One of the things everyone asks about when you get back from visiting Japan is “are the toilets really that awesome?”. The short answer is “Yes”. It is a rare event where you are forced to shit like some Western Barbarian into a normal porcelain toilet.
The good news is that the toilet gap is closing. With the ready availability here in the states of portable bidet sprayers for a paltry sum, there really isn’t a reason to leave skid marks in your grundies anymore. It still won’t compare to the luxury treatment your ass will receive in Japan, but it is better than the near-outhouse experience we all had growing up.
If you do visit Japan, though, don’t expect to sit down into Nirvana. Unless you are fluent in Japanese (and can read it), you are in for a bumpy road.
Let me show you the troubles I ran into during my recent trip to Japan.
The pic above is of the control panel for the crapper in my sister-in-law’s house. It is a mid-level control panel. I’ve seen both simpler ones and fancier ones. You can see that everything is written in Japanese (and Braille). There are a few symbols to try to help, but as I’ve learned from experience you can’t assume that the Japanese use the same icons as we would in the US.
Now I have figured out through trial and error that pushing the two buttons underlined above will result in your ass being washed with a stream of warm water (until you hit the stop button which is the square on the left). But what does it say?
Before I came to Japan, I was on Amazon and ran across a cheapo “AI Translator”. It was inexpensive enough that I took a flyer on it and brought it with me to Japan. It sort of works. There is a lot of giggling sometimes at how exactly it translates, but it is definitely better than nothing. (If you go to Japan or Korea, I highly recommend the Papago App, it works much better than this did).
One of the features it has, is that it will take a pic of something and try to translate any text it finds in it. That is perfect for this task! So I went and took a pic of the button that is over the blue line (the bare ass dropping). The result is shown below.
I’d agree. Definitely not a crazy gusher when you press the blue button. Next was checking out the button over the red line. The one that looks sort of like a prim lady sitting on the toilet. The result?
I’m going to be honest here, if this button results in a “biblical” strength stream of water, then these are some Christians who are very weak in their faith. Yes, it is slightly stronger than the other button, but it is definitely not strong enough to make you consider building an ark (or worse, feeling like the Red Sea was parted down below).
I’m sure that Straff, Sensei or other smarter Glibs who can read better than me can do a much better job translating than my Amazon machine. doG knows that I’m not going to figure it out on my own. I can barely read English, I have no chance learning three new writing systems.
In closing, I should point out that today’s Japanese/Korean toilets are especially impressive when you consider that not too long ago there were tons of squat toilets. I rarely see these anymore, so I think that the older generations who preferred than to the sit down toilets have died out. If you are wondering what a squat toilet is, here is one that was at a park near my SIL’s house about 15 years ago.
The extra observant will notice that this is the handicapped toilet stall. See that u-shaped railing at the back? This toilet has been replaced. If you went to this park now, all the stalls have normal toilets (with simple ass washing tech) and the handicapped stall has the normal bars and railings.
Hope this article sheds some light on Japanese shit.
What a shitty article!
Fun though, thanks
Maybe some people really do need a “biblical strength” ass-washing.
Well I told you once let me tell you again
I never ever wanted to be your best friend
All I really wanted to do is get to know you
All I really wanted to do is get to know you
In the biblical sense, girl.
In the biblical sense, girl.
STEVE SMITH KNOW YOU!
AND BY ‘KNOW’ MEAN….
Greg Ellifritz’s excellent book on third-world adventure travel (https://www.chooseadventurebook.com/) has a short segment about sci-fi crappers. The important part – before you start playing with the controls, find the emergency stop button.
Good advice. I wish I had known that before I pressed the button that turned out to be “Tampon Removal”
“Note – The ‘Emergency Stop’ feature attempts to end an uncontrolled excretion via the application of sterilizing foam. It will automatically call for emergency services to treat the foam exposure and the underlying medical issue.”
I’m not saying there should be a law, but damn it, there should be a cultural expectation of having at least some kind of instruction sheet for hotel showers and toilets. So many times struggling trying to figure out how to take a damned shower…
That’s a regular thing on our hockey trips. The first guy to take a shower at the hotel reports on the secret to getting it to produce hot water.
The first guy to take a shower
Shower? And you dare call yourselves hockey players?
Now I have a vision of Tesla branded asshole scrubbing robots.
It cleans so deep you are ready for a colonoscopy.
Given Tesla’s penchant for cameras, it probably does the colonosopy too.
