November 8 2006

Thailand shamed by Thaksin toilet legacy

toilet legacy

If you truly believe that women don't fart then you must hold them in very high regard. Similarly, Thailand's former Prime Minister Thaksin became seduced by the notion that foreign visitors never use the toilet. Although deeply flattered, we have to face up to the practical difficulties that this misunderstanding has created.

In order to maximise retailing space, notoriously few toilets have been provided in the gigantic new King Power shopping mall that masquerades as Suvarnabhumi Airport.

Pre-emptively laying cable at 36,000 feet isn't always possible, however, because many people - including my own girlfriend - are fearful of using aircraft toilets in the mistaken belief that their intestines will be violently ripped out through their ringpieces by an invisible force.

Obviously, she can't wait in line if the turtle's head is already poking out so King Power only have themselves to blame if she's forced to nip one off behind a stack of Toblerones.

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The Royal Flora Ratchaphruek Expo 2006 is reportedly another Thaksin-era mega-project with inadequate toilet facilities - leaving many visitors almost as full of wind and piss as the flamboyant former PM.

According to today's Bangkok Post, hoards of mucky women from coach parties have made matters worse by disposing of their sanitary napkins carelessly and a build-up of more than 400 Dracula's teabags is playing havoc with the plumbing.

One visitor said the stench from toilets located about 50 metres away from the Netherlands gardens interfered with her enjoyment of Dutch lilies.

Frankly, if the enjoyment of Dutch lilies played that big a role in my personal life, the only reason that I'd need to find a toilet would be to drown myself. However, the Expo's inadequate signage could help save my life.

Another visitor said that she visited the expo with her family and could not find any toilet signs. However, foul odours finally led her family to the backed-up facility.

Suvarnabhumi too boasts inadequate signage so passengers trying to sniff out the exit might welcome a ban on immigration officers washing their socks.

News of Thailand's latest toilet woes could hardly have come at a worse time. The World Toilet Organisation is staging its annual Toilet Forum and Expo in Bangkok next week.

The anxious hosts must be praying for a miracle because, if VIP toilet delegates get wind of Thailand's sanitary shortcomings, their reaction will make the Galt/Stickman global conflict look like what Sniffer described as "two bald men fighting over a comb."

Their unlikely saviour could be a shy rural inventor whose innovative "toilet shoes" are expected to keep delegates distracted while turd-busters dislodge the Ratchaphruek jam-rag blockage. This is how the Bangkok Post describes his breakthrough.

The "toilet shoe", shaped like a diving flipper, was invented by a local villager from Ban Ma Koh Sang. Users can wear the special shoes, costing 350 baht a pair, without taking off their shoes, he said.

This humble villager is showing us the way forward. If Thailand's pride is to be restored, the ghost of Thaksin and his toilet-dodging ways must be laid to rest. Only then can the nation that gave us the indispensable bum-gun once again take its rightful place as a major player in toilet technology.

[Posted to Thai Secrets by David]

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Readers' comments

caliguy says:

'Dracula's teabags'... awesome.

November 8, 2006 5:34 PM

Handbags at Dawn says:

Ah, that's better, thank you. Back to matters of real importance.

November 8, 2006 6:23 PM

Not Stickman Galt Trink MangoSauce says:

In related news a spokesman for deposed Prime Minister Thaksin revealed that his belief that farangs require less in the way of excretionary facilities actually originated in advice gleaned from the "Ask Mrs. Stick" column on a popular Bangkok website, in which a Ms. Poo enquired why her 78 year-old German husband never seemed to "visit the little boy's room".

(It later turned out that her husband had been dead for some months, but it seems changes resulting from this new understanding of the facts did not reach the airport construction team in time).

November 8, 2006 7:39 PM

Lyle says:

"...nip one off behind a stack of Toblerones."

Hehe. How do you dream this up? I nearly snarfed my drink through my nose from laughing while reading today's post. Your knack for hilarious imagery is staggering.

