www.RogerWendell.com
Roger J. Wendell
Defending 3.8 Billion Years of Organic Evolution^SM

Toilet Matters Squatty Potties and Good Health! ("WC", outside the U.S., is a common designation for "water Closet" or flush toilet - you'll occassionally see it used on this page..)

Click Here for a YouTube video of an in-flight flush at 32,000 feet...

Click Here for a YouTube video of a train's toilet in India...

Rember to always consult your physician before undertaking any
kind of dietery, physical, or medical change - regardless whether
it's described on my pages or anywhere else on the Internet!

What's natural?

"The ideal posture for defecation is the squatting position, with the thighs flexed upon the abdomen. In this way the capacity of the abdominal cavity is greatly diminished and intra-abdominal pressure increased, thus encouraging the expulsion of the fecal mass. The modern toilet seat in many instances is too high even for some adults. The practice of having young children use adult toilet seats is to be deplored." - Bockus, Gastro-Enterology, p. 511.

The following drawings provided courtesy Nature's Platform where they note, "The ancient Romans used the posture shown below. (Togas were easier to deal with than trousers, and provided some degree of privacy) The last picture shows a typical tourist. He might be surprised to learn that, except for royalty and the disabled, everyone used the squatting position until the second half of the 19th century..."

In 2001 I took a great trip throughout the Silk Road and China - it was there that I discovered "Squatty Potty" toilets, despite their lack of cleanliness, to be much more healthful than what we're accustomed to in the Western world. This is because a "squatting" position is required that places natural pressure on our intestines in addition to protecting our bottom's from having to sit on or touch anything! This bit of pressure, from squatting, is what helps move things along quickly and efficiently in addition to reducing clean-up and paperwork afterwards.

I don't think the term "Squatty Potty" is generally used to describe these toilets. Nevertheless, I use the term here because it's pretty darn descriptive. I first heard the term from Tina, our American friend in Western China, but can't say I've heard it used much since then...

Anyway, in addition to China I've been fortunate to visit various other places around the world, including Africa, where the squatty potty is the norm. And, it appears to me that most of the world has us beat when it comes to toilets in this regard. Clearly, the squatty is quicker, cleaner, and much more natural than sitting on a huge porcelain insulator. Squatties also use a lot less resources and are much easier to construct and maintain.

During my trips through China and India I found the "squatty potty" to be in full use everywhere - including their trains!

Platforms?

Some folks have constructed a platform around their existing toilet. This flat surface, at the traditional level of the toilet seat, allows the user to squat over the existing porcelain structure. Also, if you look around the Internet a bit you'll see there are some suppliers and manufacturers selling "Nature," "Lillipad," "In-Lieu," and "Squat" platforms. Although I haven't tried any of these commercial ones I do have lots of personal experience everywhere else and can assure you that squatting is quick, easy, efficient and healthful - I hope you'll give it a try!

- Roger J. Wendell
Golden, Colorado

(Click on any of this page's thumbnail images for a larger view...)

If every household in the U.S. replaced just one roll of 1,000 sheet virgin fiber bathroom tissues with 100% recycled ones, we could save: 373,000 trees, 1.48 million cubic feet of landfill space, and 155 million gallons of water. Seventh Generation Co.

Other Toilets, Facilities, and Supplies: (Displayed here just for the fun of it!)   In September '08 Colleen R. wrote me to say; "I was very shocked to see your photo of a "typical African toilet" as I live in Africa & have never seen such a degrading loo! Another shocker was the toilet found in Australia! They love pointing fingers at (South) Africa - I'm so pleased "our toilet" appears to be a slightly more updated model than theirs. Interesting photos."

Click Here for a YouTube video of an airport restoom...

