Travelling the world is a priceless and eye-opening experience that everyone should do. It's mainly fun experiencing new cultures and learning new ways of doing things, however visiting the bathroom can be a confusing and awkward experience.
Here are 5 of the most common bathrooms you'll see abroad, and how to handle them
Squatting toilet
Fresh off the plane, one of the most confusing parts of any traveller's day is when he (or she) walks into the toilet cubicle and sees something like this:
Courtesy of jiahungli
That's exactly what it looks like. My advice, pretend you're skiing.
Wet rooms and no shower head holders
Many places you'll visit will not have shower curtains (and have whole rooms dedicated to their showers), and do not use shower head holders - meaning that you need to hold the shower head for the entirety of your wash.
This works out perfectly for me as I normally hold the shower head the whole time to pretend it's a microphone.
It appears that this is also a problem in space
Japanese bath
Perhaps the most terrifying thing to happen to you while taking a relaxing bath is to have an angry Japanese man walk in and frantically try to get you out.
What I didn't realise my first time washing in Japan was that the Japanese see the bath as a place to relax - and only to relax - you should wash yourself off and have a shower before entering the water. And you should definitely not wash your hair in the bath (sorry!)
Indian shower
One I saw a lot during my travels in India was the bucket shower. This one is pretty obvious - fill the big bucket, and use the smaller one to wash yourself. The only thing to watch out for is etiquitte - the culture in many parts of India is fiercly conservative and they do not appreciate public nudity. Locals will always use bathing clothes (and will expect you to too).
Turkish Bath
A turkish bath is not so much a bath as it is a big sweaty man scrubbing you down with sandpaper before throwing you around a sauna. The hammam is definitely an experience to have the next time you're in Turkey, but be warned that things can get a little rough.
This post is to raise awareness of world toilet day on the 19th of November - support the billions of people without access to adequate sanitation with #Blog4Sanitation.