Laundry Day

I am still mostly sitting on my backside doing schoolwork these days, but only two weeks left of this class. I admit that I do get distracted by Facebook (am finding a lot of old friends there these days!) and listening to good music on a regular basis, but I have not actually gotten out of the house so much. My dear husband though, some weeks ago he, well insisted that we should go away for our anniversary. So, we did, to Fort Kochi (Kochin/Cochin) in Kerala. The last photo I shared was from that trip as well. But today I wanted to tell a little about the laundry that we visited, the dhoby khana.

As we entered the area, we saw a large area covered with poles and ropes. This is where they would generally dry much of the clothing, but of course, this being monsoon season, few were using this area to dry things.

As we came around the side we saw the work spaces that each of them use. Each has their own assigned space where they wash the clothes. Looked like hard work.


Nearby was a covered shed, where at this time of year they hang most of the laundry to dry. Notice how they don't need clothespins?


Inside is where they also do the ironing. Wow. These are some serious irons. This guy, who I was told was 70 something years old, offered to let me pick up the iron. I couldn't. Seriously. It was far too heavy. Of course, once you lift it and place it on the fabric, that also means that the iron is doing a lot of the work for you, so that is the good part.



Another man was working with a coal iron...


And finally, someone was starching shirts.



It was an amazing place to see.