England, June 1, 1998
England Sure is English!
Low or High, the flow is dynamic in Cool Britannia
| In England, I had a few culture shocks. One of the
strongest was the traffic flow. Not only do the cars drive on the wrong
side, and scare me when I look the wrong way, but the Underground is
backwards too! I'm sure everyone can expect and appreciate that shock,
but it's the little stuff that got me.
In the bathroom, strangely enough, is where I had the strangest culture shocks. After doing my thing, which was quite odd since there was no reading material in the bathroom, I looked around for the toilet paper. Spying only a tissue box, I was a bit dismayed. This was England, a place where there definitely should be TP! That's when I realized that the tissue box was the TP. How odd, toilet paper in a box. Next, I went to bathe and was presented with the standard tub, only this one was missing the standard (or so I though), showerhead. Seems they really take baths in England, no showers, not even showerheads, just baths. I ran with it, but when I asked how they rinsed (I re-filled the tub with clean water and splashed around like a bird) they looked at me funny and asked, 'What do you mean, rinse?' How odd! Oh yeah, one last bathroom-related culture shock was the toilet flushing mechanism. In America and Russia, toilets flush with a roar; you kinda jump back to make sure you don't get sucked down too. Well there, I ran into 'low flow' toilets, which annoyed the hell out of me! You would flush and this spit of water would come out, not enough to do much of anything. Apparently, there is a way to make the toilet flush normally, but I think it must involve a secret button or a bucket of water. Nothing I did could make the damn things work normally! I guess I really wasn't shocked all that much by Britain. After Russia, it was a welcomed relief to the daily shocks this place gives ya. |
2 Comments
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Man,we must be in the same wagon! The low pressure when flushing makes me sick.That's why their toilets are always getting blocked.And remember,this is a country which has the type of weather which tends to dehydrate the body,and in so doing,favours constipation. It's people's appetite clicks 100 'degrees.'So they eat whatever they come accross[edible],in loads.You look at a plate of food [a hill,if not a mountain]infront of him in a restaurant,and you imagine the way this guy is gonna erode the whole stuff! Now from there,if he goes to those toilets,with that constip....,what happens? Just prayers!And it is amazing,these people have no time to flush after using the toilet! They tend to be so busy.[But too busy to flush? Horrible!] You find the whole load seated or lying there confortably! Then you imagine how poor immigrants'gonna pull her/his nose up fighting it to get the stuff lost! My!my!
For the shower,you have to be like Desire's people. Manually! Get a bucket,stand in the tub,fill it and bathe.If the house is for sharing,how are you gonna use their style when you do not know your neighbour's health problem? Such is the culture here. You have to keep on flushing until the 'thing' goes.That's the only trick. Otherwise,you have to play it cool!
I'm English and we have a shower head over the bath, and round toilet roll and everything! I rarely come across a bathroom here that's like you describe... Toilet paper in a box? Foreign to me too...