No! No laundry!

One thing you learn about traveling in foreign countries is that you just have to go with the flow, whatever the flow is.

Case in point: In one of our hotels on the way to Mount Everest, I saw a laundry slip in the room and thought great!, I can get my dusty clothes washed! I entered "1 pair white socks" and "1 long black skirt" that I'd been wearing (a discreet and wise choice for when nature calls on the Tibetan plain where there are NO trees to hide behind).

When I placed them on the counter at the front desk, the woman looked at me like I was offending her. "No!" she shouted with disgust, waving me off with her hand. "No laundry!"

"But there was a laundry slip in my room," I explained, trying to justify my behavior.

She just look at me again, perhaps thinking I was deaf as well as stupid: "No laundry!"

I slunk away, rolling my black skirt around my sockies so no one else would notice my grievous error.