A little story about dry-cleaning.

I admit that when the man of the house first asked me to pick up his dry cleaning some months ago, my first suggestion to him was that he hire a car in his lunch hour and pick it up himself. Our relationship has  come a long way since then I suppose, in that he discreetly leaves the coloured pick-up slips where they cannot be missed on his way out the door in the morning. Occasionally he also meekly sends a verbal follow up my way with a regret-tinged voice. And this is how our morning yesterday began.

It was a slow morning, and I was struck by what can only be described as jet-lag from our transit the day before. With my eyes barely open, I saw his suited person depart once more and the flash of some pink cardboard carefully (and was that a moment of hesitation I noted?) placed on the bedroom dresser. The goddamned dry cleaning. I lay in bed and wondered how I could avoid doing it. Would it be acceptable to divert the work bus on the way home so he could jump out and pick up the two pairs of trousers? Probably not. Could he just wear the same pants to work every day for the next while? Nobody wants that.

And so it was that I had to make my way to my nemesis - Boroko foodworld. For some time I have been actively avoiding the supermarket for it is where I spend most of my time (and our money) and I really just needed a break. Having said that - I did take pause to reflect that Emerald and I shared the last piece of stale bread for breakfast that morning so it was probably time to at least buy some Weet-Bix. I picked up the pink cardboard slip (with mild disgust), got in the car and drove over the freeway (locked in by two cars doing 40km p/h and spewing out black smoke directly into my lungs for most of the way) and to the supermarket. I grabbed a trolley (a nice big heavy ancient trolley that constantly went the wrong way and hurt my toes a lot) and entered the fray. I only needed a few things.

What happened over the next 45 or so minutes I cannot really explain/recall, but when I got to the register my trolley was overfloweth with all manner of things. It was the biggest shop I think I have ever done in my life. I was exhausted. The check-out girl took each item nice and slowly and didn't seem to care that if she maintained that speed we would be there until nightfall. As I was about halfway through unloading the trolley and a quick casual glance at the screen informed me we were already at around 300 kina, I wondered what our bank balance was. A little chill ran through my veins. With a sense of impending defeat, I continued unpacking the trolley and watching the most painful keying in of many barcodes on items that by then I was pretty sure I could not pay for. Ding-Ding! 649 kina. I handed over the card, went through the ritual and did not bother feigning surprise when the card was declined. Unfortunately my credit card was at home, lost in the post-Australia mess. Oh dear, I would have to return. The ladies put my enormous trolley to the side and I told them I would be back in about half an hour.

At that stage I thought it would be worth at least getting the dry cleaning, so I went up to the lady and handed over the pink ticket. She started laughing immediately which I did not think was very cool. "Oh no pink here - you have to go to SVS Harbourside Supermarket!!!!" as if it was the most hilarious comedy she has been a part of in years.

I flew back home over the freeway, ran inside, got credit card, baby and haus meri laughed at silly mummy and went to SVS Harbourside. Quite angry by this stage, I deliberately parked not-where-the-parking guy directed me to - why I will never know. I got out of the car and counted my cash - I had 35 kina. I casually looked at the slip and the (by now much hated trousers) were coming in at a total of 34 kina. Feeling a radical drop of energy and blood sugar I decided to get a coke before I went any further. As I placed the can on the counter I did hope that cokes cost one kina in PNG although I suppose at some level I knew this was unlikely. As she rang up my 2.60 purchase, a little part of me died. With defeat in every step I walked up to the dry cleaning lady and gave her my pink ticket. She produced the plastic wrapped trousers and asked for 34 kina. Did she have an eftpos facility I asked? No, she did not. I waved my 32 kina in front of her, but she wasn't biting. She called the supervisor-on-duty and told her I had a cash flow problem. Her advice: 'You buy something and get cash back'.

To do this, I had to spend 15 kina. I ignored the fact I had already spent 2.40 on a coke and was about to spend another 34 (and had a trolley of 600+ kina worth of groceries waiting for me at another supermarket at that moment), reluctantly passed through the checkouts and entered the supermarket isles. Was it just my mood at the time or was every item I picked up actually priced at 14.95???? I purchased some ridiculously overpriced dishwashing powder, waited an eternity at the checkout, got cash back, got the dry cleaning and thought at this stage I needed to put some credit on my phone to call the man to advise exactly what had transpired to that point vis-a-vis his &*^$%-ing dry-cleaning. I entered the Digicel shop to do just that and was dismayed to find a small community of people standing around motionless (staff included). I did an about-face that drew some attention and went back to the car. The phone call would have to wait.

By the time I returned to Boroko Foodworld, at least 45 minutes had passed. I had assumed that the checkout would have just processed the sale, put my things to the side and continued serving other valued customers. But as I approached the ill-fated check-out, I saw that all events had in fact been frozen in time. There was my trolley, the 649 kina sale still up on the screen, the register had been closed and a polite little sign had been erected to direct customers away. The three ladies were sitting motionless waiting for my return. Their eyes actually lit up when they saw me in the distance and it was about then I was glad I did not act upon the blackest of blackest thoughts of simply abandoning trolley and never going back to that supermarket again. I handed over the Mastercard and they called for their boss man to process the sale. After about 5 minutes I saw his shoulders kind of crumble from within - as the transaction was declined. All the ladies looked at me with wonder/awe/amazement/no admiration. I simply stared back. I was but an empty shell by this stage.

With a click of the fingers, he called for another machine to be provided and he tried again. We all circled the machine and held our breath. After a tense few minutes - we heard the happy sounds of the transaction being approved and hooray (!) I made my exit.

That trolley was not easy at the beginning - so once it was laden with approximately 36 bags of groceries, it was basically perpendicular to my body as I tried to get it back to the car. With some assistance the whole ordeal ended and I drove out of the Boroko Foodworld Carpark (imagining that I was doing it in slow motion with a backing soundtrack).

Approximately 2.5 hours after my initial departure I returned to the sanctuary of home. With tears in my eyes, I embraced my child and hoped aloud I had not missed any major milestones. Sensing I had been through some kind of life changing ordeal, our haus meri stayed back late to help with unpacking - but eventually she left - and still there were bags.

Not long after this our bread winner returned and asked casually if I was able to get the dry-cleaning.

He has been referred to this article for further information (but at least wore clean pants to work today).

The End.