Cleaning Clothes / Taking A Bath

I thought I'd take a break from my normal journal posts to write a bit about how the every day Indian washes their clothes and takes a bath. This may shock some, but I assure you, it's not as bad as it seems.

The Bucket and Mug



These two little items make up your bath tub/shower, washing machine, and in my situation, the cleaning bucket. They come in various sizes and colors, and most families would have more than one. I can't give an exact price because I don't have my receipt and I bought a lot of stuff that day; however, I believe I got the combo from the store for the inflated price of around 250 rupees ($5.95USD).

Taking A Bath

At first, these two little items made my heart sink. All I wanted was running water! While you will find that most homes also feature a shower head, you'll also find that they're calcified from the hard water and end up spraying everything down in the room. As you can see in my bathroom, there's no divider between the toilet, sink, and shower. Technically you could stand by the toilet and take a bath but I don't see how hygienic that would actually be. This bathroom may look dirty but I spent a good two hours or so scrubbing everything with all-purpose cleaner. Compared to the before, it's not so bad. Actually, it's the same with the toilet but that's getting off topic so I digress...

To take a bath, simply turn on the hot water heater (they call is a giser like an old geeser not giser as in Old Faithful), turn on the water and fill the bucket. Then you proceed to take a bath by using the mug to pour the water from the bucket wherever you feel necessary. I've grown quite fond of this method. Of course, it's always warm in India so I don't have to worry about stepping out of a hot shower to a cold room. It also saves on water. I believe this method first started due to water shortages but it's become the norm in this country. Every place I've stayed at so far has featured a bucket and mug, some more slimy than others.

Cleaning Clothes

I'm still not sure of this method and if I'm even doing it right. However, no one has questioned my methods so I'm going to assume it's being done correctly. Since not everyone can afford a washing machine OR has the place to put a washing machine, clothes are cleaned in buckets. I guess I could hire a maid to do my laundry for me but I can't see spending the money when I could do it myself while hiding from the 104F heat. Not only that, having a maid wash my “intimates” seems a little weird.

To wash clothes, simply fill up the bucket with water (I use warm to hot water, never cold since I don't have a dryer), add detergent, add clothes, and agitate with 10 lovely digits. I use the clothes to scrub together if there's a stain on something. So far, I've been pretty successful in getting out stains I've accumulated. Then I let them soak in the water for 20 or so minutes, scrub again, and then rinse with running water. After I've rinsed them, I wring out the extra water and set up on my clothes line to dry. Right now, my line is in my kitchen. I'd put it outside somewhere but the state is covering the water (i.e. sewer) line across the street and there's dust everywhere outside. Heck, it manages to find it's way inside too! The minute I would set my wet clothes outside to dry, everything would turn into dust magnets. No bueno.



So there you have it. The Indian way of cleaning one's self and their clothes.