I'd be hitting all the buttons. All at once. Several times. Thanks for the afternoon giggle.

I just got back from England, where they have this same system - seems obvious, but doesn't necessarily work that way.

(I had such total toilet confusion in India some years back that I essentially didn't do anything for two weeks...)

Haha - I just read your pieces on the bidet (I've always ignored them, feeling like a Dirty Foreigner, but...) and peeing on the orchids ... holy cow.

I think you have inspired me to write a piece on my own adventures with foreign toilets (or, in some cases, whatever the hell they were). Bathroom adventures are an integral part of the travel experience, but tend to get neglected in the recounting....but pre-knowledge would be most useful... And would save many baffled moments while trying to hold pee and kick-start brain...

Holy crap! That's funny..._r

LOL! You are hilarious. But I feel you, teendoc. I still haven't successfully used a bidet. The first time I saw one I thought "How quaint. His and hers toilets." This reminds me of my trip to Europe and the first time I was presented with a hole in the floor.
Lezlie

they don't have dual-flush toilets in mississippi? or even the 'big apple?'

just another symptom of the failure of american education.

Wow Al, they didn't even have them during my years at Le Lycee Francais either. Damn that French education! I was robbed!

I know! There should be instructions for us when we get off the plane about toliets in other counties.

Don't feel bad teendoc, at least it's not the hole in the ground I was faced with in Japan and France. It was pretty easy to figure out what ent where, just not HOW I was supposed to manage to get "it" in there.

I think--assuming the toilet is not jusy messing with you, which I agree is a distinct possibility-- that your first two diagrams probably overlap, assuming poo-poo generally speaking requires a bigger flush. But having been in Jo'burg many times and knowing how whiskey tends to flow-- you never know, you just NEVER know. Proceed with caution.

I can't wait till you go to Japan!

Funny you should post this! I went to look at a house this morning and the toilets were "dual flush"... the builder referred to them as the "boys" button and the "girls" button (presumably because we girls use toilet paper!)

I wanted to rent/buy the house on the spot just for that feature alone!!! I'm tired of my husband yelling at me for clogging the toilets.

And, no, this isn't South Africa... it is East of Jesus, North Carolina out in Moonshine Country!

This is about half as complicated as the Electro-san toilet on my house-boat. It slices, dices, and grinds, adds salt to thoroughly
allow the electrocution of everything before discharge. It scares me so I usually use the facilities at the marina.
(R)ated for being a fellow sufferer of technological crap. (P.I.)

It's simpler than you think. The small button is for small flushes, urine only. The big button is for the larger water flush needed to clear solid waste.

If you go to a store like Home Depot or Lowes you can see the same arrangement on super water saving toilets.

Spot on, David. These toilet controls are common in many countries, just not most places in the US. Some US towns with chronic water shortages are requiring 2-button installations in new houses.

Most of these toilets can be adjusted to change the amount of water used when each button is pushed and some lazy plumbers just set both buttons to use the same amount of water.

In older buildings in Europe, you'll find electric toilets that mince the waste before flushing it down the narrow pipes that would cost a fortune to replace. Remote hiking shelters in New Zealand are now equipped with composting toilets which use no water, but are less stinky and require less maintenance than pit toilets.

Toilets use about 30% of water consumed in a house - any reduction in water use saves money by reducing demand both on water supplies and water treatment.

Count your blessing you are not in France where the no flush hole in the ground prevails

a longrough vaporetto ride from Vinice to Murano a squatty potty and a wife with a delima. it's funny --- now.

For those of you who have obviously not seen enough of the world, I will point out that a squatter toilet can be cleaned with a hose and are far nicer than a sit toilet where no one (and certainly not the person paid a pittance to keep the rest room clean) is willing to demean themselves by actually touching a toilet, even through the medium of a scrub brush and rubber gloves.

Oh dear, dear, dear, dear! Are all the toilets in South Africa designed like this? Was this toilet in a hotel? A restaurant. A private home? A prison? And where is the toilet paper if you don't mind my asking? So many questions which must be answered before emerging from the toilet with one's dignity intact.

Ahh yes, the foreign country toilet adventures. In India, the holes in the floor are at least simple, if a little unpleasant. If they only provided paper...

The images are great!

Hello friends,

I'm back from today's excursions to Soweto & the Apartheid Museum. And so keen was I to get back to OS that I forgot the lovely bowl of ice cream the restaurant people prepared for me to bring back to my room in the hotel. That must be devotion, or insanity. ;-)

As I eat my ice cream soup, let me reply...

Kathy: It is always my hope to give giggles! If you'd like another, do check out my Tales from a Teendoc recent post. That one, I think, is micturation-inducing!

Myriad: Do let me know when you write your pieces. I think there should be a book out there called Travel Toilets for Twiddleheads, or something like that. And the orchids? I still feel bad for them.

Joan: You're so punny!

Lezlie: Ah, you started the discussion in the comments on the squat toilet. I've not seen one so far in my travels, but I'm so not sure I have that much squat in me!

Heather: I agree! If it isn't going to be self-explanatory, then perhaps some instructions, directions, diagrams...

