Tan’s in Việt Nam!

My multi-day trip into the local villages in Sapa (in Northwest Vietnam) has made me more or less comfortable with squatting toilets. It’s either that or the bushes. In more modern, urban places like Hanoi, there is perhaps a 50/50 chance of having a squatting toilet instead of a sit-down one. However, squatters simply do not exist in America, so I feel that it is my duty to explain this…experience.

Most squatters are located outside the main living house and are situated in their own small little room. Though the variations are seemingly limitless, there are three basic components in every squatter: the squatting toilet, a waste basket, and a huge bucket of water. We shall get to the purpose of each of these components very shortly. Please take note that I have not mentioned the presence of toilet paper. Bring your own.

The squatting toilet, of course, is the reason why we use the restroom. The picture above is actually from the Taiwan airport, and it is the cleanest squatting toilet I’ve ever seen. More rural squatters are not as clean looking. That is perhaps the hardest thing to overcome. You need to go do your business, you open the door…and you see a squatter. And it does not look clean. The concrete is dark and wet. The room is dark, and there may or may not be a light bulb for you to use. The floor, the walls- everything, really- just looks dirty. The edges of the toilet have brown stuff, and you’re not sure whether it is dirt from the previous user’s boots, or something else. Sometimes the room is next to a pig pen or some other farm animal’s hangout, meaning there are some unflattering smells before you even enter the toilet room. Sometimes, you imagine the smells even when there is no pig pen. (And sometimes you don’t imagine it.)

But once you overcome this psychological impediment, the hardest part is over. You have courageously decided to use the squatter, and nothing’s going to stop you now. You have entered the room, and have closed the door. You lock the door. A commitment has been made, and you will not turn back from it. Congratulations. Now…how exactly do you use this thing?

Side comments on squatters that is not essential to this entry:

The lock and/or the door don’t always work. But trust me- everyone will know when the toilet is being used and when it is not. It’s basic human intuition.

Candidly, most people (ie, me) overcome the so-called psychological impediment simply because they could not longer wait for the hotel, 5 hours away (walking). There is no shame in such a motive. When it really comes down to it, humans have the capacity to do anything to survive.

Perhaps the next major obstacle is exactly how you position yourself on the squatter. I don’t know if I can really explain it, so here’s a picture of me squatting while I do laundry. It’s the same technique, only you’re in this position over a small hole.

Another commonly asked question at this point is, “What do I do with my pants?” One guy candidly revealed that he simply took off his pants and boxers and wrapped them around his neck while he used the squatter. Alright then. I simply pull them to my knees and then pull the pants as far in front of me as possible. But to each his own. I have no idea what the ladies do.

Another side comment

For some reason this position has often led me to ponder such profound things like black holes, quasars, and exactly how a toilet works. OK so only the last example was true. I also believe it is a lot easier to do your business in this position. Most people I’ve mentioned this to have disagreed. However, Dr. Shaka, one of my general chemistry professors, once mentioned that a sit-down toilet was in fact bad for you. It is somehow physiologically more demanding on the body than using the squatter. He says a lot of crazy things.

By now, you have derived a simple equation to find all prime numbers in this world (meaning the CIA will pay you a lot of money for it. Such an equation can be used to send secretly coded messages), AND you have finished using the squatter. It is now time to use that toilet paper that you have brought yourself. Oh what? You forgot to bring some? You, my friend, now have two choices: your left hand or your right hand. Choose wisely.

Yet another side story

Apparently in the Middle East, there used to be a strong tendency in actually using your hand to wipe clean your bottom. Since the area is all desert, there are no leaves for you to use. Most people use one hand for this one purpose, and they use the other hand to eat, write, etc. Therefore, criminals used to be punished by having one hand cut off. The idea, then is to force the offender to use one hand for everything.

I don’t really know if this story is true, but it’s interesting nonetheless.

By now, you have finished using the toilet paper. You now throw it in the waste basket. You do not, I repeat, do not throw the toilet paper into the squatter. The plumbing cannot handle such products. Regular acts of discarding toilet paper into the squatter will result in cloggage. Then we will be in a world of trouble. So don’t do it. I also like to point out that the waste basket is full of used toilet paper. If you forget to bring your own toilet paper, DO NOT fall into temptation. The waste basket has hepatitis written all over it.

If we were using a normal sit-down toilet, all we have left to do is to give that knob a little leverage, and all the waste disappears. What basically happens is that a whole lot of water gets rushed into the toilet bin, forcing everything to go through the small hole and into some pipes. We now need such a water source for our squatter. Enter the huge bucket of water. Inside this huge bucket of water is also a small pail. You take this pail, fill it with water, and dump it into the squatter. Repeat as necessary. You will know when it is no longer necessary to pour. Sometimes, when it is “the big one” (as Bob likes to call it), you are pouring for most of the time in the squatter. That’s okay too. Hopefully no one is waiting outside for their turn to use the squatter.

In any case, you have successfully used a squatting toilet. Congratulations! You are now ready for anything, absolutely anything, that Vietnam has to throw at you.

One more side note
As previously mentioned, the variations to the squatter described above are almost endless. Sometimes you have a proper door and lock. Sometimes the door is closed by rubber bands. Sometimes there is a bucket of water, and sometimes there is a faucet to fill the pail.

One restroom had an actual flusher for the squatter. All you had to do was turn the valve, and water would rush down from a tank above the room. When the waste is gone, you close the valve. Another restroom had bamboo hedges directed into the squatter, with water from a nearby stream constantly pouring into the squatter. The squatter therefore was constantly being flushed. Ingenious, really.

For a real challenge, go on the trains. They have both squatters and sit-down toilets. The fun lies in trying to squat while the entire car is shaking and rattling as it moves to your destination. Or you can use the sit-down. I personally would never want to touch anything on the train. Squatting it is.

I think I have mentioned this before, but the toilets on the trains lead directly to the outside world. When you are using the toilet here, you are actually discarding your waste over several kilometers of Vietnam. They lock the doors to the restroom when the train stops at a station. It is not polite to use the restroom while the train is stopped.

I apologize for anyone who may have been grossed out by this entry. I feel it is very necessary for everyone to understand proper squatting toilet usage, and such transfer of knowledge requires the utmost frankness. Actually, to tell you the truth, I am not sorry for writing this candid entry. It is vital information, and I’m sure someone’s going to thank me one day. So laugh now suckers. One day, you will be faced with the squatter challenge. I’ll try to hide that smirk on my face when you do.

This entry was posted on Monday, November 28th, 2005 at 11:41 pm and is filed under Super Xanga. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.