Jimbo, as somebody who translates those miserable fucking characters almost daily let me help you out so you don’t need to purchase an AI device!
https://translate.google.com/?sl=ja&tl=en&op=translate
If you own this thing called a スマートフォン (smartphone) and not something like a ガラ携 (ガラけい – garakei a feature phone, traditional Japanese-style cell phone (in contrast to smart phones)) there is an amazing application called… Google Translate. You can take a picture of said panel and look it what it outputs:
Is it “big” or “small the toilet wants to know”?
Sensei,
We discovered that the Papago app (and website) did a much better job than Google. Especially since Google and Korea seem to always be in a pissing match.
My Japanese in-laws use it all the time to reverse translate English into Japanese when helping the kids do homework.
Unsurprisingly, I am not a very good resource for helping with this homework. I can do up to about 2nd grade work in English, then I become hopeless. They ask technical grammar questions and I say “I have no idea what a past participle is nor where you could find one.” All I know is “yeah, that sounds right”.
I see no button for “happy ending”.
Honorable Machine does not soil itself with such dirty acts.
I could see the Japanese calling it something like “Happy Anus Machine”.
Then why is the blue-underlined button offering you a bukakke?
You didn’t get one with the sink on the back?
Biblical strength is an appropriate description of the violating pressure of Japanese washlets. Out washlet at home doesn’t put out nearly the power.
And no music to hide your tinkle.
I hate shitting anywhere but home these days. Washlets are far superior but any public one in this country would be quickly destroyed by the barbarians.
Expel the barbarians. Revere the throne.
The problem with public toilets is if you can trust trust that the have the illegal cameras under control.
Pic is from a toilet in Busan, Korea. Korea does seem to have an issue with spycams
Try that imgur link again
Assert dominance by pooping directly on the camera.
Actually, maybe not. That might be playing right into their hands.
One other thing to note is that the Japanese bathrooms are always separated into different compartments.
When the in-laws visit us, they are appalled at the idea of having a toilet in the same room as the bathtub/shower. Or even the sink/mirror. All those things are in different rooms in Japan.
OK, then. 🙄🙄
Our first apartment in Okinawa was tiny, but the toilet had its own room, separate from the shower.
Now I have a huge bathroom and the toilet and shower are in the same room.
I wish the toilet was its own space.
As they are in our master suite.
master suite?
*collapses on fainting couch*
a.k.a., a water closet
The tank is called the water closet, not the room,
rookie
Citation needed.
I had a house in SF where the toilet was in its own room with no sink. Annoying AF.
Dude. After you flush, there is a sink full of clean water right there! Why complicate things by having a separate dedicated sink?
At the very least there must be a separate sink in the same space as the toilet. I do not want to interact with a door before I have finished washing my hands.
Just wait till you see compact travel trailers, where the toilet is IN the shower.
It’s all pipes. They go to the same place.
New stately R.J. Manor has a separate poop closet from the shower. It’s oddly confining to me, as I never had such a luxury before.
And in the public restrooms, the women cleaners just clean the men’s restrooms without closing them off.
Yes!
Especially in Korea. There is always an old woman scrubbing something. Just wandering around the men’s room. I always felt bad for the lady’s husband. After seeing the Cardinal of the College, I’m sure she went home and threw rocks at her husband for being so inadequate.
BWC is a thing in JAV.
well look who’s too good for a hole in the ground
We can’t all be Romanian.
latrine or cathole?
When the in-laws visit us, they are appalled at the idea of having a toilet in the same room as the bathtub/shower. Or even the sink/mirror. All those things are in different rooms in Japan.
Not a terrible concept.
When the in-laws visit us, they are appalled at the idea of having a toilet in the same room as the bathtub/shower. – well I basically agree with this one
“The extra observant will notice that this is the handicapped toilet stall.”
Pass.
Here you go TOK. This is a much more the norm.
I took it because a grand-nephew – who is still fairly new to the concept of toilet training – was entranced by the yellow bar and using it to swing from while attempting to piss at the same time. I used the photo to explain to his Mom (my niece) why he was not as clean as she might have expected.
BTW, the horseshoe prints were on all the piss mats. So don’t get grouchy thinking that they are some shade being thrown your way.
Try that again
I thought the button with the blue line was for ladies to wash their boobs. Good thing you clarified that.
Those translation apps are amazing.
My wife has one and when we went to the WWII museum in New Orleans, she held her phone in front of the placards and it showed her it in Japanese almost instantly.
It’s been about 10 years since I was in Japan, but back then western toilets did not exist.
They are far from perfect, but I can’t imagine studying the language without them. They save a ton of effort.
