Misha Gitberg our trot from London, Budapest, Viena, Rome, Florence, Venice, Sophia, Istanbul, Doha-all so we can finally get to India! then Nepal, and then Thailand! and then Laos, USA and Canada.

Ode to Indian squat toilette

For those of you who have undying interest in toilette activities-I say: rest assured. Any experience of Indian culture is not complete without the experience of this age old routine, renewed daily.

Considering high density of population in India,toilets are sparse. Some of them can easily escape an untrained Western eye as they may be located on the railroad tracks, on the open rooftops under construction, or better yet, by the open gutter at the side of streets. (I am yet to see women use open gutters or area to the side of the road as toilets, Hindu men however can frequently be sited urinating on rocks, doors, walls, delicately turning their backs towards dense human  (and animal) traffic.

Indoor toilet is an art of ancient wisdom and precise engineering.

Its main components are:  a small ceramic platform with two shoe-shaped locations for both feet with a hole located at the mid-back. There may or may not be a flush box connected.

The technique:
(based on two months of personal experience as it was impossible to locate any description of this in traditional Indian annals)

1.  step with both feet onto the designated for the feet platforms

2.  roll up bottom of your pents (or raise your skirt) to knee level-this step is important to prevent your clothes from coming into intimate contact with usually wet and dirty floors.

3,  lower the top part of your pents (skirt) to knee level, while bending your knees and squatting in such a way that your rear is hanging directly above the designated hole
( at this point your pents/skirt is gathered around your knees)

The simple yet profound wisdom of such squatting position is threefold at the very least:

-it is great for strengthening leg,thighs muscles

-it eliminates straining as knees provide sufficient pressure on the abdomen

- it eliminates any desire for extra entertainment such as reading newspapers or novels, singing etc (mainly because all available energy goes towards keeping yourself from collapsing into the hole)

4. When evacuation is complete, or judged to be complete, search for a small water tap, usually located to the right of the toilette near the floor, and a small plastic water jug, usually a dirty plastic water jug (at times inventively substituted with old metal can; or can be absent)
With a gracious movement of your right hand,  open the tap, po uring enough water into the jug.

5.  While still maintaining good balance in the squatting position and preventing your cloths from dropping to the floor or into the hole, with your right hand bring the water jug to the  back of your ready to face cold water Rear. Our the water, while with your left hand (and this requires good coordination)
you try catching the trickling stream of water sent forth by your right hand, and clean..and clean some more (repeat as desired).  Now you may understand why it is considered extremely rude to stretch out left hand for greetings.

This process is considered (and it is) more hygienic then the use of toilet paper in the West, which is doomed by Indians to be simply disgusting.
One thing to watch here is the inadvertent raising of the upper lip, thus deepening of the naso-labial fold. Realizing that was the case with my face, and not wanting to permanently imprint such expression, I make a special effort to relax my upper lip (to what extent I have succeeded you can judge from the pictures of me throughout our travels in India)

6.  Step 5 solves one problem, but it creates another one:
now our left hand is in a somewhat compromised position.  You are in luck if you can locate a sliver of soup placed by some caring hand on the window sill or elsewhere in vicinity. If your karma does not allow you to rejoice with a piece of soap in your hands, it becomes your sole responsibility to either carry a bottle of hand sanitizer, or locate a place to wash nearby. If the former and latter are not possible, avoid using your left hand until the time its purity can be restored with soap and water.

7.  I advise you to either wait until the last drop of water rolls happily off your behind, or use toilette paper to dry so your underwear remains intact (this is vital during monsoon season when drying time can be extended to hours if not days..)

If  when reading this you are recoiling in shock or thinking that no amount of practice can help you, you are wrong!
In the last two months, to my total surprise, I have not only mastered the above technique, I have grown to prefer Indian-style toilette to its Western brother.(wherever the choice presents itself) Of course I am not any longer up to date on current news or bestselling novels, but it is a sacrifice I gladly make!

Additional note:  in the Himalayas, there is an added charm of some stunning views revealing themselves from toilette windows. Yet, it would be wrong of me to recommend toilets on the bases of their beautiful vistas.