Tuesday, July 20, 2010

One of the Forgotten Kyotan Tale-n

By popular demand I am forced to recount "The Tale of the Boy who did NOT Read the Map to the Toilet."

While bidding Rui farewell as she boarded the Night Bus to Tokyo, I climbed up on some lockers to wave a final goodbye. Unfortunately these lockers were very dirty and my hands were black as a chimney sweep's so I decided to search for a bathroom to clean my disturbingly dirty hands. I led Shao Min and Ava through the underground mall next to the bus station and finally found a bathroom. After washing up, I realized I also had to use the bathroom but there were at least 5 things that could have been a urinal in the single person bathroom. I looked around to see if there was some sort of sign that said TOILET but no luck. There were just 5 porcelain basins, slightly above waist height and all adorned with fancy looking do-hickeys. It was then that I wondered if I hadn't actually washed my hands in the urinal because, honestly, the thing I had arbitrarily decided was the sink didn't actually have anything that distinguished it from the other wannabe toilets. After a bit of pondering my need to urinate overcame my need to reason so I just picked one and hoped for the best. After I finished I pressed a prominent red button and suddenly there was a quiet, rapid beeping. Outside I heard Ava and Shao Min laughing. Ava exlaimed, "Map of Bathroom?! Who would need that?" Shao Min followed up saying, "Take a picture of that!"

The "URP URP URP URP" of the alarm was making me panic so I hit it again to shut it off. Bad choice because the beeping became 50 times louder. It was then that I saw there was a label for the button called, "SOS." I threw open the door, flushed in the face and with a look of pure terror on my face. "RUN!!!!!" I screamed over the sound of the nuclear reactor alarm blaring from the basin I had just urinated into. I found out that both Ava and Shao Min would be excellent in case of Zombie attack because they didn't hesitate or question my command, but ran off with impressive speed. Once out of the hallway a man gawked as a white kid bolted past him followed closely by two other foreign girls while that damn alarm continued to blare. We drew more stares as we sprinted to the other end of the mall clutching our sides which were sore from a mixture of sudden aerobic activity and uncontrollable laughter.

MORAL: The next time a bathroom comes with a map, read the instructions before using the toilet!

1 comment:

  1. this adventure in kyotan toilet made my day!! haha
    it makes me wanna go inside men's bathroom just to see what its really like =P the ones in tokyo isnt as complicated i suspect...

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