Saturday Skiddie 30.08.08

Hi all and welcome to this week's Friday Flush Saturday Skiddie.

An artist in New York is bringing his style to the streets - toilet stall style. Ricky Syers has been walking around dressed as a janitor carrying a toilet with a man inside. Pretty cool stuff, really. And being an enterprising American chap, he is now selling advertising space on his toilet.



I love it when people find innovative ways to raise money (like the couple who cycled to raise money for a toilet for their church), and in Kansas this week The Flying Pig Studio and Gallery is auctioning 40 decorative toilet seats to raise money for new restrooms.

Plans call for the restroom to be named "Bowl Plaza" with buildings shaped like toilet tanks and entrances resembling a toilet seat. A walkway will look like an unfurling roll of toilet paper.
www.kansas.com

The town of Madrid, New Mexico has unveiled its first public toilets. Up until now, visitors have had to make do with portable toilets. One lucky resident was even presented with a key to the new restroom.



The man who was struck with a toilet cistern lid in Canada last week has unfortunately died. Second-degree murder charges have been laid against the attacker.

New Zealand Olympians have been suspended after photographing a fellow athlete on the toilet. Swimmers Cameron Gibson, Dean Kent and Corney Swanepoel were expelled from the Olympic village and may face further penalties. I think this seems a little harsh - but then again, I haven't seen the photos, and they are supposedly of one of the youngest members of the team.

And finally, New Delhi college student, Shahana Sheikh, has prepared a report highlighting the dearth of toilets for women in the Indian capital, prompting the High Court to take direct action.

"One day during my internship with CCS [Centre for Civil Society] I saw a woman cleaning a public toilet at Yusuf Sarai. It struck me that though she was cleaning the toilet, she herself couldn't use it since it was meant only for men - like most public toilets in Delhi. I decided to find out the real status of public conveniences in the city," Sheikh said. "People talk about feminism all the time but nobody thinks of a need as basic as a toilet for them despite the fact that our chief minister and mayor are both women," she added.

That's a wrap for this week. I'm going to go lay myself down and dream about a walkway unfurling like a roll of toilet paper. *sigh* What happiness.

Friday Flush 22.08.08

Just a quick flush today cos I'm practically running out the door.

A man in Canada is in a critical condition after being hit with a toilet cistern lid. What an ignoble way to go. Wasn't there some famous general who was killed when he was struck by a roof tile? Does anyone know if that's true? I'm sure I heard it in a history lecture once upon a time.

The hunt is on for New Zealand's finest loo and entries are now open. Toilets are judged on all the usual criteria - cleanliness, signposting, appearance, amenities offered - and also, oddly, car parking.

Americans are apparently multitasking on the toilet; they're checking their emails and listening to music. 88% use at least one electronic device in the bathroom! The survey also found that women tend to spend longer in the bathroom than men. Recent efforts to curb water use in the shower has had little effect, with people spending just as much time in the shower as they did 4 years ago.

An incredible strike across all of Scotland by local government workers has disrupted many services. The strike, over set pay increases being below inflation levels, means that schools, which will be left without janitorial staff, will not open, as well as forcing the closure of art galleries, sporting facilities, cemeteries and public toilets. I encourage you to read the article, and especially the comments that follow it. You'll learn more about Scottish politics in five minutes than you ever thought possible.

And finally in this very brief flush this week, in Macedonia, government ministers who do not provide enough toilet paper for their staff could face fines of up to E1000.

Have a good weekend! I'm off to Sydney on this fine cold rainy day.

Friday Flush 15.08.08

I recently did a study of female toilet users in pubs, trying to get an idea of what women like and don't like about public toilets. I was surprised that one of the things that came out top of the list was hand dryers - most women prefer hand towels. Dryers often don't work, take too long, and only one person at a time can use them, meaning that most people just dry their hands on their trousers. Dyson New Zealand has possibly addressed some of these problems; they unveiled the Dyson Airblade this week at Auckland airport.