Antoinette: My first two hypotheses seemed reasonable, but I couldn't really detect any difference in flushing the two sides. But maybe I shouldn't try to look for said differences after having imbibed a bit too much Pinotage... I'm just saying.

Ablonde: It just can't be *that* different from China...can it? I became a urinary camel there if there was any possibility I might have to squat. I just returned to my hotel room and peed on the orchids.

Elizabeth: That's just fascinating! I really hadn't come across them in all my US travels. But with my husband, I'm not sure even the "girl" button would be enough. He would indeed need a "superflush" button for what he, uh, produces.

Fred: I knew there was a reason I didn't travel by boat!

David: Aw man! You took all the fun out of my various hypotheses! But interestingly, when we renovated our kitchen and guest bathroom in 2007, the designer/contractor never even mentioned a toilet like this as an option.

Cyclenorm: You and David are my killjoys today! But thank you for the information. Though I still say that I'm not discerning that much difference in toilet water flow between the two buttons. Maybe I need to get my toilet water Rainman groove in better gear.

Jack: I beginning to think that my aversion to using bathrooms outside my house/hotel/whereever I'm staying has served me well in that in my times in France, I've not come across the squat potty...yet.

Wschanz: The question is whether she finds it funny now?!

Malusinka: You see, here's the thing. Am I certain of my ability to squat, aim properly and not get pee all over my inner thighs, ankles, shoes? No I am not. Not I am not at all. I still have traumatic memories of experiences "at the side of the road" the scar me to this day. Yes I know that urine is sterile and poses little infection risk, and so on, but that doesn't mean I want my Emilio Puccis covered in it! And as for solid waste, we won't even go there...

Monsieur Chariot: Well since I haven't seen all the potties in S. Africa... ;-) But I think many are like this. The hotels and rental apartments I've stayed in have been fitted thusly. Happily my hotel bathroom has two rolls of toilet paper hanging. Interesting duality: two buttons & two toilet paper rolls...but alas only one toilet bowl. And no bidet.

Bluestocking Babe: And what, pray tell are you supposed to wipe with? Your hand? Your shirt? I'm feeling a tad ill now.

Thanks for the replies, everyone!

This was nearly as informative as shark week. I do appreciate the nice illustrations and am planning an immediate trip to Joburg to test out the devices. At least you had a choice. I've been in many airport "auto" flush toilets this week and apparently I'm a ghost. No matter how much booty shaking or hand waving I do, those things refuse to automatically take what they should. There is a minuscule button one must press in these situations. I wish I had button options like yours! You should really make postcards out of those photo/illustrations. :)

I have traveled a bit, I suppose I have been lucky enough in my travels to have always had a toilet... I to have yet to have the option even of a bidet. Some day I would like to try one, If only to finally join the club of bidet users...kind of like the mile high club in my mind, which I am not a part of iether.
Thank you for your interesting post, I feel so much better now that I know what it is. I truly would have never thought to pose the quest. on my OS page, with illustrations no less!
Thank you for the giggles;)

Thanks for those very informative graphics ! At first I thought a bidet as well. I would think that this purely to save much needed water in countries and places where it's not plentiful. It's a good learning experience nonetheless for many I'm sure. If not possibly the best laugh I'll have today .

In the interest of science, I checked on a Dual-Flush toilet while I was at Home Depot today. The High Flow flush was preset at 1.6 gallons per flush, the Low Flow at 1.1 gpf. That 1/2 gallon difference may not seem like a lot, but over time it saves a lot of water. And that makes a difference not only in the amount of water that has to be processed coming into the house, but also the amount that has to be processed going out of the house, so it's a double win.

At least it is simpler to operate than a composting toilet, which is the way I'm going to go with the house I'm building in rural Hawai'i. The choices for household water supply are trucking it in, or catching and processing rainwater. As a result, household s in the area typically use only 1/3 the water of the average mainland household. And eliminating the water flush eliminates 1/3 of the average mainland household usage.

Modern composting toilets are not stinky, and the solar powered exhaust fan I'll be using will help keep the air fresh. But there is a lever to move to activate the "trapdoor" and a crank to turn to "mix the compost," so a short lesson is required for new guests. About every 3 months the finished, odorless, dry compost is removed and spread out on the flower gardens. Makes everything grow like weeds!

I have seen these multiflush toilets all over Asia, but still don't quite understand them either. It's a good concept. Still better than squat toilets, which I'll have to see if you've covered in your China post.

I sense a travel toilet open call coming on. There's enough material in this thread for a book. I have my own tragic story from Japan. Been meaning to write it down.

I'd still be holding it. Great piece!

I just saw one of these for the first time while staying at the Vancouver youth hostel, where the dual flush system is explained on the back of every bathroom stall door. It makes sense as it's designed to save water. David Kinne called it.

Still much nicer than the Parisian (and elsewhere) squat toilets, a hole in the floor, where the floor is almost always wet and messy and, God help you if you're wearing stockings or anything at all that might touch the floor while you're in there.

Very funny!
I've had to squat in Italy & France too and it's quite a visceral shock to the system!

you do have a theme going here doc. all the posts gave me info, but didn't solve the dilemma. So I still don't know what to do in Greece, China, or South Africa! I guess I'll just stay home. (how fortunate for you to be able to make these trips-wonderful!)