Another round of Firsts

I had a few new experiences today. The first was the laundry-mat. We do not have a washing machine in our apt(yet) so we had to take our bundle of clothes and bedding down to the ole laundry-mat. Lucky for us, it is only a little ways down our street. I conned Dan into helping me take the bag there and help me figure out how to work the washing machines. We stood around dumbly for several minutes, trying to interpret the directions until a lady finally asked us(and she did have some laughter in her voice) if we needed help. She said that she has never washed here and proceeded to help us read the instructions. None of the three of us could find a price anywhere. Well, that's not entirely true. We did see a price of 3.50 euro(which converts into about $5.00) but it was under the label of soap. We continued looking for about 10 minutes until we finally figured out that we had to put  money in to get our token AND soap. We didn't want soap, as we had brought our own but it didn't matter. It did indeed cost 3.50 e for ONE LOAD OF LAUNDRY. This does not include the drying. Then they gave us half a tub full of soap, which we had to figure out how to dispense in the washer. I ended up putting it in the wrong slot and had to use my hands to scoop it out and scoop it into the other slot. While I was doing that, Dan forgot that he needed the tub but had already put the money in so the soap is spewing out onto the floor and he's trying to catch it in his hands. We were a mess. But after that, things went pretty normal. I did manage to burn the edge of Dan's towel...but he ate a whole bag of cool american doritos last night and didn't save any for me so we're even:)

After lugging all my dried laundry home (Dan had gone on to work after we got things working) it was time for my first solo bike riding experience. I was pretty nervous as bikes are treated like cars here, without the external protection that cars offer! But I managed to make it to the secondhand shop and back with only one minor mishap of nearly getting ran over. But it was so much fun! On the way back though, i was riding against the wind and that is tough. So my legs are recovering tonight. Can't wait for this weekend to get my own bike and I will definitely post pictures.