V - Indian bathrooms

All Indian bathrooms that I have seen so far did not have special compartments for showering. The whole room is tiled, so you just stand in the middle of the room, either pouring water out of a bucket or using a European shower head to clean yourself. The water of course splashes all over the room, which does not only help rinse some of the dirt off the toilet and sink, but also means that you do not have to deal with sticky shower curtains or malfunctioning shower cabins. All in all a really practical setup – if you want to wash your bathroom, you just hose the whole room down, the Indian heat will then dry it in no time.

The toilets are something that I was very afraid to use at first but quickly became accustomed to and even learned liking it. So, here is a quick instruction on how to use an Indian toilet: 1. Wash your hands. You are later going to touch your genitals with your left hand. 2. Sit down and do whatever needs to be done. Most Indian toilets are similar to the European toilets: it is a big bowl with a seat. Until the recent past the usual Indian toilet used to be only a hole in the ground. Fortunately for me, this changed. 3. Every Indian bathroom has a small shower head right next to the toilet. You take it, use the little lever to get water shooting out, and you rinse yourself off. 4a. So now, you are clean, probably cleaner than if you had used toilet paper. But how do you avoid looking like you peed your pants? Easy - you take your left hand and wipe the water of your genitals. This will not get you dry completely but at least you will not be dripping wet anymore. And in the Indian heat, the rest of the moisture will dry off pretty quickly. 4b. In some more modern and western places there is a role of toilet paper next to the toilet - just like in Europe. If you don’t want to use your hand to dry yourself off, you use toilet paper instead. But be aware! Do not EVER throw any tissue, not even the thinnest of toilet papers into the toilet! Indian toilets and their water pipes are not made for paper tissues. They will literally clog up from just a few thin paper tissues. 5. Wash your hands! If you wash your hands thoroughly it should not matter if you use your left or right hand to dry yourself off. But per Indian custom you use the left hand to wipe yourself off and the right hand for everything else.

So, next time you hear horror stories about Indian toilets – it is true, you do use your hand for cleaning yourself but only after you have thoroughly rinsed your genitals with water.

Next time a cleaner story – I promise :D