By: Sean [2006-01-17]

Toilets

A good toilet is hard to find. I've traveled 13 countries in three continents, and the vast majority of the toilets in each one of them were deplorable.  Ranging from the mere holes of Italy to the dreaded shelves of Germany, doing your business like a civilized human being is not as easy as it should be at the turn of the 21st century.

Ever since I was a young boy, I've maintained a map in my head of all the safe toilets in my surroundings: A restaurant with bathrooms near the door where one could slip in undetected, do his business, and get out, for example*, or a business with customers coming in and out at all times**. For several years my favorite was the local city hall; I enjoyed knowing first-hand that my tax dollars really were working for me.

Acquiring a car in high school expanded my map greatly -- and thank God it did. To this day I've seen few bathrooms to rival those of my high school: toilets befouled and unflushed, and always seemingly used only moments before my arrival.  Who were these people, I often wondered?  Why couldn't they flush?  Did they think it was funny?  Funny not to flush?  What kind of person thinks that's funny?  And why, in a bathroom of three stalls, was every one of them always left in the same terrifying state?  Was it a group effort?  Could one single person somehow be doing it?  And did they themselves find the toilets in a similar state when they showed up?  How did they deal with it?  They were animals, and they've made my life so hard.

I once mentioned the map to a co-worker of mine, who told me that he "usually likes to take care of that at home."  If only I could.  If my business could be conducted each morning in the cleanliness and comfort of my own bathroom, how happy I'd be, but unfortunately my internal workings just aren't moving that early in the day.  It takes until round about 10:00 a.m. for the boiler to heat up, forcing me to slink off to the nearest safety zone on the map.***

It wasn't always the state of cleanliness that forced me to keep a map. Sometimes, it was the facility itself. I can not understand why so many toilet stalls in the United States are only shoulder-height. I will tell you right now and without shame that I stand up. I've never been able to figure out how those who remain seated are able to tell when they've finished -- when they've drawn an ace, so to speak -- or how they deal with the terrible possibility that their hand may come into contact with water, requiring its immediate amputation. Done right, one must stand, and when one stands he should not be forced to look out over the top of the stall at all the other people in the room, his hands busy down below doing everybody-knows-what, and everyone trying to ignore it but generally having this feeling that something is definitely going unsaid here, but to acknowledge it would be such a departure from the civilized world that it would make everyone involved want to cry. God help him if the door to the restroom opens within line-of-sight, bringing the other diners in the restaurant or shoppers in the store into the equation. Most other countries have stalls that go down to the floor and all the way up to the ceiling, effectively giving you a private little room. America, why must you make it so undignified?

Even worse was my junior high school.  The toilet stalls in the locker room had no door. Why? Why is this? It has only fueled my contempt for the physical education system, and to anyone who maintains that my disdain comes from my being out of shape and a general, all-around wussiness, I ask you, I ask you because apparently you must think this is OK: why are there no doors on the toilets in the locker room?

The only one who ever used these toilets was the gym teacher himself. He was also the only one who used the showers. Every day after gym class he'd take a shower, tackle shamelessly flopping around in front of a room full of 13-year-olds, then walk naked down to the doorless toilets, have a seat, and go to town. Grapes of Wrath did not prepare me to deal with a situation this undignified. A friend of mine said -- and this is wisdom I've always kept with me -- that no man should ever be forced to look into the eyes of another, who is taking a shit.

When I start my company marketing maps of safe and discreet bathrooms for every city in the world, this will be our slogan.

* Pizza Hut, S. Riverside, Medford, Oregon.
** Bank of America, Otis Dr., Alameda, California.
*** HR department
"Why are there no doors on the toilets in the locker room?" [2006-01-17 01:42:17] Hatless Jack
Well, if it's anything like my high school it's because we removed them and used them to toboggan down the bleacher stairs. Come to think of it, they were more like bobsleds. Gigantic bobsleds made of stainless steel with only the promise of the smack of cold, hard concrete to greet us at the bottom. But I'm sure the kids at most junior high and high schools have found other innovative and constructive uses for their bathroom stall doors.