My experience is plenty of western style toilets in the cities and tourist areas.
Was this Okinawa? I’ve never been there.
Yes Okinawa, but that was 10 years ago, I’ll ask my wife, she’s over there now.
Your wife reads the placards? I’m so jelly. Mrs. Holiness (and the rest of her family) stroll on by without bothering to read anything.
For example, we were visiting the Himeji Castle and I stopped and read the info about the Okiku Well and the alleged ghost while Mrs. Holiness and her sister sped on by. I figured they already knew all about it.
When I caught up with them again, I commented on the ghost story and they were completely unaware of it. Then they both wished they had known about it. Too bad by that time we were far away.
Most of the time Mrs. Holiness and I agree to do museums by ourselves. Or just meet somewhere at a certain time.
She’s not as big of a nerd as I am, but I have influenced her some.
Also she said she really enjoyed talking to your wife at HH.
Ron:
My wife said nice things about both of you.
I got my official HH photo from Fourscore yesterday and sent him an email telling him how wonderful he was for starting something as special as the HH. Meeting Glibs from all over is always great.
Fetishism
“I am aware of an image that appears to depict a vile and deeply inappropriate symbol near an employee in my office. The content of that image does not reflect the values or standards of this office, my staff, or myself, and I condemn it in the strongest terms,” Rep. Dave Taylor said in a statement.
Politico first reported the existence of the flag, which was spotted pinned to a bulletin board behind one of Taylor’s staffers during a virtual meeting. A picture of the flag obtained by Politico shows the stripes in the American flag forming the Nazi symbol.
If you gaze upon it a portal to the netherworld will open.
Fucking fuck…is there anything left in the world that is trivial enough that someone won’t call the police over it?
Theft of goods under $950?
Are we sure nobody is Buddhist?
Ha! Beat me to it. That would be hilarious.
What makes the current crop of commies calling everyone and everything nazi is that the people doing it have no idea what they are talking about.
Like I said yesterday, “fascist” just means “someone I don’t like”. It has lost all meaning.
Feature, not a bug.
Politico first reported the existence of the flag,
Politico wouldn’t actually put it there to cast aspersions on a Republican, would they?
For Sale, Stripper Pole, Wife Disinterested
https://x.com/uncledoomer/status/1978657591468208553
He shouldn’t sell it. He should turn it into a time share deal.
Aspiring strippers could rent time slots and come over to train on it.
I like the way you think. He could list it on AirTnA.
Rentals? You would end up with too many dimes in the quarter slot.
Cleaning the snail slime off the pole between rentals is probably cost prohibitive.
Uninterested.
‘Disinterested’ means ‘having no prior obligations towards any party in a conflict; as in a judge or election official (yeah, right…)’
‘Uninterested’ means, ‘bored with’.
Ever since I learned the difference, I’ve gotten annoyed at seeing them misused.
I’m disinterested in subscribing to your newsletter “Popular Pedantics”
One man’s pedantics is another’s literacy…
“Barley used”
I’m not going to kink shame.
Are we sure nobody is Buddhist?
I watch a lot of old western movies. A couple of times, there have been indians bearing swastikas. In one particular instance, a warrior had a shield with a big swastika on it. I was mildly surprised it hadn’t been pixilated by the defenders of morality.
Germany has long been mocked in gaming circles due to their over the top restrictions on depictions of a certain enemy that is very popular in games set around the 1940s for reasons.
Because the people in power love them the Soviets?
And ill leave this here
https://x.com/Rainmaker1973/status/1951909283685073358
There are some things AI will never replace.
Things seem tough for Hunter
The Big Guy doesn’t have as much clout these days.
Today, on Absurdist Playhouse
Where is President George W. Bush, the man who once defined America’s moral leadership as vital to global freedom? Where are the others who could lend bipartisan weight to defending the Constitution they swore to uphold? Their silence is both disappointing and dangerous. It signals to Americans that the defense of democracy is optional, that moral courage is someone else’s responsibility.
As I said recently on The Weeknight, we could really use Bush’s voice right now. He has a voice that would resonate with a lot more Americans than even he may believe. Imagine how much more powerful this movement of Americans would be with his voice added to it. I know he may not agree with everything being said, but I have faith that he still believes in the principles of democracy. Even a single sentence from him would matter.
George W Bush, the guy who foisted the Patriot Act on us, is the resoundingly anti-authoritarian voice the nation so desperately needs. Where is that guy, anyway?
Wasn’t Bush “literally Hitler” when he was president?
