Yesterday was World Toilet Day, a UN initiative to raise awareness about the number of people around the world without access to toilets. So we bring you five weird toilets from around the world.
About 500,000 children around the world die every year due to diarrhoea and related diseases because they don’t have access to water and sanitation.
The World Toilet Day aims to raise awareness of the importance to manage human waste well, which means capturing it and then disposing of it appropriately and making sure that it doesn’t end up contaminating water and food sources.
5 weird toilets from around the world
We thought we’d also try and do something similar by bringing you some of the different toilets from around the world. Well not literally bringing it to you, because that might be a little bit disgusting.
For those who don’t want to miss a sec, London
This toilet first appeared outside the Tate Britain Museum designed by conceptual artist Monica Bonvicini. The walls are made with a one way mirror, you can see out but they can’t see in. I don’t think this is what Aerosmith had in mind when they released “I don’t want to miss a thing”. Although it’s great for clingy partners who just can’t let their significant others out of their sight, even for a toilet break. Here’s a fun thing to try: Cheer your mate on from the outside, try to look directly at where you think the toilet is.
I can’t go past this toilet from ‘An Idiot Abroad’ in China
No doors, no seat, no toilet paper. This one’s not for those that get a little stage fright when they’re in public places. Be prepared to say hello to passer by’s as you pop a squat in your ‘open-plan’ stall. Hope you’ve got good balance, god forbid you fall in.
These controversial urinals
These urinals by Dutch company Bathroom Mania! actually started life as a wash basin until designer Meike van Schijndel decided to push the envelope and turn it into a urinal as a reaction against boring white ceramic. When Virgin Atlantic tried to install these into its lounge at JFK airport, they received so many complaints they had to scrap the whole idea. Trust Richard Branson to love such a cooky idea.
Tokyo loves Toto Toilets – Space Age
Around 70 percent of Japanese households have a Toto loo in their bathroom. Not only does it have heated seats that contain a night-light so you can see what you’re doing, it’s got an ‘Integrated Personal Cleansing System’, a series of water jets for cleaning your bits that can be adjusted by pressing a button, and a handy down-under blow dryer. It’s got a deodorizer to neutralise your smells and a ‘marriage saving’ function that puts down the lid for you. There’s even an SD card that stores pre-programmed sounds, in case you prefer to do your number two’s to Beethoven’s fifth.
This has more buttons than Captain Kirk’s chair on Star Trek.
Return your natural movements back to nature direct, Cambodia
Please don’t miss the hole, have mercy for the person who has to clean those planks of wood. On the plus side, at least there’s a handy roll of toilet paper here so you could at least wipe.
It’s all about simplicity, Tibet
This is probably the one time I didn’t want the image to be so hi-res. I hate how much I can see within this image, barf factor over 9000. Do yourself a favour and don’t look too closely.
All fun and games aside, these toilets really made me think about the message of World Toilet Day. I’ll leave you with this thought below:
This may well be true in Indonesia … not much money to be made in sewerage 🙁 #WorldToiletDay (via @water) pic.twitter.com/WWVygUZ8iJ” — Sarah (@SarahJBF) November 20, 2014