 

 

Dyson claims the dryer (or is it drier?) is the "fastest, most hygienic hand dryer". It works by blasting a "high speed sheet of air, which gently squeegees your hands dry". That sounds kinda sexy. You can see it in all its sexiness at their very sexy website. It took the engineers an incredible 3 years to develop this next step in hand-drying technology. The Airblade was actually released in 2006 but I'm unsure how high the uptake has been. It's certainly the first time I've heard of it.

 

Ho Chi Minh City's attempts to "work towards a civilized urban lifestyle" have been hindered by a lack of suitable sites for public toilets. Residents are concerned about having toilets built in front of their houses - but presumably they don't mind if people urinate in the gutter. The stigma attached to public toilets needs to be mollified by designing buildings that aesthetically complement the districts - but with only a month to build them, I'm not sure if that'll be possible.

 

No such problems finding sites for toilets in Pune, India - they've installed 110 toilets in their homes. Friends of Shelter Associates (USA) has constructed toilets for sex workers, people with disabilities and those living below the poverty line. Another fabulous NGO doing great work in this International Year of Sanitation.

 

It's not very often that I wished I lived in Canada - but OH MY GOD they have a toilet festival! Organised by Oxfam, the festival aims to raise awareness about water and sanitation issues in developing countries.

 

I do however very often wish that I lived in the UK because it's the only place in the world where you could hold a From Looe for a Loo challenge. Bob and Chris May cycled 300 miles from Loo to Dymock to raise £1500 for a toilet at St Mary's church.

 

Toilet blog Where's the Toilet? has given an incredible 9 out of 10 to the toilets at Raffles Beach Singapore. This is a much pleasanter story about toilets than one usually hears about Singapore.

 

And finally tonight, a German toilet collector (that is, a German who is a toilet collector, not a collector of German toilets) spent £1,800 pounds for a rare toilet - only to discover that he had purchased a tiny replica. What do you do with a collection of toilets? Maybe you open a toilet museum. No, too obvious. How about a toilet restaurant?

 

(I never thought I'd add 'food' as a category on The Bog Logger).

 

And that is, folks, The Bog Logger signing off on this gorgeous half-way-through-the-Olympics Friday.

Failure to launch

The eBay auction for Seattle's failed auto-loos has er, failed. City officials are hopeful though that an extended auction date may prove more successful.

So, the big question is, why did the spaceship toilets fail in the first place?

 

Toilet provision is a thorny issue with most civic councils. On the one hand, good toilets in city centres encourage tourism and shopping, keep rough sleepers from pissing in the street and give a good  impression to visitors. On the other hand, toilets are prone to vandalism, can attract criminal behaviour and are difficult to maintain in a cost-effective manner. 

 

How do you balance the necessary against the evil?

 

I believe that councils go wrong when they fall into the 'spaceship toilet' trap. These self-cleaning tardises from Germany are a favourite with councils looking to install city toilets. They appeal to council budget-watchers because although they have a high set-up cost, they are supposed to have minimal upkeep costs. But the fact is that after a short while self-cleaning toilets don't. Then you're left with a room the size of 3 toilets in which only one person can relieve themselves every 15 minutes.

 

Wellington City Council (New Zealand) has a brilliant set of public toilets, on the corner of Lambton Quay and Featherston Street. There are 6 toilets arranged in a semi-circle and a room in which a toilet attendant sits. The attendant keeps the queue moving, mops the floors, keeps each cubicle in paper and provides general chit chat.

 

For many councils, taking the human element out of toilets seems to be the best option, but I think they are letting their squeamishness override their common sense. They believe that a toilet attendant is a demeaning job and they're not willing to create it. But there are people who are good at it, just like any other job. The best toilet attendants are like good taxi or bus drivers. They're proud of the facilities they offer, they welcome you aboard and they're pleased to take you to your destination. In other words, they are professional.

 

The stigma attached to the profession of toilet attendant must end if councils are to provide good clean facilities they can be proud of.