I thought it was just “Hitler McChimpFace”
This. What happened was two fold.
1) you called a very moderate republican Hitler for 8 years, completely breaking the accusation
2) The base of the right has shifted pretty far away from neoconservatism, so bush doesn’t hold much sway. His comments in the intervening years haven’t helped.
So, MSNBC, you’re part of the reason that GWB is irrelevant. Congrats, you achieved your goal of making Bushhitler irrelevant. Now enjoy your consequences.
They are cool with them now. Remember rolling out Cheney and them fawning over the man they swear was Darth Vader?
LOL the truth hurts
Never change, MSNBC.
I wonder if it will be another boring nothingburger with a lot of boomers, or if it will turn “mostly peaceful” this time.
I hate doing interviews. Most candidates pad their resume which turns me off to what might be a good hire.
I can’t stand the new trend of asking candidates to do coding tests. It has always seemed like a complete waste of time. Maybe for a true entry level job? Still seems like you could get more use out of your time by just chatting.
My go to question is: Tell me something that was totally screwed up at your last job and what you would do to make sure we never get into the same situation here.
Everyone should have a decent war story about a previous job. They should also have learned enough to know why they got into that situation and how to prevent it ever again.
Red Flags:
1) CompSci degree (they overthink shit. Don’t seem to understand the concept of deadlines)
2) Agile evangelist. Just no.
3) evangelist. Just because Java can run anywhere doesn’t mean you should use it everywhere. All languages have different pros/cons. Use the one that fits the job.
4) emacs users
Red Flags –
lists programming languages but doesn’t mention what they worked on.
Is a developer.
A “Skills-based resume” where they list stuff they can do but doesn’t associate it with employment where they actually put these purported skills to use.
higher level degrees. Too much time in academia, not enough time dealing with real work.
Is a developer.
Actually wants to work for us. We suck. Our work sucks. What circle of hell did you summon to your prior employers that makes you want to work here?
4) emacs users
Guilty as charged.
😱
But vi is so much simpler and easier to use.
(I spent 13-14 years supporting Solaris servers where vi was the only option. I got accustomed to it)
I can’t stand the new trend of asking candidates to do coding tests.
It’s not new.
I remember doing them 20 years ago.
C-c m-X do-my-job-for-me
Seriously, I went emacs for three reasons. One, it seemed more full featured. Two, it’s an editor-first editor (no having to turn on insert mode to start changing the file). Three, org-mode got me through engineering school.
1) CompSci degree
Calling me out, huh? What did I ever do to you beside give your wife mead?
Major: CompSci/Physics; Minor: Mathematics. I have proven to be quite useless over the years, I fear.
Meh — I typically like a pseudo-code level problem so I can see a candidate think through it, what sort of data structures they might use and then use it as a jumping board for stuff like memory management or synchronization depending on the role.
And not *all* of us CS grads lack the concept of deadlines, Jimbo! 😉 But then again — I got out of college 25 years ago now… (grad school anyway), so maybe things have changed. Those getting out without going for PhDs at the time were more real world focused.
And vi all the way. I already run one OS, I don’t need to have emacs as a second one.
And not *all* of us CS grads lack the concept of deadlines, Jimbo! 😉 But then again — I got out of college 25 years ago now… (grad school anyway), so maybe things have changed. Those getting out without going for PhDs at the time were more real world focused.
I’m also one that understands the concept of deadlines.
I’ll note that there has been a drop in the number of CMPSCI grads that understand deadlines over the last ten years or so.
All I know is I hope I never have to go on another job interview again.
“Full featured”? How many “Features” do you actually use?
My first boss out of college was (still is) the greatest user of vi that I’ve ever known. He taught me so much about using vi that I became a True Believer.
My last couple of jobs, I’d always impress the young heads with how I could write code without taking my fingers off the keyboard! They all grew up with fancy IDE’s that did so much shit for them that they never had to learn either vi or emacs. I’m secretly impressed by them learning all the secret IDE methods of block selecting text, but I’d never tell them that.
I’m only slightly kidding about emacs users.
The CompSci well has been poisoned by some of the ones I worked with. There may be a few of them out there that are worth hiring.
The main problem is that I seem to always get stuck supporting the code that these so-called geniuses wrote. At 3 am, I’m troubleshooting code to see why something broke and find instances where the CompSci dev wrote an “elegant” solution. They made it elegant by shrinking some process from 15 easy to read/understand lines into a single line. Fuck that noise.
And as I said, they missed a deadline writing that elegant one line of code.