Port Lockroy, Antarctica, restoration from World War II	Here's one of the toilets we used on Mt. Rainier...	USS Pampanito 09/09/05 WWII Submarine Toilet	The other USS Pampanito WWII Submarine Toilet	Toilet in Ecuador Climbers' Hut at 16,000 feet! (4,877 m)	Also discovered in Ecuador
Bathroom Art!	Reading...	Tanzania toilet	Typical African toilet...	Climbers' toilet on Mt. Kenya	Found this one in Australia...
Roger in Grand Canyon	Monument Creek toilet	Me on the Monument toilet	Three Grand Canyon toilets...	Me visiting Four Corners in '92	Montezuma, Colorado
Me and a French pay toilet!	Condoms at Calais, France	Making payment in Calais, France	Police toilet China	Public toilet Xinjiang, China	Public toilet Xinjiang, China
Urinals, UK	Urinal candy, UK	Dover, England, UK	Hygiene Monitor, UK	Harrods Department Store, London	Earth First Toilet Paper
Mining toilet in Tombstone, AZ	Private toilet Nogales, MX	Outhouse For Sale, Nevada	Virginia City, Nevada	Tanzania Toilet Paper	Kenya Toilet Paper*

Above: In June 2007 I was on business in Tucson and took a tour of the "Good Enough Mine" in Tombstone, Arizona. Far left is the miner's toilet on display there. A few days earlier I was a bit further south, into Mexico, and asked a family if I could photograph their private toilet after they so graciously allowed me to use it! - Roger

* Toilet tissue insert

Left and Above: I found this advertising insert inside the roll of toilet tissue I purchased in Kenya (above). It's pretty serious business as it explains how proceeds from the sale help keep parents employed and kids in school - what a fantastic idea!

	In late 2017, in a show of disrespect, the Guggenheim Museum offered the White House its golden toilet display when the request was to borrow a Vincent Van Gogh painting.

Miscellaneous Toilets Continued:

Dachau	Dachau	Dachau	Austria WC	Bidet - Wolkenstein, Italy	Iguazu Park, Argentina
Mauna Kea observatory	Arches National Park	Portable camp toilet	San Francisco street toilet	Sego Canyon, Utah	Baker Archeological Site, Nevada
MV Clelia II in Antarctica [see note*]	Aluminum siding in Boulder

*The M/V Clelia II, while in Antarctica, added this reminder for its passangers:
May we remind you that the vacuum toilet system onboard is very sensitive. Please take care that objects do
not fall in and that only the provided toilet tissue is deposited, otherwise the entire system can be blocked.

India Toilets

The toilets of India deserve a space of their own, not because they're so different, but because the country is so large (population-wise), and diverse - even when it comes to toilet matters! We visited India at the end of 2008 and really enjoyed it there. So, don't misunderstand, this section of photos is not poking fun at India, but, rather, reflects the diversity we found throughout their wonderful country!

Oh, throughout much of India, especially in tourist areas, it's common for attendants to receive a tip after you've used their restroom (actually, I've seen this practiced in other parts of the world, as well). Also, a very common sight throughout India is people (usually men) urinating alongside a road, sidewalk, or on a wall. In one of my photographs, below, you can see an open, outside urinal adjacent a busy street...

Train push-button flush	Train toilet and my foot...	Pay toilets	Hybrid toilet	Typical "squatty"
Street urinal	Condoms	Me and a sign in Sanskrit	Bidet & toilet	Bidet & toilet
Indian toilet tissue	No tips please!	Western style!	"He" - Ranthambhore	"She" (India)

Click Here for my page about India...

Bidet sprays ceiling!

As Wikipedia describes it, "A bidet is a low-mounted plumbing fixture or type of sink intended for washing the genitalia, inner buttocks, and anus." It's believed that the bidet was invented by a French furniture maker, sometime during 17th century, and comes from their word for "Pony" - since the user sits on the device in a way similar to riding a horse... I used this particular bidet at the Amerian hotel in Buenos Aires, Argentina. This entry is not meant to be a slight against the Amerian - we found it to a very nice and comfortable hotel. It's just that this particular bidet was capable of spraying a solid and powerful stream of water straight into the ceiling! Click Here for the YouTube video proving my claim!

More Colorado Toilets...
(my favorite state...)