I'll never look at an airplane toilet the same way again, though. Ouch! Yikes. Not that I spend a great deal of time looking at toilets, of course.

November 8, 2006 7:55 PM

Slow Learner says:

Question, David. Do I have to wear my shoes inside the flippers or can I wear yours?

November 8, 2006 8:01 PM

Saeb says:

Classic - Ms C thought I was pegging out when the Saeng Som started running out my nose.

What's with the flippers anyway?.
Do you dump in them whilst afoot then casually discard them in your neighbours rubbish or a friends car?.

How do they work after a night on som tam and undercooked gai yang with a fair slug of Mekhong thrown in?.
Are they liquid absorbable?.
The public have a right to know!.

Yes - the Galt/Stick global conflict - quite.......indeed.......get the UN to mediate.

November 8, 2006 9:08 PM

Jack Wow says:

As an IBS sufferer I find the loo shortage in Thailand a major problem, and this kind of article poking fun at it makes me quite irritable.
Using terms such as "turtle's head" and "nip one off behind a stack of Toblerones" may seem funny to most but... to sufferers like myself... this only... oh no... brb

November 8, 2006 10:10 PM

Dicer says:

new airport and no toilets...bingo. More people have graduated from the Romanian College of Urban Planning.

Perhaps the toilet frustration is what led the visitors at the Royal Flora to nick all the pineapple trees?

November 8, 2006 10:14 PM

Slow Learner says:

On the plus side, if you buy the flippers, for once you will know exactly how deep the shit that you are standing in really is. Is that worth B350 to you?

November 9, 2006 12:10 AM

Mr Thaksin, BKKchat.org says:

Its a rare thing to ever witness {hear the running taps of hand basin's} Thai's washing their hands after using the shitter.
And they calls us farrangs dirty wonkers.

Thaxo.

November 9, 2006 1:22 AM

Andy says:

After all the hyperbole / bollocks talked about the new airport, David's description above was right on the money. *chuckle*

November 9, 2006 6:22 AM

philH says:

Top drawer David, just what we needed - toilet humour a breath of 'fresh' air after the Galt/Stickman jihad.

Thanks for the tip, behind the Toblerones, I'll remember that if the turtles head is out when I arrive December.

btw I think the correct term is "to curl one off" but it's a bit academic if you are suffering from the Aztec two steps.

November 9, 2006 10:05 AM

tracy says:

profanisaurus-tastic.

November 9, 2006 5:53 PM

Andy says:

David, oddly Mr T must've been looking to the future when all his fans in Isarn became rich enough to jet off around the world - country Thai have minimal toilet facilities infested with two million or so mosquitoes and then tend to go once or twice a week in one very fast and violent movement!

November 9, 2006 8:35 PM

sniffer says:

Surely the lack of bogs at the new airport is part of an intricate conspiracy involving not only Thaksin but also a dim Kiwi website owner in order to get people to stop buying motorcycle parts from somebody's mate's gogo bar on ebay. Or something

November 9, 2006 8:57 PM

Dicer says:

Habanero!

Viva la baÃ±o!

November 9, 2006 9:35 PM

bob says:

Ah a breath of fresh air, Galt has had his 15 minutes of fame and gone back to obscurity as a trolley boy at Tescos having found running a website is not easy as he ran out of things to say.

November 9, 2006 10:52 PM

Fya Pon Dem! says:

Thanks David,

I'll have to remember to "drop Gary Coleman off at the jacuzzi" before I get to the airport. I'm sure the stench will be nothing compared to that which the last post raised.

A'ight!

November 10, 2006 4:26 AM

Liu Bei says:

"I'll never look at an airplane toilet the same way again, though."

I will. I tend to aim. Common courtesy. I also make damn sure to piss before the plane lands, especially when flying Khee Nok aka Air Asia, as one cannot possibly know how many hours the busride from plane to terminal will take.

