Lavatories Of The World (cont.)

Francis. Current whereabouts unknown.

Once upon I time I was a tourist in Peru and, not too surprisingly, I suffered from the usual gastric ailments aka the Inca revenge. So far so what and I'm sure you're expecting a story about an ancient Inca public convenience and/or a flock of llamas. Wrong. Everything was under control until the return flight home. On the runway at Miami airport (waiting to take off) I feel the urge. As we taxi around for takeoff the urge becomes stronger and as we take off some gaseous emissions occur that warn those in adjacent pews that someone's intestines have a major problem. Finally after minutes of leg-crossing and clenching of every other relevant muscle the fasten seatbelt light goes off. Using the farts as rocket assistance I leg it to the front toilet (it was closest) ignoring the flight assistant trying to tell me that it's reserved for business class. There follows about 5 minutes of explosive diarrhoea followed by 5 minutes and most of a loo roll to clean up. Finally exit with a waft that silenced the protesters queuing up outside. From observation the toilet was out of bounds for the rest of the flight. I think the worst part was having to leave the plane at the end of the flight and watch the flight attendants fail to say "good bye please fly with us again..."

Shell from Australia

I was about 12, and I went to this public primary school. It was a rainy day and so as we always did on rainy days, we were all crammed inside, completely hyper-active from boredom and longing to get out in the rain. So while the teachers weren't looking me and my frenz (may God have mercy on your soul - Mil), Liegh, Tia and Kate, ran outside and started having a rather active game of tag. (Is tag ever non-active?? anyway...) The effect of giggling uncontrollably, running around like a mad-men and dripping rain was starting to take its toll on my bladder. Tia had decided to begin chasing Kate and eventually Kate ran into one of the toilet blocks on the school grounds and locked herself in a stall with me running along close behind her yelling out to Tia not to get me because I badly needed to pee (by this time I was doing a pee-dance all the way down to the toilets trying to keep it in) unfortunately the school had for some stupid reason decided to paint all the walls of the toilets black, so this along with dim lights, tiny windows that let in NO light, a cloudy day and Tia's bright idea to use a stick under the door to get Kate out didn't go well together!! I luckily made it to the stall and managed to shut the door thinking I was safe to "let 'er rip". However, me, Kate and Tia just couldn't stop laughing uncontrollably and so I was having quite a time trying to get my pants down without wetting my self. All of a sudden I saw the stick come under my door and thinking I was Kate, Tia started to hit my legs with it, yelling at me to come out. Well this just proved too much for my bladder and unfortunately I just let 'er rip all over my pants. Horrified and completely at a loss as to how to fix this terrible terrible wrong, I bravely pulled up my knickers and stepped out of the stall, in search of Tia. (Basically just to yell my head off at her) The next 1/2 hour was spent with Tia, Kate and Leigh rolling on the floor over the whole thing while I tried to wrestle a deodorant can out of Leigh's hand. (That's right she WOULDNT give me it to relieve some of the smell coz she didn't want me to WASTE it. What kind of a sick person would do that?!?!?!) Eventually I got it off her and managed to mix the smell with that of the deodorant can which basically just made it worse. The rest of the day was spent with hearing snatches of people say "eeeewwww, can u smell that- it smells like urine" and to this day EVERY time they see me without fail they bring up that story and still laugh uncontrollably. (They introduce me as the poop- girl due to that time and the time I sat in horse poop) (Oh and every time I smell that deodorant it still makes me wanna puke.)

(If that story doesn't lead to this page having about a million hits a day then I know nothing about the Internet - Mil.)

Richard from America

Back when I was studying at the infamous 'Bolton Institute of Higher Education', I lived in a large, ramshackle house that had been converted to accommodate students. Bolton Institute was too hard up to build decent halls of residence like any decent university would have. Much of our student accommodation was in the form of shared rooms as a result. Early one morning, I stumbled off to the bathroom for a shower. I was halfway through my ablutions before I was seized with a quite urgent need for a pee. Not being so uncouth as to actually piss in the shower, I stepped out of the shower cubicle... Alas, my random choice of bathroom that morning did not include a toilet! Never mind, I thought, and improvised by pissing in the washbasin. I briefly turned on the taps to rinse away the evidence, and then completed my shower. Leaving the bathroom soon afterwards, I noticed a hand-written note which had been stuck to the bathroom door. "Please don't use the basin - it's leaking into Angus and Tony's room." (Hi to Angus and Tony, if you're reading this.)