Backcountry skiing at Jim Creek

Grays and Torreys trailhead

Colorado is my favorite place and has been my home, most of the time, since 1972. I've either visited, climbed, hiked, camped or worked in every part of our 103,598 square mile (268,318 square kilometres) state and figure our outdoor toilets, as far as toilets go, are probably the most memorible - due to the high elevation and cold temperatures!

Coal Bank Pass	12,095 feet / 3,686 metres	Crowds are welcome!	Bair Ranch Rest Area Glenwood Canyon	Joelle's John at the Vail ski resort	Joelle's John at the Vail ski resort
12,095 feet / 3,686 metres	Crowds are welcome!	Austere	No Trash!	St Mary's Glacier	Near the Lizardhead Wilderness

Durango and Silverton Railroad

During the summer of 2009 I used the Durango & Silverton train to reach the trailhead to Chicago Basin for a week of climbing 14ers. This particular train is mostly for tourists but makes room for a handful of climbers each trip. Below are a few photos from one of the train's toilets. There's also a YouTube video of it as well.

Click Here for a YouTube video of a toilet on the Durango & Silverton train in Colorado...

Woody Creek Tavern

Near Snowmass & Aspen, CO

The Woody Creek Tavern, located near Aspen, Colorado, is pretty famous place that locals, visitors, hikers, bikers, tourists and celebrities hang-out at. I've been there, a few times, including the day after Hunter S. Thompson died - probably their most famous patron (more on that on my Margy's Hut page).

Dauntless Mine
Elevation 3,751 metres (12,307 feet), just below
Mount Sherman (a Colorado 14er) in Park County

Garderobes were medieval toilets in large public buildings and castles. They were often holes in the outer walls which dropped into cess pits or moats. I photographed a few while on a visit to the United Kingdom in October '06:

Tower of London

Dover Castle

Garderobe entrance

Escape the smell!

Groom of the Stool

Me at Dover Castle's garderobe

Click Here for my page about the United Kingdom...

Best Restroom:

BestRestroom.com voted Wendell's Restaurant (no relation to me!!), in Westerville, Ohio the best and cleanest restroom in 2006! Their web site stated, in part; "The important message here is restroom hygiene matters - for good health and good business..." "Wendell's received the coveted 'America's Best Restroom' plaque of recognition from Cintas, and secured their place in the 'America's Best Restroom Hall of Fame.'" "'We're thrilled to win the America's best restroom award,' said Wendell's General Manager, Rich Belding. 'It's a testament to our staff's professionalism and commitment to all the things that make a visit to Wendell's a great experience - including upscale casual dining, hospitality and cleanliness.'"

"Wendells' restrooms, which are always stocked with towels, soap and mouthwash, are a favorite among sports lovers who are keen on cleanliness." The 2006 winning restroom featured a classic athletic theme with black and white photos and sleek countertops...

World Toilet Association
CNN.com/Technology (AP) Friday, November 23, 2007

"The World Toilet Association kicked off its inaugural conference Thursday, hoping to spark a sanitation revolution that will save lives through better hygiene and break taboos about what happens behind closed bathroom doors."

"2.6 billion people worldwide lack access to proper restroom facilities."

"Dr. Shigeru Omi, western Pacific director of the World Health Organization, said 1.8 million people die annually due to diseases related to inadequate sanitation, 90 percent of them children younger than 5."

"Providing healthy bathroom facilities worldwide would cost some $10 billion a year -- equal to 1 percent of world military spending or what Europeans annually spend on ice cream, he said. The new association aims to provide toilet facilities to impoverished countries, provide for urgent sanitation needs after natural disasters and spread information and technology for improving toilets."

Water Conservation New toilets-- drive 'em to believe 'em KOHLER, Wisconsin (AP), November 27, 2007

"With droughts parching the nation's Southeast and chronic water shortages drying out the West Coast, water utilities across the country say they're grateful for recent advances in the toilet industry, and a number of state governments are moving toward mandating the use of the water-saving commodes."

Toilets built 30 years ago guzzled 5 or more gallons of water per flush, but in the early 1980s manufacturers designed new models that needed only 31/2 gallons per flush. Congress emphasized further conservation in 1992 when it passed the Energy Policy Act, which mandated that regular toilets made starting in 1994 use 1.6 gallons."

