Thursday, October 9, 2008

Dirty American

Dirty is always relative; it depends on your system. My family, for example, thinks I am ridiculous in maintaining one sponge for the dishes and another for the counter. I, in turn, and despite not having read any hygiene news in my support, find it equally ridiculous to put counter dirt near my dishes like that. But still I eat at their houses.

Our upstairs neighbor, on the other hand, though perhaps it is more appropriate to say on the other planet (or maybe just country), has her own special set of cleaning standards which she has irritatingly chosen not to keep to her idiosyncratic self. She has, apparently, been complaining to the building manager about our (my) inept cleaning of the laundry room for a while now. I was quite surprised to finally hear this this week, having been schooled on the finer details of cleaning the laundry room once soon after moving in, and having never really recovered from the blow to my pride that this represented, and thus having kept rather tidy ever since

The rules that this woman thinks I should keep made make my eyeballs ache. The dials must be turned in the same direction (up). The lint trap must be washed out. The soap drawer must be cleaned, of course, but should be taken out entirely and washed thoroughly. Inside should be checked for drips. (Apparently she puts her face up to the hole to check for fabric softener residue.) The rubber part on the dryer door must be inspected for lint. And these are in addition to the already crazy house rules. All doors and drawers should be cleaned thoroughly and left open, but only slightly. The floors around the machines should be mopped. The sink and the top of the machines should be polished. Oh, and our assigned laundry period is Wednesday afternoon. No other laundering without special permission.

9 comments:

Lillo said...

This is insane! What is wrong with those people? It is a communal laundry room. If they want it so fancy clean, then why don't they get a washer for themselves?

Swiss Ms. said...

Hear hear!

Anonymous said...

i am 100% with you on the separate sponges in the kitchen. it is a bit over the top to expect all those things with a communal laundry situation. i have a sneaking suspicion that lurking underneath all this laundry room static (no pun intended) there may be some anti-american sentiment??? but i am always suspicious of the swiss and their non-alignment, nationalistic, peace-pushing ways...

Swiss Ms. said...

Yeah, I am pretty sure the management wouldn't be patronizingly instructing me how to clean if I were Swiss. But then again, maybe I would know how to clean properly if I were Swiss.

I'm going to tell my family you're on my side next time it comes up.

Lillo said...

Only because of your and a certain Ms. DC's disgust of using only one sponge for the kitchen do I also now use two for the kitchen. I do it, but I am not sure it really helps. I think it is to ease your mind and only that.

Chantal said...

My neighbor is exactly the same way...I had my first laundry lesson here in both French and German. She even wants us to soak the soap dispenser in vinegar...yeah right. Look for my upcoming essay on laundry room joys in the November issue of Swiss News.

Swiss Ms. said...

Ah, so it could be worse!

Anonymous said...

I too am a two-sponge kitchen girl! Though I have not had the courage to confront the new jenicrob mr. about it yet. . . .

Swiss Ms. said...

Okay, next skypeathon I'll be sure to raise the issue....