Dean from Britain

My friend Glenn and I were stood at the bar in "The Scottish Bar" in Rethymnon, Crete about 8 years ago, rather the worse for the local brew when we overheard a mother and daughter having this conversation. (Bear in mind that the mother will have been early forties, and the daughter early twenties, both of which were tattooed, and pierced in some delightful places - not that I am judging them you understand.)
D: "I've just been to the loo"
M: "Nice, thanks for telling me"
D: " There was no toilet roll"
M "What did you do?"
Now let me just interrupt things here in case you or your readers are unaware that the drainage in Greece is of the "Small bore" variety, and the custom of flushing loo roll does not exist, a bin is provided, and we are expected to deposit dirty paper into it. (eeeuugh) to which the daughter replied "There was a bin in there with some paper in it, I just used some without much shit on it"
We left .

Anna from Australia

My toilet story involves a long-drop at a place called Davies Creek in Far North Queensland, Australia. For the uninitiated, a long-drop is just that, a deep, deep hole in the ground full of shit. This particular long-drop was also home to a colony of cockroaches who liked to fiesta on the toilet seat and around the toilet bowl making seated performances unwise. My plan of action was to take along a torch and a water pistol before being seated so that I could lure the beasties up with my light and then blast them into the shit-pit below with the pistol. However juggling all this paraphernalia plus toilet paper proved logistically impossible and I managed to drop the torch (a highly expensive water-proof dive torch) into the long-drop. I then had to spend a merry half hour or so with a tent pole, a bent bit of wire and a much weaker torch, hanging over the edge of the toilet seat, hair full of shit-fed roaches, rummaging around in years worth of turd to retrieve the torch.

Halah from America

At the end of one of those lengthy nights, I was caught in a conundrum. My best friend and I very much needed to expel the night's collection from our bladders, and the bar in the lower east side (that's NYC) that we were at simply had one ladies' room. Being the magnanimous woman that I am, I offered her the ladies' room and boldly tromped into the men's room, much to the chagrin of onlookers. Now, I should note here that utilizing men's facilities in a dire moment (particularly when the line for the ladies' room coils itself around the venue like the intestine that sends you there...) is not a novel experience for me. Sometimes, it is better; more often than not, it is worse. Nevertheless, I will not forget the feeling of utter disorientation that washed over me as I stumbled, energetically and terribly rushed, into the men's room at this bar. 'Was it dirty?' you might ask. No. The lavatory was perfectly clean. And you really can't be too picky about the loo in a bar at the end of the night. But, you can concern yourself if the bathroom is perfectly suited for a family of pigs to eat out of. Yes, unlike most civilized people, the owners of this bar thought that the most interesting, and perhaps economical, urine catchall would be a shiny steel trough running the length of the wall. Sadly, it was also too high for me to squat over anyway.

John Russell from Britain

In Goa I went to the toilet and saw that there was a large frog in it looking up at me. I tried coaxing it around the U bend with a stick, flushing it, scaring it but none of these techniques worked. It would always come back to the surface and look up at me. Eventually I just dumped on it. That's probably what it wanted. A few days later I noticed a smaller frog in the same cubicle. It was attached to the door with its suckered, padded feet. I touched it and it squirted urine at me.

Alex Cook from Britain

This seemed to be very common when I was in Australia… Public toilets had these long metal urinals that ran along the floor by one wall. But the cunning thing was the urinals came out about two feet from the wall, and you stood on a metal grid over them. Again, cuts down on the spillage on the floor, but I found it very unnerving, especially if it was busy in there, as I kept expecting the grid to give way, and I would be washed into an Australian sewer along with several thousand gallons of piss.

Benay from America

My Brother and I were on a motorcycle trip across North Dakota when in Bismarck we decided to veer south towards the Ft Yates Indian Reservation. Along the way, to our amusement, we came across General Custer's (actually he was a colonel) house and his military compound - a recreation of all the buildings and huts from that era. People dressed in the clothes of the era ushered us around the place pointing out various buildings and their functions. As we entered Custer's house, I was suddenly pressed for the need to shit. I didn't want to attract attention and I didn't want to tell my friend (he would have made a big deal out of it at my expense) so I broke off from the group to look for a bathroom. At this point I was walking like a penguin and I knew if I didn't go within the next minute it would be too late. I found what I assumed was the bathroom - it was basically a wooden bench with two holes cut into it (one male the other female???) At this point I was gritting my teeth so I dropped my drawers and hovered over the opening. Afterwards, upon completion and quite relieved, I began to search around the room for TP. There wasn't a sheet in the room but thankfully I still had McDonald's napkins in my jacket pocket. I managed to catch up with the group and as we left I asked the tour guide if there was a bathroom in the building. He said that there wasn't and the lavatory in the house was in fact shut closed. I thanked him and as we went back to our bikes.

