Anyhow, since we're in the business of being informative on all things Korean, this also has to be said about Korean Toilets: good luck finding toilet paper beside them. Every toilet in my (Simon's) school is paperless, and the same could be said about just about every other public toilet we've visited in Bucheon. It's quite annoying. I had to bring in my own roll. I left it in the mens washroom. It was stolen after a couple of days. I brought in another roll and it was stolen again. This could be the main reason why you'll never find toilet paper laying around: there are very efficient toilet paper thieves who make regular rounds. Your best bet - and supposedly common practice here in Korea - is to have pocket packets of toilet paper, sold in all convenience and grocery stores near you. Anyhow, click on the picture above to see our video documentary, or click here for our video on Korean Toilet Paper. See what we're talking about on YouTube if you'd prefer it that way.
9 comments:
Simon,
I so didn't need to mindlessly click on your video while eating a bowl of oat meal for breakfast. It's quite puzzling to me that the plumbing system in a tech savvy country like Korea isn't able to flush TP. Love your and Martina's blogs. Keep 'em coming.
Regards,
Jonathan
Hi, Simon.
I so didn't need to mindlessly click on your video while eating a bowl of oat meal for breakfast. It's quite puzzling to me that the plumbing system in a tech savvy country like Korea can't flush TP. Love your and Martina's blogs. Keep 'em coming.
Regards,
Jonathan
You videoed poopy trash? Is there anywhere you people won't go?!
Just FYI, my school is the exact same. This is beyond gross and more than unsanitary. Definitely gag inducing.
lol apparently you can't chuck the used toilet tissues with your *ahem* poo because the neck which connects the toilet to the drains are too small... why don't they just make it larger? strange.
I heard that they use raw sewage as fertilizer in the countryside. If this is true, then maybe the toilet paper just doesn't make good fertilizer.
Hi, I'm a Korean and live in Seattle. I randomly clicked YouTube videos and one of them was yours, so followed the link and here I am. You guys have great video editing skills and a great blog! For the Korean Toilet video, I have a comment. Koreans don't use the basket in their home. The reason why there're baskets is because the janitors of those public places are sick and tired of clogged toilet. Womens sometimes dump their hygienics and others sometimes dump cigarette butts and so on. So the Janitors got sick of those and started to put the basked right by the toilet. Some store owners forcely asking you to use the basket to dump toilet papers after use because the clogs frequently make water flood mass. I'll say the basket is originated and started because of some mannerless people who dump anything into the toilet. Hope you can add this comment to Korean toilet section so foreigners don't see Koreans too weird.
Great job and Great blog!
For what it's worth, the same system applies in Morocco, where I visited a few years ago.
Sandpiper probably has the correct explanation for the practice.
....I live in Houston, Texas, and that's actually pretty normal here too...[...Is it really that weird???] I think Sandpiper is right about the clogged toilets, and that's why we have them like that.
Stumbled your blog and love it. Great job. As far as your poopie paper is concerned everyone is right.
It goes a little something like this:
Long ago raw sewage in villages was a huge problem. They tried everything you can think of. In Jeju they came up with the "dong dweji" or shit pig. The pig's stye was built with a little hut like commode along the wall just above the pigs pen so that people could *ahem* drop off some extra scraps as it were. The pig would eat the human excrement later the villagers would eat the pig. Gross yes, but this is how we humans evolve.
Next, a war torn country for several centuries now caused many things. Stubborn people known as Koreans and a lack of all animals. Now before anyone gets all uppity about me calling Koreans stubborn I say this in a complimentary way. For had it not been for Korean's ability to be so damn stubborn the people here would be speaking Chinese, Japanese, or Russian. SO back to my point
A lack of all animals namely cows and such other fertilizer baring livestock the Korean people turned to what they had. Up until just a decade or so ago this was very common practice. In the town that I am in just below Gwangju some farmers still use this method.
No matter how you look at it this is still a 3rd world country. The way things may have worked say 30 years ago or even 50 years ago won't soon be forgotten or changed. Koreans love their traditions and wont soon change. For us who are not from here it may seem gross, but here... it is what we have all heard before. "I em uh KO-REE-UHN!"
Continue flushing your paper nothing bad will happen. Like in Japan and China and other places around the world they use copious amounts of TP and this is why they believe TP always bungs the toilet. I don't think you or anyone else has the testicular fortitude to walk in after your students or friends and show them how much TP to actually use.
Sandpiper also hit the nail on the head as well. I have seen what people leave behind in the standing urinals. A few bottles of the green and all of a sudden it's ok to smoke, drink coffee, and throw all the rubbish into the toilet. The basket gets left behind in public so as to avoid this.
However I have seen the same basket in peoples homes as well. Ewww yes. Again not my country I'm just a visitor and not here to change them or show them the light.
All very good posts my fellow teachers, and non.
-W
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