I learnt when I moved to Stuttgart about the (rather strange) tradition of "Kehrwoche". There is perhaps no literal translation of the term but it means "cleaning week". A Swabian tradition that puts each household responsible for the cleanliness in the apartment for that particular week. And that means sweeping the stairways or wiping the window panes or shoveling the snow off the entrance, the household takes care of it all during that week.
I come from a country where labour is so abundant that for a few rupees all of this would be taken care of by someone else. Cleaning your house too is a job that is done only if the household help does not arrive. Given this, it felt rather strange initially to be put in charge of cleaning. But it took one week of doing the job to see that it wasn't so bad after all. In fact, it was easy to see that it would increase social responsibility and boost overall levels of cleanliness, as well as a collective sense of responsibility.
I reluctantly changed my mind in just a few weeks after our first Kehrwoche. I realised that hardly anyone actually does it in our apartment block, let alone meticulously. I have been keeping a watch on the state of the building just to find no change in it for days on end. My own motivation to clean has, not surprisingly, gone down rapidly since the first kehrwoche. What a pity that in a country known for its strict, upright way of life, the tradition of kehrwoche has turned into mere lipservice!
In the last few days I had reason to justify a further deteriorated opinion of the so called attitude to cleanliness. The family who lived in the house below ours shifted out last week. On their last day here, they put together all the trash that they did not need in a heap on the pavement outside our building and just left! For a whole two days after that, several people came and picked up stuff that they wanted from this heap - toys, baby gear, electronic equipment, utensils. This happened round the clock - even at 4 am (wonder if it was so that no one would notice them doing that). They also did not do it nicely - they ripped apart bags and threw away what they didn't need right there on the street. I just wish I had clicked a picture of the dirty mess that was the result.
How disappointing that both those who left the trash and those who dug through it did not care about the consequences of their actions. Of course, no one will come to clean that street and over time the trash will dissipate due to the rain or wind. Thankfully it was not my turn at kehrwoche, for if it had been, I would have surely been extremely disturbed about it.
I come from a country where labour is so abundant that for a few rupees all of this would be taken care of by someone else. Cleaning your house too is a job that is done only if the household help does not arrive. Given this, it felt rather strange initially to be put in charge of cleaning. But it took one week of doing the job to see that it wasn't so bad after all. In fact, it was easy to see that it would increase social responsibility and boost overall levels of cleanliness, as well as a collective sense of responsibility.
I reluctantly changed my mind in just a few weeks after our first Kehrwoche. I realised that hardly anyone actually does it in our apartment block, let alone meticulously. I have been keeping a watch on the state of the building just to find no change in it for days on end. My own motivation to clean has, not surprisingly, gone down rapidly since the first kehrwoche. What a pity that in a country known for its strict, upright way of life, the tradition of kehrwoche has turned into mere lipservice!
In the last few days I had reason to justify a further deteriorated opinion of the so called attitude to cleanliness. The family who lived in the house below ours shifted out last week. On their last day here, they put together all the trash that they did not need in a heap on the pavement outside our building and just left! For a whole two days after that, several people came and picked up stuff that they wanted from this heap - toys, baby gear, electronic equipment, utensils. This happened round the clock - even at 4 am (wonder if it was so that no one would notice them doing that). They also did not do it nicely - they ripped apart bags and threw away what they didn't need right there on the street. I just wish I had clicked a picture of the dirty mess that was the result.
How disappointing that both those who left the trash and those who dug through it did not care about the consequences of their actions. Of course, no one will come to clean that street and over time the trash will dissipate due to the rain or wind. Thankfully it was not my turn at kehrwoche, for if it had been, I would have surely been extremely disturbed about it.
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