 

The location of public toilets is also key. The middle of a park is always going to attract criminal behaviour. The middle of a shopping district - not behind the carpark, or hidden away down an alley - is the best location. Toilets must take up excellent real estate if they are to be excellent. At the same time, there must also be decent simple provision outside of the main shopping area for people who are making their way home or for people who have no home. But the facilities must still be on good real estate.

 

To ignore the human element in city centre public toilets is to commit a fatal flaw. Toilets ARE human. Expensive machines which make the human element disappear fail. Seattle has paid the price, but has it learned the lesson?

Re-employment

I'm recently re-employed again (hence the slight downturn in regular blog postings). The toilets at my new place of employment are a little on the miserable side, and it got me to thinking - job interviews should be held in toilets.

 

Seriously. There are plenty of seats, you can talk shit without it being out of place, and guys can all stand around comparing penis sizes.

 

You can learn a lot about an organisation from the condition and layout of their toilets. The ladies toilet in my new workplace has two cubicles and one separate disabled toilet into which no disabled person has ever gone or could ever go. It is the worst type of accessible toilet: it is an almost-accessible toilet. It has a tap that can be mouth-operated, a generous hand rail and a slightly wider than usual access door. Unfortunately, the door leads into a little hallway with a door which is smaller than usual. Even if a wheelchair could fit in the hall door, there isn't sufficient room in the hallway to turn into the disabled toilet, without doing an 8 point turn. Honestly, who designs these things?

 

I do like my new workplace, but there is an air of almost doing things right.

 

My old workplace was notoriously bad for people not changing the loo roll - I guess it just wasn't in anyone's job description.

Hundertwasser Toilets!

Last year The Bathroom Diaries Toilet of the Year went to the Hundertwasser toilets in Kawakawa, New Zealand. I found this out shortly after I moved to New Zealand, and I wondered if I would ever get the opportunity to see them.

Well, I did, and here they are.

The view from across the street. Yes, that's a tree coming out of the roof.

The 'lobby'. And the trunk of the tree.

Most of these bottles are Jim Beam.

I was only able to take photos of the ladies toilet.

From the front door.

From the toilet seat.

The gate to the boys toilet. Forbidden territory!

I've read other blog posts that say 'meh' to the Hundertwasser toilets. I say, screw them. I think they're fab. And the fact that tour buses stop so that you can hop out and take a photo of the toilets is just brilliant. You couldn't make that up.

One New Zealand dunny

They don't make their toilets half bad down under. This gorgeous little cabin is somewhere on the South Island (I'll have to dig out my notes to find out exactly where). It makes the long drops of my youth seem dingy by comparison. Of course, the long drops of my youth were dingy, and full of redback spiders and cockroaches.

Dirty Bombs

There's nothing worse than walking into a toilet and finding pee on the seat. Or so I thought until Thursday.
A friend walked into the toilets at her work and discovered not one, but two poo pellets on the seat.
I have a number of questions about this.

1. How do you manage to poo on the toilet seat?
2. How does that poo end up all the way up the back of the seat?
3. Finally, how do you not notice the poo on the seat and then CLEAN IT THE HELL UP?

My friend, being a fellow Toiletiquette Fiend, gathered a large wad of paper and cleaned up the offence. It's a strange day for humanity when one healthy adult has to clean up the poo of another healthy adult.

I really do find it incredible that people are terrified of their own effluence. Once their waste has exited their body they completely dissociate themselves from it. "No, this is not mine, this was never mine. This mess has nothing whatever to do with me," and out they walk as though nothing has happenned. I probably wouldn't find this so mind-boggling except that these same people seem to be perfectly happy to have OTHER people, complete strangers, touch their poo. Surely that's a fetish.

Back when I lived in a hostel, the plumber had to come round once every 6 weeks to unblock the sewage. There are some women who can't bear the idea of wrapping up their dirty tampon and putting it in the bin. They would rather drop it straight into the toilet and pretend that it didn't happen. They would much prefer it if a strange man would come around, gather up all their dirty tampons and put them in the bin for them. What an odd, odd world.