Francine from America

The one thing I remember about Italy was that the toilets just didn't pack much firepower. I suspect there must be some secret trick to getting them to flush properly the first time, known only to the Italians, passed down through the generations, but you could always tell when there was an American in the can. You'd hear a flush. Then silence. Another flush. A third flush. A curse. Another flush. More curses. And so on. The vilest toilet I encountered was in a subway station in Munich. Only one of the three toilets had water in it, and that one had no door or toilet paper. Also, someone had exploded all over the walls of the stall. No, that's exactly the word I had meant to use. No exaggeration.

Iain from Britain

Rosyth Naval Dockyard, circa 1981: One block of toilets, outside the Pipeshop. They just happened to be near a large steam drain. The bright spark who built these toilets decided to use the waste water from the steam drain, for flushing the toilets. Great idea, ecologically sound and all that. Apart from the fact that the water is at nearly 100 degrees centigrade. On the one hand, this is great, because tired dockyard workers can rest their weary heads in here on cold winter's days, and luxuriate in the warmth. On the other hand, have you ever tried dropping a turd into boiling water? Gas masks recommended.

Josh from America

One of the worst feelings in the world: sitting down on a warm toilet seat in a public place. You just KNOW someone was there before you, and can't help wondering what they've been doing.

Nicola. Current whereabouts unknown.

My friend's sister told me a tale of when she was in a nightclub, wearing a hooded top, tied around her waist by its sleeves and she needed to pee. She drunkenly staggered to the loo, did the deed and came back. Some time later on the dancefloor she decided she would like to put her hooded top back on, which she did, by untying the sleeves and swinging the top up to catch the hood on her head. Except that she was so drunk she didn't notice she'd used her hood to piss in instead of the bowl and subsequently got wet hair.

Grover from the UK

This a bit of a friend of a friend story.... A guy my brother knows was at some big posh works do, eating and getting pissed at their expense. Late into the evening, something, I don't know what, made him laugh very hard, and in his drunken state, he shat himself. He quickly excused himself to the toilets, and in the cubicle tried to clean himself up. He had to abandon his underpants, and tucked them behind the bowl. He then made his way, commando, back to his table with his dirty secret playing on his mind. A little while later a/the boss returned from the gents, announcing loudly "Some dirty little sod has left his shitty pants in the bog" the room erupted into laughter. In the half beat of silence between the laughter subsiding and the general hum of conversation resuming, the words "It was me" inexplicably escaped from our protagonist's mouth.
One day he will be President

Lucy from Manchester

Five o'clock in the morning, not slept for 30 hours, stood in front of a hole in the ground in a shed smaller than a cereal box which smelled like a pig's arse, in the middle of a field in south eastern China crying my eyes out and wondering whether pissing myself would be a better option. I still wonder to this day.

Julie from Columbus, OH

A Tiny Airport on the Island of St. Lucia . My husband and I were waiting for a plane at 4 am to return from this little tropical island to the States. We had been on our honeymoon at a small, all-inclusive resort, where we had stuffed ourselves on all sorts of exotic food. I was feeling slightly ill when we arrived at the tiny, stuffy airport, when suddenly I realized that I was quite sick. I rushed to the bathroom, and paused in horror. What I saw was this:
Every single toilet seat had been broken off by what appeared to be a sledgehammer, and the pieces were stacked neatly in a corner. What remained on the toilets were jagged pieces of porcelain. The stalls had no doors. I was violently ill and had to basically take a massive shit. The idea of trying to do this in a small, bouncy plane on a stainless steel chemical toilet seemed to be comparative in its awfulness, so I huddled in the farthest stall, trying to situate myself so that my ass wouldn't be ripped to shreds on the broken toilet. The horror of that was compounded by my fear that some woman would come in and be aghast at the smell and the sight of me! I managed to finish my business without the extra humiliation, but I will never forget that truly terrible experience. I've never been able to figure out what purpose there could have been in breaking of what looked to me perfectly good toilet seats. Perhaps torturing tourists?

