So I've been going to my schools for a while now. I've been to my base school, what, like 40 times now? The other schools, numerous times. Out of my 3 schools, none had Western Style toilets...they were all like the one shown above, left... (or so I thought).
Does anyone else do this????...Once I use a bathroom, I always use the same stall if available. I don't know why. Some subconscious thing. I just pick a stall and stick with it. The pictured one is the one closest to the door...then there is one in the middle, then there is a far one. In each of my schools, I gravitate towards the farthest one...I guess subconsciously so that people can not hear me use the restroom from the hallway. (Well this is a moot point because there is always the automatic "manner flush sound"...the little box that makes a flushing sound...did I already talk about this?...I thought it was ridiculous at first, but it turns out that I LOVE it).
Okay, yes, getting off track...I know this is a difficult blog to follow, but I'm trying to paint the whole picture. So the middle stall, pictured above, is never cracked open. I guess when I daintily pushed it to see if it was free, I thought it was occupied, because, as I know now, the middle stall is the only stall that opens out.
Anyways...(I wish you could have just been there to witness this all).... Yesterday...after using the bathroom SOOOO many times before, I go in, and that middle door is cracked....and I see a Western style toilet inside. I didn't comprehend that I had never actually seen inside the middle stall. So I grab my supervisor, and force her into the bathroom...exclaiming "WHY IS THAT THERE???" while pointing to the Western style toilet.
You see, I thought that it was new, and that they put it in just for me. I was trying to show my exasperation with them putting in a regular toilet just for me. But she looked soooo confused. I said "WHY IS THAT THERE????".... I kept repeating myself, waiting for her to say...oh they just put that in...or something. But she kept saying "I don't understand the question", "I don't understand the question".
When she said again "I don't understand the question" I repeated "why is that there?"... she must have thought that I was CRAZY (which I am)... and she finally said "Because this is a bathroom, so there is a toilet to use, in the bathroom." In an instant, it all came together, that the Western style toilet was there the whole time, but my mind filled in for what I never actually witnessed, and filled in a "squat toilet" where the regular toilet was. Crazy mind.
Today I checked my other school..and sure enough, there is a Western style toilet that I had never seen, and would have never known was there. And I'm sure tomorrow, I will find at my last school, a Western style toilet.
My supervisor had a good laugh with the entire office about me. She totally understood what happened...I'm just afraid that something got lost in translation when she told the Japanese speakers. She then kept telling me "Steffanie, you are CERTAINLY the MOST INTERESTING ALT that we have ever, and will ever have".
Lesson: Don't use the same stall every time you go into a public bathroom. You might be missing something better on the other side of the stall door. Dozens and dozens of squats, that I did not have to take....
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