Washing soda is ανθρακικό νάτριο in Greek - according to Google! Perhaps someone can correct this if they know better. I've been looking for it too - none of the supermarkets round here (Sitia) have it, but have yet to try pharmacies or a place which sells industrial cleaning materials. Will post if I have any success!

washing soda crystals were something we used to clear the sink drain, amongst other uses.

It Greece it looks a bit like scales off a fish.

ΑΝΘΡΑΚΚΙΚΟ ΚAΛΙΟ

is rather sophistated words to use & probably people will not understand.

phonetically if you ask for potasa

you will find it in the smaller supermarkets by the kilo, in the farmer places it is sold by the 40 kilo.  In the larger supermarkets 200 to 300gms and will be expensive Tuboflo is one of the brand names used by the supermarkets.

so try asking for either potasa or Tubolflo.

let me know if you are succesful

ta lem

It's a funny thing ... I made a heap of sodium carbonate just last week. It's the easiest thing in the world (and basic school chemistry).

Heat up your oven to about 170C, pour sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) into an ovenproof dish - I used a pyrex lasagne dish and spread it thinly over the bottom. Put it in the oven and leave it there for a couple of hours. You then have washing soda.

250g of baking soda yield approx 160g of baking soda (plus 90g of evaporated water and CO2) once the decomposition is complete.

Note, however, that this is pure sodium carbonate. Washing soda crystals are the hydrated form. If your recipe stipulates washing soda crystals then you need to add 175g of water to every 100g of dehydrated sodium carbonate to get to the approximate composition of washing soda crystals. You'll end up with a milky liquid that is about 15C hotter than when you started.

Don't breathe in the dust while you are doing this as it would be an irritant.

I always  used a  small cup full of  ICI soda crystals in my washing,  I found it is an irritant to he skin and also rots  cotton clothes.

In the  conditioner  section in the washing machine  powder drawer, put a good splash of  lemon juice, this will not only  get rid of old  soap in clothes, it will de- scale the washing machine.

Lemon juice is a natural acid detergent and not chemical, gets rid of  mould, de scales  any thing and  you do not get " contact dermatitis " with it  or the now   common " lycomplanis".

I bought a 200g box of boracic acid powder at the pharmacy in Vamos. It seems to be used for feet - possibly as an anti-fungal treatment. (But it certainly got rid of our ants!)

On the white box is printed "ACIDO BORICO POLVERE".

Βορικο οξύ (boric acid).

Σκόνη υια διάλυμα εξωτερικής χρήσης.

(By coincidence, I told my wife to put some in the washing machine yesterday to get rid of any mould. Not sure if she did or if it will.)

I'll definitely try this around the ants' nests!  We tried to sow grass seed once and they took it ALL! We bought some pyrethrin powder from the local gardening shop and he told us to put it all around the area we wanted to grass and all around the nests.  It took me ages, it was spring time, we sowed our seed, and that night it rained in torrents and washed away the powder.  The grass seed got moved into heaps and we couldn't retrieve it.  The ants did though, and they took it all into their nests.  Then it rained again and they brought all the seeds up to dry so I collected it and resowed it, and then they nicked it again so I poured water into the nests and they brought it up to dry and I took it back ....... you get the picture.  I suppose it could make a good Tom and Gerry-type cartoon, but in the meantime we ended up with no grass.
It is pleasantly surprising to find simple ingredients that do really useful jobs. I might even invest in some new grass seed. Thanks Martin!

You probably should read this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boric_acid#Toxicology before using boric acid. It's safe enough for occasional use but you wouldn't want to make too much of a habit of it.

BTW, lemon juice may be "natural" but it is also a chemical. Everything in the world is made of chemicals and any attempt to divide things into "chemical" and "natural" is at best naive, at worst deceitful. Just because something occurs naturally doesn't make it safe ... scorpion venom is entirely natural, for example.