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A mop with tights and a ban on cleaning floors: how to clean up the house in different countries
Why their advice is worth taking note of
Leo Tolstoy once said: “Let everyone sweep in front of his door. If everyone does this, the whole street will be clean. ” Let’s learn from other nations to clean their home. It will become cleaner not only in our home, but also in our soul.
France
Many French people walk around the house in the same shoes as on the street. Therefore, from modern technology, they most of all give preference to a vacuum cleaner. The wireless robot has become their favorite. It is believed that immediately washing floors is a useless dilution of dirt. Therefore, an automatic dry cleaning is performed first, and then a wet one.
The French are fascinated by another modern device – a steam generator. They clean the bathroom, floors, plumbing fixtures, tiles and upholstered furniture. Environmental safety in the art of cleaning is in the first place for many Europeans.
A good housewife in France should always have sparkling windows. Numerous sunny days show the glass to be clean, which is why homeowners constantly wipe it down with a dry cloth. By the way, this saves time on cleaning windows when the period of general cleaning is approaching.
The southern country of Scandinavia has a damp climate. Most of the year, the streets of Denmark are wet and slushy, so residents of the country change their shoes when entering a house. But most often they walk in socks or barefoot. This is why cleaning floors is considered an important daily routine. For the smell, special chemicals are added, but by no means chlorine. The Danes would not understand our “Whiteness”. They rarely use chlorine-containing products.
Housewives in a European country like ordinary household vinegar to wash off rust. It is diluted in a spray bottle with water and this solution is sprayed with taps, cutting boards, glass surfaces.
A Russian emigrant told that Scandinavian women do not wash windows very often, for them it is … rain. The system of vents in Denmark is different than, for example, in Russia: the window opens in the lower part “away from you” at an angle. Rainwater runs off without getting inside, but at the same time washes the surface of the glass.
Fragrances in the house are a kind of fetish of Eastern countries. Smells are everywhere – on the street, in shopping centers, hotels, shops, cafes, cars and, of course, in homes. Sticks, candles, special deodorants, diffusers are used to spread aromas.
Oddly enough, the spices unusual for the Russian nose are very attractive. The most important raw material for perfume is oud – the resin of the agar tree, which settles in the core of the tree and impregnates it. In the Emirates, it is easy to buy household chemicals with the smell of oud, washing powder, bakhur (a special mixture for flavoring clothes).
Rose and patchouli are also held in high esteem among home fragrances. Having tried to aromatize a house in Russia, you can get into the atmosphere of the East.
The mistresses of the country fell in love with automatic dryers. You rarely see laundry hanging on a line in the United States, for example, over a bathroom, like ours, or in the fresh air of a ranch. A tumble dryer is just as essential as a washing machine.
Practical advice books are very popular in America. So in the 1970s, life hacks from the “sloppy sisters” – two friends, Pam Young and Peggy Jones, became a bestseller. They compiled guidelines for housekeeping and called them “Uncollected Housewives: From Barn to Paradise.” To put things in order, they proposed a card index method of housekeeping. Their advice became serious instruction for American women. The ladies began to write down their daily, weekly, monthly and seasonal activities. Every detail is recorded on the cards so that you can plan each cleaning and distribute it to family members. The card with the completed tasks is postponed until the turn for the next worries comes. By the way, such reminders in the modern world are even easier to do, because you can keep a schedule on your smartphone.
Here dust is fought as if it were the worst enemy. Cleaning is done in the morning, before work, before school or just before lunch. The whole family grabs onto vacuum cleaners, dry rags and begins to get rid of litter. The most important ritual of Italian women is to shake out rags, rugs, bedding from the balcony or from the window. Wet wipes for collecting dust are rarely used here, you cannot shake it out. And it is very important for the hostess to hear “come e ‘bravo”, which means “come on, well done”.
But the terrace and the floors are washed with special means so that there is a gentle and pleasant smell in the house. After lunch, Italians do not clean – not accepted.
The first thing that surprises the arriving tourist is the abundance of various smells and the cleanliness of the Chinese streets and premises. Even the cheapest hostels don’t have a single speck of dust. Linen is washed differently than in Russia, because the blanket here is often sewn to the duvet cover, so everything is loaded into the machine together. It turns out that the blankets of the inhabitants of China are always clean. The interesting thing is that the sheets are put on the mattress, but they put a blanket on top, on which you lie down. For the Russian man in the street, it is not entirely clear why, in this case, a duvet cover and sheets are needed, but such are the traditions of the Celestial Empire.
General cleaning “da sao chu” is necessarily carried out before the New Year. A mop or broom is wrapped in nylon tights, this allows static electricity to better collect dust. But our grandmothers also know this secret, in the villages they also often put tights on brooms.
The country of innumerable philosophies even refers to cleaning an apartment as a harmonious “cleaning” of the soul, body and surrounding space.
Marie Kondo after the publication of her book Magical Cleaning. The Japanese art of putting things in order at home and in life ”was included in the list of the 100 most influential people of 2015 according to Time magazine. Marie talked about how you can get rid of trash not only in the apartment, but also inside yourself. With the help of such “cleaning” the house becomes harmonious and spacious, while the mood is joyful and consistent with your inner state.
The writer says that it will be easy and quick to maintain order in the house if you not only cleanse your home of trash, but also get rid of old habits. According to her version, it is necessary to get rid of unnecessary things radically, so that the house is spacious. Anything that gets in the way should be thrown away or given away. It can be boring furniture, duplicating clothes, old dishes with chips, dusty souvenirs. The words “may be useful” and “just in case” should also be thrown out of my head.
I would like to take note of the statement of Marie Kondo: “Everything we do should lead to happiness. Cleaning is needed to improve the quality of life: with its help, the house becomes harmonious, and only those things that bring joy remain in it. ”