Saturday, July 4, 2015

Toilets you can't stand

If you visit a coffee bar you can use their toilet or find a public toilet nearby. We are encouraged to drink water in hot weather, indeed any weather. Coffee makes you want to visit the toilet. But even water has the same effect.

Where to find a clean toilet? What do other people do? What should they do?

The Daily Mail online has run an article about toilet signs showing visuals indicating you should not put feet on toilet seats. The debate rages about whether one should put up signs, and install a squat toilet.

Some people don't want to sit on a public toilet seat. Others argue that squatting is more natural and easier.

With a long skirt or coat you can't squat on either a floor or a toilet. A half squat, with feet on the floor, knees bent, seems the solution to suit everybody. A better sign would be wipe the toilet set before and after.

I like toilets with washbasins. You find washbasins in the disabled toilets. Also mother and baby cubicles large enough for a pushchair, or a buggy, or wheelchair, or suitcase on wheels, or a shopping trolley. A bigger cubicle means you are less likely to brush against a dirty wall or toilet. The wash basin in the cubicle makes it easier to wash your hands, yourself, the toilet seat. Some toilets in Asia have a hose beside the toilet seat.

Some motorway stops have gel dispensers for use wiping the toilet seat. I remember reading, too late, the sign that the gel was not for hand washing but sterilising the toilet seat. One we'll all have toilets like those shower cubicles in one star motels in Europe where the entire cubicle including the walls is showered and dried every time you close the door on exiting.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3148808/How-use-toilet-signs-erected-Swiss-railway-Asian-tourists-don-t-use-properly.html#comments

Angela Lansbury, travel writer, author, speaker.

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