Aiko learns how to do laundry, which in Japan, usually means hanging them out to dry on your balcony.
Although you can purchase dryers (or combo washer/dryer machines), they’re not common like they are in North America. When it rains, laundry can be hung indoors, and modern bathrooms have heater fans inside them that can be used to dry clothes.
When we wash our clothes, we usually use the old bath water for the wash cycle (the cycle that uses detergent). After that cycle is done, the clothes is rinsed with fresh water.
How do you do laundry where you’re from?
Answers and Responses to Frequently Asked Questions
- Yes, it’s a new home!
- Yeah, this wasn’t Aiko’s favourite video to make, but she wasn’t really that sad about making it 🙂
- The laundry machines takes 22 minutes to wash, but a long time to dry (sometimes more than 3 hours). The clothes come out with very little water in them, as the machine has a “spin dancing” feature.
- The clothes don’t get crunchy when hang dried, but I totally know what you’re talking about, since I’ve previously experienced the crunch. I’m fairly sure there’s a softener in the detergent that helps to make the clothes not crunchy. All in all, the clothes dry nicely when hung out on the balcony.
- I don’t know where you get the door hanger outside of Japan, but I’m sure you could Google it and see. It’s a very easy to get in Japan.
- Clothes take anywhere from an hour (hot, dry, and windy summer day) to the whole day (cold and humid winter day) to dry when hung out.
- We do laundry almost every day. Why so much… I wish I knew why 🙂 Perhaps because there would be no room on the balcony to do a week’s worth of laundry for an entire family?