Laundry

Laundry may seem like a boring thing to talk about, but it’s a lot more interesting when you don’t have a washing machine, or even running water.  Back in Mountougoula, my host mom or aunt always did my laundry for me.  Here, Alima does it.  Many PCVs do their own, many others pay someone to do it.  While I’m able and willing to do my own, I and all of the Malians know that I’ll never be able to get my clothing as clean as a Malian woman could, and it would take me at least 3 times as long.  So I’m happy to let Alima do it for me, and I try to help as much as I can.  My attempts to help have been quite the process…

A quick overview.  Alima and I load up all of my laundry (we usually do it once a week or so), 2-3 buckets, and soap, both powder and bar, and head to the pump or the well, usually the well because it’s closer.  We draw a bunch of “juru” (leather pouch) fulls of water to fill the buckets, then carry them a short distance away from the well.  The big bucket gets a handful of dirty clothes and the powder soap, which smells awesome by the way.  Sometimes Alima uses a washboard, sometimes she just uses her hands.  Her hands fly as she washes!  After an article of clothing is washed it goes in another bucket of water.  When all the clothes in the big bucket have been cleaned, Alima washes them again, then transfers them to a third bucket where they soak in clean water.  Sometimes they soak in a 4^th bucket.  Sometimes she put my white/light clothing in a mixture of water and a blue dye which is meant to brighten dull clothes.  The first time she did this I was super annoyed that all my whites ended up blue – and they stay that way until the next washing, when all of the blue mysteriously disappears and my whites are super-white again.  Malian magic!  When the clothes are clean and rinsed, I hang them up on the stick-and-thorn fence surrounding the well.  (There’s also a garden within the fenced area, hence the fence).  During hot season all of the clothes, except the last few, would be dry by them time we finished.  These days, about half dry, and the other half get hung up on the clothesline in my courtyard after I return home.

Laundry drying in my courtyard.

My attempts to help:

At first I think I was entertainment for Alima.  I guess you could say I’m clumsy when I try to wash clothes by hand.  For the first several weeks I was only allowed to was rags and bandanas, or the occasional T-shirt.  If I tried to wash something else, even a bigger T-shirt, Alima would take it out of my hands and replace it with something less cumbersome.  I don’t have many small things like that, so soon I was left with nothing to do, and I would literally stand around for hours while Alima did my laundry.  Hanging up the clean clothes became an exciting event!  I’m sure I wasn’t expected to accompany her to the well, but it gave me something to do and I refuse to let other people do so much work for me without any kind of retribution, so at least by tagging along I could try to feel useful.

Sometimes other kids would accompany their moms to the well and I could play with them.  The moms, by the way, thought this whole process of doing my laundry was hilarious.  They’d look at me and say, “You can’t do laundry?”  I’d respond, “Yes I can!”  But Alima tells me to sit!”  So they’d say, “Show me.”  I’d march over to the bucket and start scrubbing clothes, and after a few moments of watching, the women would crack up and say, “Ok ok!” meaning I could return to my post of standing around doing nothing, and if I didn’t, Alima would tell me to do it anyway.

Once we went to the pump to do laundry 8 other pre-teen/early-teen girls were there, getting water and playing around.  Alima started doing my laundry and of course I tried to help.  And of course, all 8 girls started laughing at me.  One came over and literally took the shirt out of my hand and started washing it.  So I moved to another bucket and started working there.  A second girl came over, took the shirt out of my hand, and started washing that one.  This proceeded until 6 of the 8 girls were doing my laundry for me while I was reduced to hanging up the clean clothes, as usual.  The girls only stayed and helped for 30 minutes or so but my laundry was done in an hour, as compared to the usual 1½ - 3 hours!  Malian women are unbelievable. 

On another occasion, Alima and I were at the pump to do laundry.  Soon after we got there she sent her younger brother home to get me a stool and a bowl of brusse (bush) grapes.  But I still wanted to help.  I could just see Alima thinking, “I bring you a chair and food and you still won’t leave me to get the work done?!”  Later the cows stole all the grapes while we were hanging up clean clothes.  There’s a thought: when have cows ever interrupted your laundry?  Until rainy season came and the fence was rebuilt around the well (and before the cows were busy in the fields) we’d literally have to stop working to shoo away cows and donkeys who came to drink at the well – or eat my grapes. 

My attempts to help are improving.  Alima decided I can now learn how to help, so she started by letting me draw water from the well, something I learned how to do during homestay.  (Watching me do this is another form of entertainment for the average Malian woman).  Two weeks ago she decided to do everything herself, and I was reduced to crouching on the ground and playing in the mud (literally) while the 12 year old did my laundry.  Life sure is different here…  Last week was the best: we did everything together and took our time, chatting as we worked.  Apparently I’m starting to prove my worth!  During this time I also learned that Alima, like many Malians, is afraid of toads (apparently sorcerers can transform into toads and practice their evil magic that way).  Since it’s rainy season, toads just so happen to be everywhere, including next to the well.  Now I tell her I’m a toad and I’m going to eat her, and then I flick my tongue out at her and snap my teeth.  Usually she screams, and it cracks me up everytime!