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"Where’s the commode in this dungeon? I gotta take a squirt."

What started as a “Hey, I need a break. I wonder what funny stories are on Fark today?” moment has turned into a descent into porcelain madness.

Perhaps it’s the recent adventure in plumbing I had or the girlfriend’s occasional bouts of gastric distress (The Redhead and I have a favourite catchphrase: “Toilet time is private time!”), but lately toilets have been a recurring theme in my life.

Fark points to an Associated Press story on Singapore’s initiative to make sure that you always know the answer to Steve Buscemi’s question in Reservoir Dogs: “Where’s the commode in this dungeon? I gotta take a squirt”…

SINGAPORE – When finicky tourists in Singapore hear nature’s call, they’ll know where to go.

The city-state is publishing maps pinpointing its 500 cleanest public

toilets in its drive to wipe dirty lavatories off the face of the

island, an official said Thursday.

The toilet maps will indicate the cleanest and best-equipped restrooms

for the benefit of tourists and shoppers, said Jack Sim, a founding

member of the Singapore-based World Toilet Organization and president

of the Restroom Association of Singapore.

Singapore started rating public lavatories in its “Happy Toilet”

campaign last June — using a five-star system similar to that used to

grade hotels. A “Happy Toilet” is one that’s rated three-stars or more.

The maps will be available free at the international airport and

information counters by August, and shopping malls whose restrooms

don’t yet qualify will be encouraged to upgrade so that they can be

included, Sims said.

“If retail operators could use this as a competitive tool, it would

help raise the standards of toilets in the country,” Sim said.

“Shopping centers with well-facilitated loos will win the trust of the

shoppers.”

The tightly controlled island nation of 4 million people is well-known

for its behavior improvement campaigns targeting gum chewing, spitting

and people who don’t flush toilets.

It may seem like yet another symptom of Singapore’s obsession with the

control over the minutae of life; after all, they cracked down on

gum-chewing and spitting as a measure to keep city streets clean.

However, anyone who’s had to use a public restroom in China and Hong

Kong knows how difficult they are to find — the Chinese take “toilet

shame” to a Woody Allen-esque degrees of neurosis. Once you find them,

you wish you hadn’t. Imagine “the worst bathroom in Scotland” from the

movie Trainspotting, and you’ve got a good picture of what many toilet stalls there are like.

(That’s one thing I have to say in favour of McDonald’s restaurants and

globalization: their worldwide presence, coupled with their

three-ring-binder of procedure, has raised public toilet standards worldwide.)

I was intrigued by the fact that there were not one, but two

restroom-related organizations in Singapore. “Restroom Association of

Singapore”? And even better, the “World Toilet Organization”, whose

initials must annoy the hell out of the better-known WTO.

I did a little Googling, and it turned out that the World Toilet

Organization not only has a web site, but this “toilet seat from the

future” logo:

Even better, they’re having a summit in November! No word of a lie, here’s the promo blurb from their site:

Attend this WORLD Toilet Summit held for the FIRST TIME here in CHINA – Meet the KEY DECISION MAKERS, KEY OFFICIALS and the MOVERS & SHAKERS of the Industry! Make a Date!

Yes, the emphasis on the phrase “movers and shakers” is mine, but they did

use that phrase without any trace of irony, and put in all caps. I’m

still wondering what sort of person becomes a KEY DECISION MAKER or a

KEY OFFICIAL for toilets, and what kind of qualifications one needs.

CNN covered the 2001 summit, and the World Toilet Organization has a review, as well as photos from the 2003 summit.

The World Toilet Organization has toilet campaign posters which you can download.

If you want the high-resolution files from which you can generate

poster-size prints, be advised that they’re charging the ridiculous

price of US$50 for them.

The fun doesn’t stop there: the World Toilet Organization commissioned an anthem. In keeping with Chinese Toilet Shame, it’s titled The Secret Garden, and you can download a .zip archive containing an MP3 recording and some explanatory notes.

It’s rather unlike an anthem, as it’s a lounge-y number done in jazz

waltz time and sung by a chorus. Imagine a Sergio Mendez/Brazil ’66

cover band waxing poetic about the commode.

Here’s the full text of the notes that came with the song:

WORLD TOILET ORGANIZATION’S ANTHEM

SECRET GARDEN

VERSE ONE

SECRET GARDEN OUT IN THE OPEN,

SOMEWHERE MY HEART RUNS FREE,

DEEP DOWN BURNING, FOR EVER YEARNING,

ALWAYS THERE

VERSE TWO

WHERE I CARE FOR, NATURE’S THEREFORE

TEND TO YOUR EVERY LEAF,

PRIVATE MOMENT, SECRET GARDEN

IS WHERE MY HEART RUNS FREE

**********

Lyrics & Music to Secret Garden composed/arranged by

DUNKEN McKEE  

 Song sung by

The CITY HARVEST YOUTH CHOIR, SINGAPORE

Theme of the Song

Our Private Moments in the Secret Garden

The Xpression

In our rushing-here-and-there society,

 we hardly have private moments to ourselves.

The Toilet is a Secret Garden where we can be alone

 quietly with ourselves, and our spirit can run free.

Going to toilets are natural behavior and we want to care for it because it tends to our needs, and yearning.

We need to open the subject and

 pour ourselves out to improve it

It’ll be a delight to know that there is always

 a nice toilet go to whenever we need it.

It’s our aspiration that the Secret Garden is always there

 FOR YOU

Purpose of the Song

To initiate a collection of many more toilet songs and

popularise them into albums for sale

We welcome contributions from our www.worldtoilet.org  visitors

THE SECRETARIAT

WORLD TOILET ORGANISATION

‘HOPE YOU ENJOY LISTENING TO THE SECRET GARDEN’

Believe you me, it’s not my heart that runs free when I’m on the crapper. And don’t even get me started on the “deep down burning / forever yearning” couplet.

It’s all like a highway accident — I want to look away, but I can’t!

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