Day 285: Longing For A Dryer

Oh the clothes dryer, oh how I miss thee!

Korean apartments all have a washing machine, but the vast majority do not have a dryer. This is one of the first things that a foreigner notices upon arriving in Korea, and it seems like such a absurd condition, as having a washer and dryer, back home, are synonymous as two things that *always* come together. But not here in Korea, and it's something that you never really get used to. Now the new 'officetel' style of apartments in Korea sometimes come with a washer/dryer combo, but this is a new concept for the Koreans, and only the affluent can afford these. And us foreigners may be relatively affluent here in Korea, but our apartments still don't come with one.

I tell ya, it's a sad reminder of what I'm missing in my life every single time I do my laundry. The washer stops, and then instead of throwing your damp laundry into a handy dryer, you gotta set up the clothes dryer rack thingy which takes up at least 57% of your living space, and then lay your clothes across it. And then you gotta wait like two damn days for the clothes to dry. And the drying time actually varies quite a bit depending on what season it is. In the hot late or early summer the clothes dry in mere minutes it seems, and the wait isn't too long in the winter when you have your apartment heat jacked up, but in mid-summer when it's wet and rainy and humid as hell, it takes an eternity and a day for your clothes to become wearable again because of the air's humidity.

And I use that word 'wearable' very loosely. They may be dry after a few days, but Downy-soft and annoying Teddy Bear-cuddly they certainly are not. Unless your idea of comfortable clothing are jeans that can stand up on their own, or socks that have dried in Cubist prune-like contortions, or stretched-out fitted shirts and pants that have changed shape and length because of that god damn drying rack! Argh! Korea is destroying my clothing! My poor innocent clothes will never be the same again, and they will never forgive me for having taken them away from their much-loved dryer.

Oh Mr. Dryer, oh how I miss thee! ;-)