“Roughing it” is a matter of perspective

Living in twenty-one different apartments over the past seven months, I’ve had the opportunity to live without a number of creature comforts that I might previously have said were essential.  A lot of it is specific to our current lifestyle and mode of traveling, but it has given me food for thought about what I might be able to do without once we’re back in the States.  I now have a “hierarchy of appliances” based on our experiences so far.  

Things that are not as important as I thought

Television

Several of the Airbnb postings we’ve looked at will advertise how many English-language channels they have, or free Netflix access, or cable… but I don’t actually know how many of the places we’ve stayed at actually had TVs because we didn’t even notice.  The only times we’ve turned on a television were: once in Valencia, where we briefly thought that watching shows in Spanish would help us practice our language skills (ten minutes of “Ley y Orden” was enough to get rid of that illusion – Law & Order is hard enough to follow in English sometimes!), and then in Krakow and Berlin to watch World Cup matches.  Other than that, we have not missed movies or TV shows. We haven’t felt like we had time for any of that. At home, we don’t have cable but tend to get caught up in series, but here we are either doing touristy things or catching up on regular life stuff like laundry and groceries and planning our next city, so we feel like it would be terrible to make time for something that we can do when we’re not in Europe.

Dishwasher

At home, the dishwasher is critical.  We do a lot of cooking (and by “we” I mean mostly Craig), and there are a lot of dishes generated by both the process and the end results.  Even with just two of us, we run the dishwasher almost every day, and that’s in addition to the hand-washed stuff in the dish drain. On the road, though, our food tends to be pretty simple, often just requiring one or two pots.  The flavorings usually come from a jar or a packet, rather than ten different spice containers and measuring spoons. In some of the places we’ve stayed, there aren’t that many dishes anyway, so we need the dishes again well before a dishwasher would have been full.  It makes more sense to hand wash things, especially since it doesn’t take very long. In a few places, we’ve used the dishwasher as a drying rack to save space – it’s great for that! We’ve also used it to wash all of the dishes in the cabinets before we start using them, on the assumption that maybe the guests before us were not super scrupulous about cleaning.  Other than that, though, we haven’t used dishwashers very much and haven’t minded the apartments that didn’t have one.

Microwave

When we discovered that our monthlong apartment in Paris did not have a microwave, it seemed like a crisis.  At that point, I had been microwaving my breakfast every morning (either a sweet potato or Spanish tortilla), so this completely changed my routine.  In our monthlong Madrid apartment, we’d frozen some soup so that we’d have a quick go-to meal for days we got back late, and the microwave was helpful for heating it up.  How would we go a whole month without a microwave?! After a while, though, it was no big deal. We’ve had a few more apartments that didn’t have a microwave, and while it was a bit annoying to not be able to easily reheat leftovers, it really didn’t impact us that much.  I’d definitely rather have one than not have one, but it feels less critical than before.

Dryer

We have only stayed at apartments that included a washer, but very few have had a dryer.  We knew going in to the trip that dryers are not common in Europe and also that we might have some tricky laundry situations due to our carry-on-only packing strategy, so we purposely packed quick-drying things.  (This means a lot of merino wool, which I’m now totally in love with.) Air-drying our clothes has not been a big deal at all, and it’s probably helping our clothes hold up better. The only thing I don’t like about the lack of dryers is the initial crispiness of air-dried towels, and the difficulties of air-drying sheets and duvet covers.  Other than that, though, the lack of dryers has not been an issue. In fact, we had access to a dryer in our Berlin apartment and didn’t use it a single time the whole month.

Hairdryer

Airbnb listings actually specifically call out hair dryers as an amenity, which I guess makes sense.  The bachelor pad we stayed at in Paris did not include one, whereas most of the unoccupied places (that is, not people’s usual homes) did.  I didn’t pack one mostly because I didn’t get around to figuring out how to get a Europe-compatible device before we left. The first few places we stayed had one, and I probably used them as much to warm up or dry things like snow-slogged shoes as much as for my hair.  After Paris, though, I realized that my hair dries fast enough to not really need a dryer, plus I just scrape it back into a ponytail under my hat anyway. It’s not like I’m “styling” it or anything. That’s not to say that I could get by without one in “regular life,” especially with having to show up at places at particular times and look halfway professional, but for now it’s a bonus rather than an essential.  I’m really glad I didn’t buy one for my bag, as it would just be adding unnecessary weight.

Things that are more important than I thought

Air Conditioner

Here’s the thing: a lot of places in Europe, not just apartments but offices and public buildings as well, don’t have air conditioners because they’re so rarely needed.  But when they are needed, they’re really, really important! We had days in Berlin where a jacket was a good idea, and not having an air conditioner then was no problem. But when it’s 90 outside with no breeze, it’s a big deal to not be able to get comfortable.  Even worse, there’s not really anywhere to go. A lot of cafes and restaurants don’t have A/C. Museums where the artifacts are in cases tend to not have it, either, and the body heat generated by the visitors makes some of the galleries downright unpleasant. Luckily, our favorite type of museum has to be cool to preserve the paintings, so we can take refuge there.  I’m pretty sure I’ll be living at the Rijksmuseum for the entire month of August.

Washer (in unit)

In our building in D.C., we have shared washers and dryers in the basement rather than in individual units.   The benefit of this is that the appliances are bigger than what we’d squeeze into our little condo, and I can do two loads of laundry at a time.  I figured that having a washer in our Airbnb apartments would be nice, but maybe sometimes we’d use a laundromat or building laundry room. Thankfully, I only reserved places that had washers in the unit, and that has turned out to be way more important than I thought.  We do laundry every few days, partly because we have a limited number of clothing items but also because the washers tend to be relatively small and can only accommodate so much at a time. Plus, with air-drying, there is limited drying-rack space on any given day. I’ve gotten so accustomed to being able to run a load of laundry during breakfast and then put it on the rack to dry so that it’s ready the following morning that I’m now wondering how I’ll adjust to having to share washers with my neighbors when we return to D.C.  

Wi-Fi

I figured that internet would be pretty important to help us stay connected with folks back home and to be able to look up stuff, but I really underestimated how much we would rely on it.  I spend a lot of time researching lodging and transportation options, and it’s really helpful to be able to do that at “home” rather than going to a cafe or other place with free wi-fi. I also have become very dependent on online yoga classes, which require a fast and steady connection.  We’ve had a few times where the internet was slow or unreliable, and it was really frustrating. It’s one thing to not be able to scroll through Facebook; it’s quite another to not have a place to live in two weeks and have to wait for the Airbnb site to slowly load each of 20 possible options.  I now make it a point to mention in my reviews of our apartments how the wi-fi was, as I suspect we’re not the only ones who find it essential.

Let’s face it: traveling in Europe is by no means “roughing it,” especially the way we’ve been doing it.  While I’d like to think that I’m a trouper for adjusting to uncomfortable beds and limited climate control, the fact is that there is a lot more we could be giving up or having to adapt to.  I feel like any inconvenience I’ve encountered is a true #firstworldproblem.  In some cases, the apartments have been nicer than our apartment back in D.C.! (I am now a huge fan of double-paned windows and really high ceilings, not to mention solid-wood doors.) Still, it’s helpful to have to “sacrifice” even a little to see what we really care about and what we can do without easily.