A fire destroyed Tununak's washeteria on Feb. 15. Now the community is not getting all of their laundry needs met.
Before the fire, Tununak resident Anastasia Evan took all of her loads of laundry to the washeteria. Now she’s doing them by hand.
“I have a small tub that I used to wash them in and then wring them by hand,” said Evan.
She says it takes her about three hours from start to finish to wash about six to eight items of clothing. It’s a whole process. First her significant other drives back and forth between the watering point and their house on his ATV, hauling 5 gallon buckets of water. Evan said that it takes him three trips to bring back the amount of water she needs. Then she washes the clothes in the buckets. She doesn’t rinse them, because it would take too long, so her clothes end up smelling a little soapy. She hangs them up to dry after wringing them out a couple times. She washes clothes for herself, her significant other, and her teenage son.
“You know how boys are, they get dirty,” said Evan.
She said that she and her family don’t change their clothing as often now.
Evan used to wash her clothes in a small, portable Danby washer, but hers broke a few years ago and she doesn’t have the $600 it costs to buy a new one. She’ll keep using her handwash method until Tununak gets a replacement washeteria. She hopes that happens soon.
“Very. We depend on that,” said Evan.
Edna Angaiak has a Danby washer too. They don’t require much water to function, which is a must since homes in Tununak don’t have running water. But the Danby is too small for her family’s coats and blankets. She used to wash them at the washeteria; now she’s cleaning them as best she can without water.
“I put them in my dryer and put sheets,” said Angaiak.
She’s hoping the heat and dryer sheets will kill the bacteria. She said that she knows she can’t dry them forever. She’s considering a summer trip to a neighboring village to clean them. It’s about 45 minutes away.
“Maybe this summer I can go Toksook [Bay] to wash my blankets. Or, I don't know,” said Angaiak.
Community member Felix Albert said that his wife usually does laundry in their portable Danby washer, but preferred the laundromat.
“When we have enough money we used to use the laundromat,” said Albert.
It cost about $8 per load of laundry at the laundromat; the machines were much bigger and got the clothes cleaner. He said that if a replacement facility were free, he would do all his laundry there.
The Tununak Tribe has plans and funds in place for a permanent replacement washeteria. But in the meantime, the Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Corporation says they’ll help the community fund and install a temporary washeteria.
“We need washeteria now,” said Angaiak.
For Edna Angaiak, who wants to be able to wash her blankets, that day can’t come soon enough.