Incidentally, women's restrooms never have these types of problems, and they frequently have furniture. Or at least that's how the legend goes.
doors and the lack thereof [2006-01-17 02:51:19] Wyatt
There were no doors on the stalls in boot camp, and I'm sure it was for the same reason as in your high school: sheer humiliation. I was never tempted to use one of the pissoirs in the streets of Paris but in boot camp, I had no choice. It was that or shit in my rack, which I'm not sure my bunkmate would have appreciated. We did have one guy who liked to pay whores to shit in his face, but that was in the fleet and is really another story.

Can I just say that I do not ever want to engage in a conversation with another man while I have my dick in my hand? No, I don't want to stand at the urinal and discuss the weather or the score of last night's game. Get over it.

The Japanese have a tradition of completely ignoring each other in the bathroom. No matter what, they will not even make eye contact. I think that's a fine policy that should enjoy legislative promotion in this country.
Maps [2006-01-17 04:17:57] König Prüße, GfbAEV
The part about maps of good johns reminded me of some spam e-mails that I've gotten offering maps to gloryholes! Now, on the list of stuff that I'd not likely do is put myself through a hole in a bathroom wall. There could be Jack Russell terriers on the other side!
I rember those toliets [2006-01-17 08:32:57] Crashpod
I remember those toliets one time I saw the gym teacher taking a dump on one. Its hard to respect someone after that
Stalls [2006-01-17 10:06:52] Stonecutter
When I was in grade school(3rd grade), there was an experience I witnessed that terrified me for years. You see, I had just started at a new school (3rd new school in as many years), only to discover on my first trip to the washroom, that it was apparently not approved of by any of the other grade-school boys for one to use the toilet. How I learned this was by observation when relieving myself at a urinal during recess. About a half-dozen other kids were entertaining themselves by wadding up wet toilet paper and throwing it at the ceiling, to which the wet-tp-wads would stick and apparently become permanent parts of the ceiling. This looked like fun, until they then proceeded to fill one of the sinks with tp and then proceeded to pee all over it. Then they played paper/scissors/rock a couple times over until the loser was selected to take the urine-soaked heap and heave it over the top of the stall that some other poor kid was using. I still get nervous when in a stall due to the necessity we all require from time to time and I hear someone enter the bathroom, although this seemed isolated to a specific school with a particularly spoiled type of wealthy kid as the norm. I escaped the torturous event, although there were times while at that school that I had no choice but to risk it. Phew...
Tough School [2006-01-17 19:17:57] König Prüße, GfbAEV
The school where I went was so tough that we wadded-up kids and stuck them to the ceiling.
Tiny URL [2006-01-17 21:18:46] König Prüße, GfbAEV
http://thingsihate.org/

has a length of 23 characters and resulted in the following TinyURL which has a length of 24 characters:

http://tinyurl.com/d5vpy
Stonecutter [2006-01-17 22:48:36] Sean
Are you saying that you've shat in front of other people? Or what are you saying you couldn't escape?
George Costanza.... [2006-01-18 06:34:17] Brynn
had a map of the entire city w/ safe bathrooms.
Sean [2006-01-18 16:39:48] Stonecutter
By couldn't escape, I meant that there were times where I had no choice but to use the bathroom in the school. There were doors on the stalls, but open at the top & bottom like the ones you mentioned in the article. Going when there was no other choice was always psychologically excruciating. Imagine having no real influence over the speed at which nature takes care of things, all the while knowing that at any time one or all of those kids could walk in....
. [2006-01-18 16:50:25] König Prüße, GfbAEV
Newman!
Batroom Anthropology [2006-01-18 22:35:05] König Prüße, GfbAEV
The global cultural customs for this common need are indeed hilarious! Corn cobs, for example. And too, consider Servic Paper Co. of Portland. And the Beachboys song, Wipeout! You've probably heard the joke about the bunny rabbit who encounters a bear taking a shit in the woods and asks him how he keeps his butt from becoming befouled. Not a pleasant prospect for the bunny rabbit. The bats have the guano business going on. Pigeons are busy with the statues.
Re: I rember those toliets [2006-02-20 20:44:01] Gabriel
It is hard to respect someone after having watched them take a dump, but it does help you fear them. I always figured the public pooping was an issue of intimidation. He was trying to place terror into the hearts of young boys, and I think it pretty much worked. That gym teacher, was a terrible, terrible man.
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