A little extra motivation

Tonight I have been hanging wet laundry.  This is one of my least favorite tasks, one I usually leave to my helper,who is of course on vacation this week.  I usually start the clothes in the washer, she hangs them, she usually folds and I put them away... team work right? We do have a dryer, but usually "I" (aka my helper) hang our laundry unless I am in a hurry for something to be dry. I do have to dry my towels though...there is such a big difference between soft, dried towels and hard, crinkly line-dried towels.  But I digress.  So usually when my helper has been gone awhile I cheat and dry more clothes in the dryer, because I am lazy.  But I now have a little extra motivation to hang that laundry myself.

We found out recently through our friends' unfortunate experience that our city now has a new electricity-saving motivation.  What is usually the biggest motivator for most people?  Money of course.  So, everyone is now allotted a certain amount of electricity for a calendar year, starting in January (I have no idea what that amount is however).  If you go over it before December 31, you are bumped from paying 5 mao (or half of one yuan)/unit (also have never figured out exactly what this unit or "dun" is) to paying a whole yuan/unit.  The price doubles.  You are then allotted a small amount of electricity at this double price.  If you go over that, then you have to go to the office of electricity and have them add additional electricity at some exorbitant price for you and receive some sharp criticism of going this far over your limit.  To clarify, the way our electricity "bill" works is a pre-paid system.  So you take your electricity card and your bank card to a machine (at a bank or for us there is one in the management office) and put money on your electricity card. Then you stick your card in your electricity meter in your apartment and it adds the units to your meter.  If you run out before you pay again, your electricity just cuts off until you pay.  Clever but annoying system to make sure you pay your bill.

So, most of our American friends who were here all summer have already passed the second tier and are making trips to the office to beg for electricity mercy to make it to the end of the year.  I suppose it really is a good way to help people conserve and I think we fellow Americans could certainly use a little financial motivation to not waste, myself included.  However, the allotment given here is probably plenty for a family of three who don't own an oven, a dryer and who mostly believe air conditioning might make you sick from the wind blowing on you.  For a family of 5 or 6 or 7 who do use those appliances, well, good luck.  We still have 1400 units left in the first tier, we found out a couple weeks ago when we added money to our card.  I am sure the only reason we have not gone over is that we were gone for 3 months this summer. We use an average of 20 units a day (30 when we run A/C but won't be doing that anymore) which gives us about 70 days.  As it is October 6, we won't make it to Christmas without at least going into the second tier.  Unless we do a bit more conserving.

Thus, I spent tonight hanging our laundry.  Something I really don't mind that much I suppose.  At least not as much as running around town begging electricity mercy.