not just for the china man...

on the weekend i went to the grand opening of a laundromat around the corner. they were offering unlimited free laundry so i went with my three loads, which would have cost me $6 to wash and dry in the laundry room of my building. as soon as i walked in i realized i was in for a wait. the place was packed with people and their 50 loads of laundry each. but i figured i could just use the waiting time to study and i would save some money while i was at it.

i signed in (we were all given call numbers), sat down on a window ledge and took out my pediatric dysphagia text. as i was reading i saw out of the corner of my eye a familiar looking red white and blue bag. i looked up and saw a huge pile of maybe 15 hung bak lam bags full of laundry! all of them belonged to this african american lady sitting next to me and we struck up a conversation. i told her i'm chinese and that in hong kong and china we use those bags all the time and then i asked her what they're called in english. she said "you speak english real good--how long you been here?" and then "they're just laundry bags from the dollar store". and today i definitely saw a homeless man with a hung bak lam, too. so apparently they're common here, which i find hilarious :D (on a somewhat related note, what's with little black girls and hello kitty? when i see non-asians with sanrio stuff, it just blows my mind)

well in the end i waited at the laundromat two whole hours and then managed to do two wash cycles before i couldn't take the waiting anymore and just took my wet clothes and dried them in my building. so i saved two dollars. woohoo.