"Consumers weren't pleased with those early low-flow models. The first flush didn't always clear the bowl, and subsequent flushes negated any water savings."

"But the newest generation of high-efficiency toilets -- developed in the last two to seven years -- does the job on the first try and uses only 1.3 gallons per flush, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency."

"'The technology is ready, it's been tested, and it's receiving rave reviews from customers,' EPA spokesman Benjamin Grumbles said. 'There's real enthusiasm for high-efficiency toilets. Water conservation is really the wave of the future.'"

"The future is now in thirsty California. Last month Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed a bill mandating that 50 percent of toilets offered for sale in 2010 meet the high-efficiency standards, ramping up to 100 percent by 2014."

"Conservation groups hailed the law as an easy way for people to help the environment."

"'With these new toilets, it's not changing anyone's lifestyle to conserve water,' said Jim Metropulos, a legislative representative for Sierra Club California. 'It's an easy and cheap way to help.'"

"Other states, including Georgia, are considering similar measures."

"The EPA isn't specifically pushing for federal legislation, but Grumbles said his agency is providing Congress information linking water efficiency and energy efficiency. Less water flushed means less energy used by treatment plants."

"One high-efficiency model that's gaining in popularity is the dual-flush toilet, in which users press one button to flush liquid waste with 0.8 or 0.9 gallon of water, or an adjacent button to flush solid waste with 1.6 gallons."

"The flushes amount to an average of about 1.3 gallons, complying with the EPA's definition of a high-efficiency toilet."

"While a water-friendly toilet can be several times more expensive than a standard one, which typically costs less than $100, consumers can expect to recoup the cost within about two years after water savings and possible rebates from the local water company."

Fluffy Toilet Paper Said to Be Worse for Environment Than Hummers FoxNews.com - Friday, February 27, 2009

"That super-soft toilet paper you're fond of using? It's an ecological disaster, environmentalists say.

"Millions of trees are harvested throughout the Americas - including rare old-growth forests in Canada - to sustain the United States' obsession with quilted, ultra-soft, multi-ply toilet paper, the New York Times reported.

"Although toilet paper manufacturers could produce products from recycled materials at a similar cost, the newspaper reported, the fiber taken from standing trees are necessary to help give the tissue its fluffy feel.

"'No forest of any kind should be used to make toilet paper,' said Dr. Allen Hershkowitz, a senior scientist and waste expert with the Natural Resource Defense Council told the Times.

"The United States is the largest market for toilet paper in the world, the newspaper reported, but tissue from 100 percent recycled fibers makes up less than 2 percent of sales for at-home use among conventional and premium brands. People from other countries throughout Europe and Latin America are far less picky about what they use to wipe.

"'This is a product that we use for less than three seconds and the ecological consequences of manufacturing it from trees is enormous,' Hershkowitz told the Guardian newspaper, which cited the chemicals used in pulp manufacturing and process of cutting down forests.

"'Future generations are going to look at the way we make toilet paper as one of the greatest excesses of our age,' Hershkowitz said. 'Making toilet paper from virgin wood is a lot worse than driving Hummers in terms of global warming pollution.'

Revolutionary corn-based toilet paper
Cleaning and Maintenance Management Online - Thursday, March 26, 2009

"The winners of this year's Purdue Corn Innovation Contest successfully developed usable toilet paper from the cellulose of corn, according to HoosierAgToday.com." "The winning team, Nature's Silk, consists of Dave Jaroch, Jessamine Osborne and Janie Stine, the story stated." "Stine says: 'We actually use waste cellulose from the fields that's not being used for anything else. It's not going to be used for food product, or fabric or anything else." "Osborne said: 'Right now, toilet paper is made from wood. You have to use virgin lumber and the world is becoming more environmentally friendly. The gasoline to carry the trees from the forest to the plants is becoming more of an issue. What we have here is 74 million tons of waste not used every year. We can take that waste and farmers can give it to factories that are already present and use it to make our product.'"