Kate from Australia

My dad LOVED to tease me when I was a little girl. (Yes, I feared where this story might be going after reading that too. Fear not. - Mil.) He also had a fondness for creepy crawly fish, you know, axolotls and yabbies. When I was about eight we had a fish tank full of yabbies and I was a little freaked out by them. They had a tendency to escape and crawl through the house. Many times I would wake up and have a yabby staring at me with its wee beady eyes... dad would just chuck them all back in the tank and carry on with whatever he was doing. This particular time though, one went AWOL. We all searched high and low to no avail. Days passed and we assumed the dog ate it or it escaped to the outside world. One morning, however, I awoke (I awoke every other day too... and in fact I still do most of the time), and as with most people, had my morning whizz. I sat on the toilet and felt something brush against my bum. I thought there must have been some splash back or something and continues. Then (I will NEVER forget this moment), it PINCHED MY ARSE. I SCREAMED and ran (whizz trailing) into mum and dad's room. YEP, the damn yabby had been hiding out in the toilet.

Kathy from America

My husband, being the little frat boy he is, talks a lot about male bonding, and what a wonderful thing it is. The fraternity house he (and about ninety other guys) lived in ten years ago is even built to uphold such a fine male tradition of being "one with one another". There are no locks on any of the doors; all of the guys sleep in bunk beds in one massive, stinky room (I should know, I slept there once... just once. The rest of the time we shacked at my place); and last, but not least, there are no stalls in any of the bathrooms: just toilets and urinals lined up in neat little rows. My husband will tell you (and God knows he has absolutely no reservations about doing so) that, in his glory days, he had taken a dump next to every other guy in the house, at least once. The general opinion of his fraternity brothers, and himself, is that this is jolly good fun, and hence jokes about shitting, peeing or just about anything else you can do in a toilet, are fair game, and are funnier than anything. They give each other shit about a dump someone took ten years ago that was particularly notable in one format or another (puns and double entendres intended). Being female does not exempt me from having to listen to their stories. Fortunately, I'm not the bashful type, and as the stories are funny more often than not, it's usually worth the aggravation and disgust. This is one such example.
Back in the good old days, the boys were out of town cheering on the school basketball team while they were competing in a regional tourney. "March Madness" had a different meaning back then. Generally, it had something to do with drinking a ton, coming back to the hotel room with or without a girl, as the case might have been, and then either passing out or having sex, or perhaps doing them both at once. You never could tell. Anyway, one of the guys was the last one out of the hotel room early one day and he felt an urgent desire to take a dump. As he will admit freely, he'd drank a lot the previous day, and as usually happens, alcohol acted in its usual fashion, and was the natural laxative he needed to purge himself of the untold amount of McDonald's he'd eaten earlier. After splitting his sides for the better part of an hour whilst reading a Rolling Stone, he looked down and was tremendously pleased with his efforts. He had produced, what he still considers to this day, the dump of a lifetime. According to him, it was huge and solid, and that's all that really mattered. He was SO impressed with himself that he decided to sign his crowning creation. Did I mention this guy was an art student? Anyway, someone had ordered a club sandwich from room service earlier in their stay and the remains were left to rot in the room. He grabbed the little toothpick with the coloured cellophane streamers and stuck it in his shit, so proud was he. He promptly left the hotel room, and kept his little secret all day and night long. He, the three other guys he shared the room with,and a few girls returned much, much later and promptly passed out or had tried to have sex (note what was said earlier about such subjects). One of the other guys, however, woke up a few hours later, trying to be quiet in his quest for relief, but still urgently needing to use the facilities. After walking awkwardly over bodies in the dark, he finally reached his haven, only turning the light on after he sat down. He yelped loudly when he was poked viciously in the testicles by the still-floating flagged creation. After much hysteria had passed, which included two half-dressed girls flying out of the hotel room in a panic, all of the guys congregated into the bathroom to see what the deal was. The dumpee proudly claimed the creation as his own amidst howls of righteous indignation. Evidently, that was all they needed to change their tune. They then proceeded to slap dump boy on the back and said he was right to stick the flag in his shit, as it WAS mightily impressive. Someone even took a picture of it.
Dear God...I married one of these freaks!

Jeff from California

I am an easy going, beer loving American who at one point in time was visiting the fine city of Brussels. While dining at a local establishment (and after several delicious beers) I sought out and found the most confusing pipe-ridden excuse for a urinal on planet earth. After relieving myself, I looked around trying to find out exactly how to flush the damn thing. Poking my head around, above and behind the "pot", I discovered a footpedal. I pushed. My mistake. You see... pushing the footpedal released a torrential flood the likes of which Noah himself couldn't navigate from approximately 6 feet above and directly over the pot. I was soaked through and through.