November 11, 2006 8:03 AM

Pants Elk says:

Passing through Suvarnabhumi Airport recently, I felt the urge to drop the Cosby kids off at the pool, so located one of the two (apparently) thunderboxes kindly stuck round the back of the shops. Stylishly decorated with broken tiles and dirty puddled floors (a hommage to Tarkovsky's "Stalker"), I discovered too late that my stall had no paper. Plus, previous visitors had, over some time, carefully stuffed their ass-flowers in the paper dispenser. Luckily, a few sheets of paper wer found, after a Brian Rix-style dash, in the next cubicle.
Really as horrible an experience as visiting the Jim Thompson shop, just a fart's breath away.

November 13, 2006 9:26 PM

ozricmann says:

what a load of shit.............

November 14, 2006 1:14 AM

Fya Pon Dem! says:

Me: "drop Gary Coleman off at the jacuzzi"

Pants Elk: "drop the Cosby Kids off at the pool"

Any other scato-gems lurking out there?

Let 'em rip!

November 14, 2006 10:02 AM

Brucey says:

"fearful of using aircraft toilets in the mistaken belief that their intestines will be violently ripped out through their ringpieces by an invisible force".

Jest ye not!
I read this actually happened once to some poor overweight creature on an aircraft who must have fell back on the pan while her load was ejecting. Apparently she was rushed to hospital on landing and they managed to stuff her intestines back through her exit hatch (thatch? whatever).

November 18, 2006 1:41 AM

Neville Southall says:

Regarding the correct terminology of 'to nip one off'. I believe this to be fine, when 'curling' is mentioned then one would normally say, 'to curl one down' rather than 'off'. Maybe it's a regional thing but I think I speak for most!

November 23, 2006 7:42 PM

Dicer says:

http://www.nationmultimedia.com/2007/01/13/
business/business_30024011.php

and comments at the bottom......

There they go. More toilets perhaps? The continuing problem is as the superior race they haven't figured out their neural challenges so instead of getting a few foreign thinkers to iron things out, they plod on with their plan. Just like the people who sold me a dud oven with funny English on the package. As superior people, their version of English is actually the right one. The Arabs and even Malays listen closely to outside advice.

What is worse about Thai thinking is the boss has to be the one to figure it out. No one dares point out flaws. Loss of face: On one air crash the copilot saw the error but said he dared not tell the captain who was older and preferred to crash and maybe die than risk a face problem. So the big boy rolls around mulling things over and finally has a wild random Chinese thought come through. Baste of course on emotions and maybe indigestion.

I spent many Kafkaesque years trying to tell people how to move from 6th grade to 9th thinking. They would of course not listen to me or the other foreigners. We were the alien scum; they were the super superior karachakan. Only the head could come up with ideas (face) and when you tried to get them on basic thinking that workers an trainees needed you found CANNOT BE BOTHERED, DO NOT CARE. Life to them was a frenzy of inner group rivalry to which we had no input at all.

But I finally drew the line. One time the head decided we were to turn in daily work plans. I wrote up a thing saying this is just what we as children had to do in middle school but NOT OK for office people. Then I gave it to a member of a rival group to the head's and a lot of upset people and the daily plan submission immediately dropped. This was his idea of WORK. Life beyond 11-12 is impossible to imagine for them so they remain stunned to this day. The more they suspect they are wrong, the more they hate CRITICAL FOREIGNERS. So how do most things get done? The boss or some sweaty egghead near the boss figures it out.

As an example head to Patpong around 4pm and see how they organise the place, the stalls, supplies, everything. There is one Chinese controlling the whole chaotic place. Everything else falls in. If that one man was not there the place would be a mess.

January 14, 2007 11:13 PM

Prufrock says:

Dicer. Dude. Do another one.
You're saving many of us the trouble.

An aside.
I have found that Thai women, perhaps perforce of their function on the weird Thai societal Xmas tree, have a clue.
But then in a weak moment, 95% of them 90% of the time head back to the barricades.

Rock on.

Prufrock

January 15, 2007 8:03 AM

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