February 5, 2014. San Francisco, Ca. Laundry.

The place seems a caricature of a laundry from the past. We both laughed when we walked in the door. Our hotel has no guest laundry facilities. They are helpful by sending laundry out to be serviced, which is nice, but expensive. During our walks, we noticed a sign for laundry and dry cleaning, so we went in…and we laughed. I bet that only in San Francisco could you find such a laundry today. The room was small and packed full with stuff. It had all the normal revolving racks you find in a dry cleaning service except it was small. The room was deep but only 10 feet wide. The only working person in sight was Chinese, and was tiny. When we walked in the door she was ironing. Immediately, I spotted three different types of sewing machines, tucked into the corner behind the counter. She came over to talk to us and was smiling cheerfully. And she was delighted to attend to our dirty laundry, all for $1.50 a pound. We told her that we would return tomorrow. It all seemed to be a throwback, but here we were yesterday, giving over our dirty clothes to the still beaming old lady, to return in the morning to collect our folded clean clothes. Of course, Ken correctly points out that we have no clue what we will be paying as we never did ask whether the cost was for the clothes wet or dry. But I don't care. It reminds me of all the books about Chinese laundry facilities. I am happy to be a part of a new real Chinese laundry in San Francisco. And we will pick up our clean and folded clothes in the morning, we hope.