Laundry Time

I admit it. I am a really bad procrastinator (and by that I mean that I'm excellent at procrastination) when it comes to doing laundry. I will not re-wear a leotard without first washing it, but I will avoid doing laundry for as long as possible.

That is why yesterday morning found me getting dressed for ballet class in my last remaining clean black leotard, and yesterday evening found me in the laundry room doing a load of dark laundry (jeans, towels, a few shirts, and lots and LOTS of leotards).

I mention this not because I think you really care a lot about my clothes-washing habits, but because I want to talk for a bit about the laundry room itself. I feel as if I should let someone know every time when I go down to the laundry room, sort of like you are supposed to do before you go hiking in the woods, so that they can send a search-and-rescue party to come save me if I don't return.

No, the washing machines don't eat people (and we haven't got any dryers to eat our socks). The reason that I'm afraid that I'll need to be rescued from the laundry room is that it is hidden deep inside a labyrinth of rooms and corridors in the basement of the dorm building and I'm rather afraid of getting lost.

Maybe you're laughing at me now, but I am actually being serious. There are rows of identical doors and you have to turn so many times that I actually couldn't give you directions for how to get there. I have to make the trek down to retrieve my clothes from the drying racks (in the room adjacent to the room with the washing machines) right now, and I'm going to give a tour along the way so you can see what I'm talking about.

First, I walk down six flights of stairs to reach the first floor...

...then down two more flights of stairs to reach the basement...

...then I turn left, go down the hall, and go through this doorway...

...then turn right, then turn left just around the corner...

...and go through this doorway...

...and here I must remember to turn right...

...and not left, because then you'll reach these doors and I don't know where they lead...

...and after I turn right again, I reach this corridor of very similar-looking doors...

...the second of which leads to the room with the washing machines. 

The third doorway leads to the drying room (imagine a room so full of racks of clean clothes hung out to dry that it is difficult to get from one side to the other and you'll have an accurate idea of what this room is like :).

Ok, maybe I am exaggerating about the whole search-and-rescue party, but only just a little. I'm not fond of going down in the basement by myself.  Even after going down to the laundry room quite a few times so far, I still end up slightly disoriented when I am finding my way there and back. I know that I am not the only one who has had this problem, since one of the many doors that you must pass through on the way out of the basement (located at a particularly confusing point where there are five or six nearly-identical doors to choose from) is labeled (in Russian) as the exit.

The basement-labyrinth is confusing, but it's also a unique, almost endearing, characteristic of this building. I appreciate it enough that I've now given it its own whole entire blog post. Hopefully the washing machines will be happy about that and thank me by not eating any of my socks.