toilets

You knew this was coming, didn't you?
I am experienced with toilets, been using them most of my life and my mom says I have a quite advanced 'pee pee dance'.
But of all my experience I don't understand squat toilets... these are the ones that are most used in China. They are just as they sound, two footprints straddling the porcelain trough. To use, as with the bowl type we use in Canada, lose the clothes in the appropriate location and instead of sit, you squat over the trough and release. Sometimes the trough is one continuous trough going from one stall to the next, not nice at all as all the... never mind. You will find them everywhere, public toilets, restaurants and even homes (and the school dorms).

So here are the questions... why? why? and why? It's not like there is all that much more porcelain involved in producing a bowl, and add a plastic seat, and bob's yer uncle, and it's so civilized. But no!! they chose the other...
We all know that if you pour liquid from any height onto, say, a hard flat surface or a bowl of liquid, there is going to be splash. For example, we all are familiar with urinals, and men's toilets, yes? There are always puddles, wet tracks and smell, I am not wrong on this. No woman will, by anything except desperate choice, use the mens room. The seat is always up, and sprayed with pee and the floor is wet and it's all stinky.
Well here in China, the same is true of the women's toilets too. I don't love it at all.

And I have learned what a bad aim I am too. As a kid in the great outdoors I didn't worry to much when I came out of the bush with my right foot warm and wet, but here in China, I get a little red in the face. And of course the floors are all like swampland and so stinky. Just try to have a successful trip, with no toilet paper (and nothing allowed in the toilet but bodily waist, the paper is not to be flushed but goes in a smelly little bin nearby), no soap, no paper towels, often no water, your pant cuffs and shoes badly sprayed or dragged through... I'm sorry if you haven't eaten yet.

You might wonder about getting down to assume the position, being comfortable while there, being productive and then trying to get up again? There is nothing to help you, no handles, knobs, railings, nothing. Nor is there a hook for your coat, purse or very heavy backpack. So you will be trying to take care of all this with your tissues in your purse or pocket and your nickers at your ankles and then get back up, all the while keeping your cuffs as dry as possible. I think you might be laughing by now at the thought but for me, it makes me consider never drinking again before going out.

I didn't mention the doors? Or might I say lack of doors? Or even walls for that matter. Sometimes the walls are only waist high so there is never a problem wondering if your friends are still in the toilet or have exited already. There is no lingering in Chinese toilets. No comfy chairs to wait for your friends, no space to change a diaper, no nursing your hungry babe... There is much to be enjoyed with no doors though. Ever been in those toilets that forces you put one foot in the bowl so the door will close? Well with no doors, no problem. And the ones that you need climb under the toilet paper holder or sit side saddle to use the bowl? Right, with no paper, no problem.
So I want you all to enjoy your cushy toilet seats, dry floors and doors, but don't forget me over here, building my thighs for next snowboarding season.