Catshanghai

Warning! This post gives too much personal information, but it is very useful for foreigners to know before they visit China.

My brother was trained to be a barcode printer, but the computerisation of this industry led him to see the writing on the toilet wall so he changed to become a plumber and bathroom fitter. Now I have no excuse to have a blocked toilet!

The trouble is I grew up in the UK where the plumbing is up to the task of making anything and everything flush away forever and now I live in China. In England, hygeine dictates that toilet paper should be flushed down the toilet bowl along with everything else, but in China this is a mistake. There are signs in public restrooms throughout Shanghai reminding you to dispose of your soiled paper in the sealed bin next to the seat. If you put paper down Chinese toilets, eventually they will get blocked until nothing flushes away.

I find this advice very difficult to follow, because it seems dirty and is totally at odds with my instincts and upbringing. I have also been very lucky to have lived in Shanghai for over two years without any serious toilet problems. My brother is too far away to answer my calls for assistance from Shanghai. However, now we live on the fourteenth floor and the pipes can not cope with having paper stuffed down them. Call it cultural reeducation or a new year’s resolution, but 2007 has started with a change in the way that I dispose of toilet paper.

Now it goes in the bin and not down the pan!