Every Human Being Spends Five Years of Life on a Toilet November 23, 2009 Generally, an average person spends five years of their life on a toilet. The World Toilet Organization (WTO) was founded in 2001 at a conference for toilet professionals held in Singapore. Currently the organization has 200 members, including Russia. At the same conference the World Toilet Organization declared its professional holiday, the World Toilet Day, which was celebrated on November 19. The recently created international organization has plenty to do. Like any other industry, toilet industry is not without extremes. On the one hand, WTO compiles international ratings of public toilets marking them with stars, like hotels. For example, Singapore and China already boast 5-star toilets. On the other hand, some 42 percent of the world population does not have an opportunity to relieve themselves in specially designated areas and do it wherever they can. One of the most challenging issues in all countries is elimination of notorious lines in women's restrooms. World history of toilets proves that all peoples independently of each other came across the same issues and found similar solutions.

• Toilets estimated to be approximately 5,000 years old were found on Orkney Islands near the Northern shore of Scotland. There were drain gutters installed under clay toilets.
• Archeologists excavated utilities diverting waste to street drenches and then outside of the city in the ancient city of Mohenjo - Daro , Pakistan. The utilities were over 4,000 years old .
• Chinese Emperor of the Western Dynasty Khan who lived around 200 B.C was buried along with a stone chair with armrests and a waste tank.
• The Roman sewage system was the most advanced system for waste water diversion at that time. Custodians had to use boats to move along its underground tunnels 5 meters in diameter.

It is not surprising that under such anti-sanitary conditions epidemics of plague, cholera and other scary diseases spread instantaneously. Europeans realized it only by the 19th century and began to think about building sewage systems.

• Back in the day Leonardo Da Vinci suggested improving toilets. He made drafts of water supply, and sewage and ventilation systems. However, the genius was too advanced for his times and his project was left unattended.
• In 1596, Sir John Harrington created a devise called water closet and presented it to the English Queen Elizabeth. The invention did not catch on due to the lack of plumbing. To flush, the water had to be manually poured into a waste tank.
• In 1775, when plumbing already existed in London, Alexander Kamming refined the invention.
• A Russian version of water closet was designed by a military engineer Vasily Blinov. Exactly 130 years ago he presented it in the Emperor's University laboratory. The device featured a hydraulic valve shaped like a curved pipe separating the content of two bowls. As a result, half a bucket of horse manure dumped in the bowl disappeared as soon as it was covered with a bucket of water.
• Tsar Alexander the II was the first one to use the new water closet. Ten devices were handmade for the Tsar's palace at the porcelain factory of Kornilivy brothers.
• Batch production of porcelain devices was started in 1909 by the Spanish company Unitas

Literature: Fertile Waste (Managing your domestic sewage) by Peter Harper - Copyright 1997 Improving on the World's Greatest Invention (A Healthy Addition!) by Wallace Bowles - Copyright 1999

• Colon Health Handbook (New Health Through Colon Rejuvenation) by Robert Gray - Copyright 1980
• The Master Cleanser (with Special Needs and Problems) by Stanley Burroughs - Copyright 1976

In 2001 WTO declared 19th November World Toilet Day (WTD). Today it is celebrated in over 19 countries with over 51 events being hosted by various water and sanitation advocates. World Toilet Organization created WTD to raise global awareness of the struggle 2.6 billion face every day without access to proper, clean sanitation. WTD also brings to the forefront the health, emotional and psychological consequences the poor endure as a result of inadequate sanitation - Click Here for more info on WTD!

More Toilet Vids (by me!)

Toilet Waypoints

For personal safety, and just for the fun of it, I usually take a GPS "reading" on the top of each peak, at the trailhead, or some other interesting point or curiosity along the way. WARNING: I cannot guarantee the accuracy of these waypoints as my own GPS bounces around a lot or I simply take an incorrect reading! Please rely on a more accurate source for your Waypoints! That being said, I still enjoy "cataloging" Waypoints and I keep a bunch of other locations, from around the world, on my 12ers, 13ers, 14ers, Hiking, Waypoints, and other pages...

Links:

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