Laundry...but not today

[kosui]

It's a bad day for drying laundry...again. D:
At least we have clean clothes. I'm not sure how people dry laundry here in the winter, though. Line-drying never worked well in Michigan winters. On top of that, we won't have central heating. How do you do it, Japan? How do you do it?

Comments

[kosui]

Well, the Japanese usually deal with it by preparing their kotatsu (short-legged, curtained tables with space heaters behind the curtains) and just piling on the clothes and sitting with your feet folded under the table (or, in the case of children, just playing under the table). Also, they use space heaters (traditionally kerosene heaters, but electric ones are becoming more popular) and have meals that are cooked at the table in nabe pots. I know Nat's going to hate it. She doesn't usually like mildly cool days. I love the winter, though. The severity of the winter in Japan largely depends on where you are, though...and I not always latitude (we're at about the same latitude as mid-northern North Carolina, but our climate has a closer resemblance to Michigan's or Ohio's...but with a rainy season in May or June and the occasional typhoon).

Some wall-mounted air conditioners (central air conditioning is not as rare as central heating...but close) double as heaters.

The last step that helps Japanese survive winters without central heating are their winter futon blankets. As someone who really likes the cold, I can't even stand using a summer futon blanket. They're really thick and come with fitted, zip-up sheets. In the winter, you use that same blanket, plus a thicker blanket, plus (if that's not enough) any other blankets you have in the closet. These blankets are really heavy. Heavier than your typical duvet. We might need to get new ones, since the ones we inherited have been heavily used (I've been patching things as I can, but some of the slip cases have broken zippers...so I'm saving them to make patches from), or maybe I just need to beat them into shape.