For Pete’s Sake

Warning: tasteless rant concerning bodily functions.

I love living in Japan. However, if there is one thing that really irks me, it’s using the bathroom here.

American women are pretty private about their toileting habits. We go behind stall doors and keep to ourselves. Going out into the wide world, I had to learn to be much less modest. Relieving oneself is natural, and we all do it. It should not be cause for embarrassment. I have relieved myself in the middle of an open meadow into a barrel, the only woman for miles around and surrounded by guys. In Korea, I was 8 months pregnant, squatting over a hole in a janitors’ closet while some strange man urinated into the mop sink. In Bosnia, the bathrooms where I lived were unisex and I had to chat amicably with the fellows using the urinals as I passed through. The real world forced me to come to terms with the process and develop a practical attitude toward it all. Nonetheless, I was totally unprepared for Japan. The Japanese are a very private people with delicate sensibilities (except for in the bath where everyone walks around in the buff). Japanese women do not like for anyone to hear them using the toilet. At work, if one of the Japanese ladies walks into the restroom and someone is already there, she will walk out. If someone walks into the restroom while she is in there, she will sit quietly and wait until the other person leaves before going about their business. If it is absolutely necessary that she go while someone else is in the restroom, she will flush the toilet, so you cannot hear her. Some swankier restrooms have speakers that make the sound of running water when the button is pressed, to cover up any unpleasant noises. You cannot see another person in the restroom, either, for that would imply that she had or is planning to use the restroom. It is ridiculous. After all of these years striving to NOT be self-conscious about it all, and now I find myself becoming so paranoid that my toileting might be considered rude. We have 3 perfectly good stalls in the restroom adjacent to my office; however, if I walk in and there is a stall door already closed, I will turn around and walk out. It is counterproductive.

I asked a Japanese friend why it is like this. She was very embarrassed but finally managed to get an explanation out. Apparently, years ago fine ladies toileted in private and it was extremely unseemly for anyone to even see the results or admit that it happened. This attitude has extended to anyone who sees herself as at all refined.

Every time I find myself sitting quietly in my stall, waiting for the person who came in to wash her hands to leave, fuming because I cannot just go out there, sensibilities be damned, or when I find myself wandering the building looking for an unoccupied restroom, I think the Japanese ladies all need copies of that children’s book, “Everybody Poops.”

End of my rant.