Confused old foreigner at the laundromat: Did you think this was going to be easy? Hint: Hell, no!!!

Despite the arduous journey to the laundromat, the Friday evening was still young. It was still light outside. Let the youth enjoy their Friday evenings with food and laughter and fun. The old guy's got laundry to do. Either that, or wear dirty, sweaty clothes.

Into the Aqua Wash I go. "Oh. A screen. It says start here. Okay." And I immediately let myself get sucked into the screen. I did NOT take a proper look at the washers and dryers, maybe a quick glance, but that's about it. Can I blame this failure on Microsoft and Google? On smartphones and computers? Am I so drawn to screens that I ignore everything around me in my physical environment? Has my assimilation into The Borg that the Internet represents caused thought defects? Presence of mind defects? I have no way to know. Maybe I've always been like this, and if it wasn't the screens it would be something else. Let me tell you the story.

Maybe because it was a Friday evening, I was the only person in the laundromat. There was nobody around to ask for assistance. Like I said, I got sucked straight into the screen. 

1. Select language: ENGLISH
   
   
2. Press here to become a member
   
   
3. Enter your telephone number
   (Formatted for Korean phone numbers only, which I do not have.)
   "Okay. I'll put in a fake phone number."
   
   
4. Enter a four-digit password
   "Okay, I'll put in an easy-to-remember password. Same as some of my other passwords? No. Too dangerous. Use something unique, but easy to remember."
   
   
5. Deposit enough money to pay for a load of laundry
   (How much is enough? Are there different prices for different size loads? What do these numbers mean? 39', 43', etc.)
   "F-ing hell. I don't know. How am I supposed to know?"
   
   
6. Deposits 6000 Korean won / USD 4.50
   (4000 Korean won would have been enough as it turns out...)
   
   
7. Use Washer #1
   (Goes to Washer #1, where absolutely nothing is happening. All instructions are in Korean.)
   "Give me a couple of days, and I'm sure I can work it out. For now, I am F-ed."
   
   
8. "Now what? Now F-ing what?And where's the laundry detergent. There's none in here. Do I have to go over to the convenience store and buy some? Why do they have Bounce laundry sheets, but no detergent?"
   
   
9. Purchases a "Bounce" for Korean won 500 / USD 0.37, on the long shot hope that maybe it's laundry detergent.
   (Of course, it's not. It's just a couple of Bounce dryer sheets as you would expect.)
   
   
10. Gives up, massively frustrated.
    "F. I was tested and I failed. I failed the test of doing laundry in Korea the first time."

Having failed the test, I took my dirty clothes out of Washer #1, put them in my backpack, and went outside, where I could take off my Covid mask for air. Yes, I was doing all the steps above with a Covid mask on, hardly able to breathe, as my frustration mounted and finally peaked.

The air helped. Taking a break helped. After a while, I went back inside (masked of course). "Let me see here." I started taking a proper look at the washers. "Hmm. Coins. Price based on load size. I don't have much. I saw a machine for changing bills into coins. Here it is." Now I had a bunch of coins, more than enough for my small load of laundry. "Still, no laundry detergent, but F it. Some cleaning's better than no cleaning at all." I put in the proper amount of coins, selected the water temperature (medium), pressed start, and I was off to the races.

Imagine my joy at seeing lots of soap bubbles. "Oh. The detergent is automatically included. Why didn't you F-ing tell me!!!" But I wasn't too bitter. Rather, I was happy not to be a total loser who couldn't do his laundry at the laundromat. Forty minutes later, the laundry was done. I took out the clothes and headed for the dryers, where there was only one glitch. What I thought was the Start button on the screen didn't work, but I quickly found a physical start button above the screen.

To celebrate my victory, I actually folded my laundry, with the exception of underwear and socks, which will never be folded by this low-budget traveller because to do so would make no sense. The seven-kilometer walk back to the motel had no errors as I had begun learning some streets. Straight back I proceeded, arriving at the motel room quite tired.

Penalty for not properly inspecting physical environment prior to getting sucked into a screen: 6000 Korean won / USD 4.50

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