Oh, for a clean load of laundry!

So, our laundry facilities have been broken since I got here, and apparently for several weeks before as well. Last night, we got word that, amazingly, the laundry was up and working. Many people rushed to toss a load in, but I decided to wait until tonight.

Charlotte was talking to people online and I was bored, so I decided to try to figure this new-fangled laundry thing out. She said that the guard at the door knew how to work the machine that gives you cards (so that you can pay for the laundry).

I went downstairs with a big hamper, and found the guard surrounded by five or six of the Ethiopian teenage boys who also live in the mirkaz klitah. I asked him how to work the machine, and each and every boy jumped up and offered to help me. I was escorted by the entourage of teenagers to the machine, where I offered six shekels (the initial cost to get the card) to the guard, who attepted to put the coins in the machine.

The machine, of course, didn't accept the coins. Within a minute, after several tries, the boys all started offering up fistfuls of coins. Shekels were flying by me so fast, that I no longer had any idea if ANY of the money was mine, let alone where my original six shekels were!

Finally, one boy picked up a five-shekel piece and spun it into the machine, where it stayed! The digital display registered the amount. The boy's objective: to get one more shekel into the machine. Again, the coin popped out, and everybody began offering up money.

After another minute or two, they evidently got the last coin into the machine, because somebody handed me a card. I was standing back, watching the pandemonium unfold, as they asked me for more shekels to put money on the card for use in the laundry machines.

By the end, I had no idea whose money was on my card. One member of the financial circus informed me that there were ten shekels on it.

As I turned to get my hamper, one of the boys swung it up in his arms and ran down the stairs with it, depositing it in the laundry room.

And guess what? All of the machines were full!

Thus ends the saga of Betsy's first attempt to do laundry at the Mirkaz Klitah Yafit in Arad. Hopefully, a sequel will be forthcoming, because I'm running out of clean clothes here!