Thursday and Friday were truly the high point of my three weeks stay in Sydney. I took a 2 hour train trip to Blue Mountains to visit a friend and to do some sightseeing. And with this best/army friend majoring in hospitality and his known affection for good food and drinks and anything gastronomical, what did I get?

A food and sightseeing tour of Blue Mountains with a very attentive and knowledgeable host.

What more could I want?

I’ll like to talk more about the trip but that is another story. That trip deserves a post of its own. Pictures will be uploaded too.

Anyway, I got back to Sydney on Friday evening around 8pm. I was dog tired after walking around so much from all the sightseeing and from Central Station back to my hostel (15 minutes walk). I just dumped my duffel bag near the door, changed from my sticky clothes (story in the next post) and promptly plopped myself in front of my laptop and just started doing some mind-numbing surfing.

Strange eh? How I switched so fast from active-and-hyped-up-Zareth back to my lazy-ass-mode.

After half hour of surfing the net, I decided to clear out my duffel bag and packed up my stuff. It was then I realized that I had quite a lot of laundry to do. I mean, A LOT. For some reason, this week load was more than last week. Maybe it was because I bought new shirts and t-shirts. Six altogether.

So this strange thought jumped into my mind. Even though I was tired and I wanted to just turn myself into a zombie in front of my laptop, I decided, hey, let’s hand wash all my undies and socks! It’ll be fun! So I loaded up the pail with warm water, pour the required amount of detergent and added baking soda and swirled the water around to get warm, sudsy water.

Then I tortured my undies and socks by dumping them into the pail. I soaked the clothes for a few minutes before doing the usual kneading, rubbing, scrubbing and washing (its not called hand washing for no reason). That was the easy part. The difficult part was rinsing the undergarments. Seriously, I stood in the shower for a good half hour, just rinsing 5 pairs of boxers and 2 pairs of socks. A note, don’t put too much detergent, put less than the recommended amount. It’ll be easier to rinse.

After the rinsing, was the usual line drying. I had to change my home clothes (clothes I wear when at home, duh) cause I got totally soaked. Then I realized that even with the preemptive strike against my laundry load, I still had a lot of clothes to wash. The list:

1) One dirty, sticky jeans.

2) 6 t-shirts

3) 2 long sleeves tees. (One of them sticky).

4) 2 shirts

5) 2  shorts

6) 1 undershirt

7) 4 towels

That’s not including a jacket and two scarves I have to send for dry-cleaning.

Feeling depressed, I took comfort in doing stuff like more net surfing and snacking on mixed nuts. Around 2am, I felt very pooped and tired and so decided to turn in for the night.

And did not wake up till 1:44pm today. Wow, almost 12 hours of sleep.

I fixed myself brunch and did more net surfing until 4pm when I managed to muster myself to hand wash my jeans. Yep, hand wash jeans. I love my jeans and I don’t really trust the washing machine my hostel provides. Why? Cause even when I adjust the setting to ‘colours’, I still see hot water coming out. I mean, WTF? I expect cold water or mildly warm water, not hot. And jeans bleed very badly in hot water.

So I spent another 45 minutes hand washing my jeans. The usual kneading and scrubbing in a pail before the rinsing. I had to apply more force as the jeans was one of the main victim of yesterday’s fiasco. So after washing my jeans, I flat dried my jeans. I had to use a chair and two shelves to achieve that. Mental note: buy a drying rack.

I then did the usual laundry pile sorting: separating the colours from the whites and from the towels. I made 8 trips to the laundry room within 2 hours to wash the clothes, dry them and pick them up.

8 trips.

I didn’t want to spend 3 bucks per load on drying my clothes (that rhymes) and wanted to save money so I decided just to use the dryer for my towels. As for all my garments, I either hang them up drying or converted my bed into a makeshift drying rack. So now I have moist garments everywhere drying in my room. I really, really need to get a drying rack.

In the midst of all these laundry doings, I realized that I’ve forgotten to pay rent for the next two weeks. SHIT. I only realized it at 8pm and by then the reception was closed. I hope they are still open on Sundays. I really don’t want to be kick out and be without a home. School’s staring soon!

After all the laundry were done with garments drying in every possible spot and the warm towels folded and stored in my wardrobe, I proceeded to wipe down both my sling bag (another main victim of yesterday’s fiasco) and my duffel bag. Then I fixed myself dinner, which consisted of peanut butter and honey oatmeal, tuna with cold bread and cucumbers and Heineken.

Even the dinner sounds boring. What’s worse, I saw two Korean kids carrying out a big, steaming bowl of pork ribs from the communal kitchen when I was on my way to collect my towels. Damn it, I need meeaaattt.

Tomorrow will be equally boring. After buying the drying rack, I’ll probably just entertain myself by watching my clothes dry.

I feel like my life revolves around laundry. Since its winter now and I don’t sweat, I’ll wear an item of garment four times. This excludes underwear or socks. Jeans will only be washed twice a year or when it get soiled, whichever comes first. Jackets and cardigans will be washed after winter or when soiled, whichever comes first. There, laundry load cut and money saved.

I’m starting to feel domesticated.

By myself.