift selection 18 months ago....... 3 WONDERFUL pairs of ExOfficio "Give N Go" underwear. These babies will treat you with love and softness, care and dryness and enhance general wellness. They are a backpacker's dream and worth every penny.