Toilets

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Specifically, Squat toilets. On my last trip through, Yunnan Province, it suddenly dawned on me that I had been doing an aweful lot of taking pictures of the beautiful mountains rising into the misty clouds and the gleaming brown waters of the Yangtze river slithering silently along beside us for a chunk of the trip, a brown mud snake....all these breathtaking photos had distracted me from the more mundane, far less visually asthetically pleasing, yet no less interesting phenomenon of Squat Toilets. Think about it for a moment if you will...they are not exactly commonplace in the US and even if you are familiar with them due to experiences abroad you have likely never thought of them as picture worthy until you have encountered the variety of squat toilets in China (plus throw in the the random, occaisional seat toilets in some unexpected places to make it more interesting). Truth be told, at this point in time, i prefer them to the seat toilets...minus their tendancy to smell a little more than the average one in the US, and the occasional child who seems to miss the hole entirely. Early on, my first week in China I started a scoring system of toilets here on a scale of 1 (atrocious) to 5 (heavenly). I mark down based on the smell factor, the cleanliness of the floor and if there i toilet paper it gets a big plus (not that it really mattered much since we are all in a habit of carrying our own). Though China decided to make toilet paper accessible in public toilets it is often gone, either because people take more than they need, steal it, or they simply restock too infrequently. The best toilets are ones with either some incense to frechen the smell of the room or one that is not fully closed to the ouside so some fresh air is regularly coming through. Though most toilets are rather uniform (a white bowl stunk in the floor, hole at the bottom and grooves where you are supposed to place your feet) I came across a couple exceptions. The first toilet I gave a 5 to was in the most unlikely place: along the side of the road on our way through Yunnan. I paid the man sitting outside 5 jiao (chinese version of 50 cents) and went inside only to find out that it was not fully enclosed (air circulation). the toilets were under a ledge of roof so you could go to the bathroom without being rained on. Not only were the walls of the stalls really short (maybe a little higher than my waist when standing) but there were no doors on them. The best part however was the fact that there was no hole in the ground. Instead there was a single groove/half pipe in the floor that went from stall to stall...and like a mini river carries all the waste to the same place....rather clever really. Though it was a little awkward trying to figure out how to squat over a little ditch that ran parallel to the wall (when one is used to facing the door). The other toilets we laughed over were the fanciest seat toilets I have ever encoutered. Supposedly "Green" (though we speculated whether they were called that because they were eco friendly or because the plastic bags were, themselves, green), we sat on the seat which was covered in plastic and essentially peed into the plastic bag. The moment we stood up the automatic flush took over....which mean that the plastic was slowly sucked down into the hole just enough to ensure that the plastic now covering the seat was indead unused/clean. Both amusing and disturbing at the same time. At one point, one of the fancier seat toilets we encoutered also bubbled up the moment you started peeing into it.

China must be the most fascinating place I have ever been so far. Intellectually speaking I am entraced by its history, culture and bizarre mix of modernity and seeming "backwards" or "third world country" things here. I suppose the toilets are just one of the many places you see some of this strange mix of old and new. I love it!!!!!!! I will likely never love China the way I love Madagascar or even Senegal ......in the bone resounding, heart thumping way. The way I see it, metiphorically speaking the red African soil has been mixed with my blood and that is way my connect to the continent involves my heart so much/is so emotionally based. My love for China on the other hand has found an intellectual handhold, a place where it can dig its claws in deeply.....so fascinated am I by its culture and history and social complexity. If I were to turn it into a metaphor of diseases (as I already have for a couple of people) Madagascar and Africa is like malarial infection, running through my veins whereas China (and I suspect most of Asia if I were given the chance to explore more) is an affliction of the brain/head. Anyways, enough metaphors.....Im obviously done with toilets for now. Other than a brief mention that the signs in English have proven themselves to be rather humerous in some cases (and picture worthy), I am done speaking....

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