To be fair, the other reason they bug me is because they know the fancy CompSci terms for all the coding stuff. I am mostly self taught and it annoys me when I get corrected that the ? is the unary operator.
DEG:
I got my first job in ’95 with them promising to teach me how to code their way. After that, I joined a startup and didn’t have to do any coding test for that. That company was bought/sold several times after that so I never really had to interview.
It was only in 2017 or so I started going on “real” interviews and all of a sudden there were coding tests. So tedious. Especially the one that was done on a white board. All of us giggled at how bad my handwriting was.
Like I said, I’d much rather chat with the candidate about there actual experience than see if they can write stupid code.
Coding test: Design a database schema that would operate as a CRM for a dog grooming studio and write a SQL statement that would pull the best customer records for sending 15% discount codes.
Real coding: The product is broken, here’s the log. Good luck navigating the 40 layers of custom functions all interacting with one another to build this feature. At least they seem to be named somewhat usefully.
I would only do pseudo code in interviews. It doesn’t have to be bug free just show the though process.
*but aren’t really
Trashy:
My last job was a company that had always brought in contractors to build stuff. I was part of the first real internal dev team. The database was a classic example of consultantware.
When a new contractor came in to build something they’d look at the db and decide “Fuck figuring that shit out, I’ll just build a new set of tables and use that.”
I spent several years slowly consolidating the data models and updating api’s. No fun at all. Especially since it was almost impossible to figure out what was using the various tables. Most of the times, I just dropped a table and waited for complaints.
When I first got hired at the state, my supervisor did comment afterwards that I was the only interviewee who’d been honest on the resume.
I see no point in claiming to have done something I didn’t. It’ll be apparent PDQ
You’re not looking for a slightly shopworn Windows sysadmin, are you? I promise, my resume is like six lines long…
If not windows sysadmin, perhaps a UNIX sysadmin? I know more useless package management and service control methodologies than you need.
There is a team that does Windows for AD. Most of our work is in Linux (RHEL, UBI, …).
I’m curious about the button that apparently sends a small hurricane to Godzilla and the other button that sends bigger one to what appears to be a mech.
City Programmers accidentally shared interface from Sim City with City Toilet!
Hope this article sheds some light on Japanese shit.
I see what you did there.
#ows604 🔎 5/5 (00:48)
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
🔥 streak: 1
onewordsearch.com
#stack219 5/5
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟
⏱️ 1m 57s
🔥 streak: 1
puzzlist.com/stackdown
I’ll shared today’s simply because I had a really, really good day. Most of mine are frankly complete crap:
#stack219 5/5
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟
⏱️ 1m 3s
🔥 streak: 1
puzzlist.com/stackdown
#ows604 🔎 5/5 (00:58)
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
🔥 streak: 36
🥈 #owssilverteam
onewordsearch.com
😀
I can’t get under a minute on ethe onewordsearch. I blame my old eyes and reflexes lol.
#ows604 🔎 4/5 (01:25)
⭐⭐⭐⭐
🔥 streak: 24
🏆 #owselite
onewordsearch.com
Money dump
Scott has committed to giving away the majority of her $41.2 billion estimated fortune from her involvement with the founding of Amazon. Since 2019, when her divorce from Amazon founder Jeff Bezos was finalized, she has distributed more than $19 billion to over 2,000 nonprofits, with about $110 million directed specifically to DEI causes in the past year alone. Her model is characterized by trust-based philanthropy: large, unrestricted gifts made with minimal bureaucracy. Her website states, “Communities have always led their own preservation. We’re simply supporting those who already know what needs protecting.”
In a period marked by uncertainty and debate about the value of DEI, Scott’s $40 million gift is a high-profile affirmation and a significant boost for the battle to preserve Black heritage for future generations.
If you pound enough money down the rathole, some of it must do some good.
As opposed to the majority of it, which is doing evil.
I sense a Glib business case needs to be developed….
Here she is distributing the $40 million.
I cannot believe our new, vibrant, Somali neighbors here in Minnesoda haven’t gotten their hooks into her yet.
They’ve worked their asses off to scam the state gov out of a mere $1B in myriad scams. Here is a gal with $20B and she’s giving it away?
It’s nice to see a private citizen pissing away money that just a year ago would have been our tax money. That should warm your heart.
Although she’s not really pissing it away, she’s buying temporary popularity with the in crowd.
And the instant it is gone they wont bother unzipping if she catches fire.
Jimbo’s missing music link
https://youtu.be/_rNIotFrsas