Karen from America

France: Paris has a real problem in the fact that as soon as you step out of the centre of Paris where the tourist attractions are, it reeks of urine. I lived quite far from the centre of Paris and would frequently, actually every night, see men peeing on the sidewalks. One night after drinking we went searching for a bathroom. We found a public toilet with the self-cleaning mechanism, but it cost 6 or 8 Francs and that is when we realized the reason for the street relief.
Every Train in Europe: The toilet is located in a room the size of a person and every one of these rooms has a floor made of a quarter inch of urine. When you do finally finish and flush the toilet it simply drops the contents onto the ground below. I picture thousands of piles of human waste littering the European countryside and every now and then a cell phone.

Alexander from America

When I was a wee little jackass (my junior year abroad in Scotland) my theatre friends decided to get the rotund American jackass drunk. Well, they did, at the Doctors around the corner from the Edinburgh University Theatre Company's theatre. I was drinking pitchers of Old Peculiar, which is in itself a travesty, but I was young and foolish. Well, I proceeded to the basement of the pub (where the loo was) to discover two doors. One of them clearly led to the men's toilet, the other to the ladies. Well, I picked the right one every time my small-girl sized bladder required me to return, but of course when I had to throw up, I picked the wrong one. You can imagine my surprise when I staggered out of the john into the arms of a middle-aged Scots lady, and mumbled a rancid-breathed apology.

Anna from East Anglia

Well, it's like this. During my last year in the Sixth Form I wasn't a very well person, suffering from chronic anaemia and liable to flake out at any given moment. My most memorable flake happened (of course, why else would I be telling you this) while I was sitting on the toilet. I awoke, probably only a few seconds later, feeling drowsily comfortable and absolutely 100% convinced I was in my bed. I can feel the soft pillow even now. It was an almighty shock to realise that where I actually was at was in a kind of praying to Mecca position, with my bare bum in the air and my head wedged under the bottom of the cubicle door. To this day I thank any Deity that's listening that nobody came in and found me. And while I'm at it I also give thanks for the flake happening BEFORE the dump.

Cariad from the UK

I discovered a bizarre toilet arrangement in a restaurant in Chippawa, Canada recently... After finishing my meal I went to find the ladies 'restroom' (as they call it over there - why? I'm not going there to rest). The door opened straight onto the room containing the toilet - nothing strange so far, this seems reasonably common in small restaurants and cafes in Britain too. Except this one had two toilets in it. No partitions, no stalls, just two toilets and a sink. One directly in front of and facing the door, the other at right angles to and facing the first. It was a large-ish room too - for all the world it looked like they just forgot to put the partitions in. Very odd. Maybe they thought they were being considerate and providing for the women who go to the toilet in pairs, or maybe it was for family use... who knows?

Anneke from Canada

The dirtiest bathroom in the world.... I had the misfortune to end up in an emergency room in Florence, Italy (long story involving foreheads slamming into walls, stitches, questionable sterilization of hospital equipment, and a tetanus shot). Needing to use the facilities, I enquired in my best gesticulations and was pointed to the "toilet". Now, I have to tell you. I have used public toilets in India. I have used "Johnny-on-the-Spots" on Canada Day (Yes, I AM Canadian!). Even gone "potty" in the woods with no TP. Nothing - NOTHING! - was as filthy as that emergency room bog. Despite the fact that there was no paper to use (and, from appearances, never had been) the toilet had been used over and over, as had the floor and the sink... I don't think it had been cleaned in weeks. Needless to say, I held on until I made it back to my villa some two hours later.

Keith from the UK

I used to work in a DIY store in Chester. As is the norm in large stores such as this, we had displays of many things (conservatories, kitchens, bedrooms and obviously bathrooms). One day, a few of us were having a bit of a skive at the front of the store, near to the displays, when we noticed a kid who looked like he had probably just combined the ability to walk with the new found ability to use a proper toilet. Next thing you know, this kid has dropped his kecks and plonked himself on one of the toilets and proceeded to indulge in a number two in the middle of the shop. Being the non-parental type, we all stood and watched, amazed at the scene unfolding in front of our eyes. When his mum realized what was going on she went ballistic! The problem with that is that the kid was obviously only doing what he was told, i.e. shitting in a loo rather than in his pants. It's no wonder kids grow up to be so confused these days. Oh yeah, guess who suddenly found something to do when the mother and child left the shop without so much as an apology, nor an offer to clean up her kid's mess? That's right, yours truly was nowhere to be seen when they put THAT job on a job list!

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