![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ANOTHER entry you’ve all been waiting for: my cute stinky apartment – the bathroom edition.
The Japanese bathroom system is as such: there is a room the size of a decent closet and it is completely tiled all the way around with enough space for two bathtubs. Only about ¼ of that space is actual bath tub, I have a traditional sitting tub which is about half the size of a U.S. tub, but it’s a lot higher. The other ¼ of that space is filled by the machine that heats the water. Everything is gas and it’s old, so there’s a complicated water system: I have to open the knob on the gas hose, switch the dial to open, hold down the dial, crank the flint (?), continue holding until the little blue flame gets big enough, turn it to shower, and then turn on the water. At that point, hot water runs from my faucet and I can control it with little numbers. There’s another dial that controls between shower handle and tub faucet…yeah…
I usually just shower in the tub because the plastic in the tub is treated to resist mold and the plastic boards that make up the floor outside the tub are ridged for traction and I see them as giant mold traps. I do have the traditional Japanese system, a small open space in front of the tub with a plastic bucket overturned so you can sit, and a plastic basin for pouring water over yourself. I have nothing against this system and if I ever go to an onsen or somewhere else where people will be watching me bathe (lol) then I’ll do it, but for now I kind of don’t like the idea of sitting bare-assed on a bucket.
Because I’m having house guests for the weekend (I wrote this on August 29th lol), I scrubbed the crap out of the bathroom, which is annoying because there’s so much tile. It took me 30-45 minutes on 3 separate occasions to finally get the whole thing done, but I’m sure in the future it’ll take a lot less time since I’m maintaining it, unlike The Pred. I’m glad it’s finally clean though. I assumed everything was going to be quite stained, but surprisingly enough after I scrubbed the turned it all back from grayish black to baby blue.
It’s kind of strange to me that this room has a shower door and opens right into the living room, but there is a curtain you can pull that blocks the view. The toilet is not in this room. The toilet, again in Japanese style, is in its own tiny closet-sized room (porto-potty size) off the entry way, not in the actual apartment. This kind of makes sense, toilets are gross and you might want a few more doors between you and your roommates when you’re attending to business, but since the room is so small and poorly ventilated, it does nothing for that sewage smell I mentioned before. Sometimes people use slippers going into the bathroom. In Thailand where the toilet was in the fully tiled shower room it made sense because it was always wet or skanky, but this room is relatively clean and if you keep it clean, well, I don’t see the need to use slippers in my own home. The toilet itself has the sink attached so that the water you don’t use on your hands goes into the toilet tank, which is very eco-friendly, but it also upsets me because the basin is shallow, you always get water everywhere, the water only comes out when you flush the toilet, and you can’t make the water hot. So in short, I use the kitchen sink for pretty much everything. There’s a little cleanser ball in that toilet sink that’s supposed to automatically clean the toilet when you run the water, but pretty much all its succeeded in doing is making the room smell like old lady flowers and sewage instead of just sewage (not an improvement) and on occasion it stain things blue because water inevitably splashes from the sink.
The toilet’s not all bad though, it comes with a “little flush” and “big flush option,” and the seat is heated, which will be nice in winter because there will not be heat in the genkan and it’ll be like doin’ your business outside.
Well, my toilet room is on the up-and-up anyway. Just last night I finished the linoleum project The Pred started (when I arrived it was half pink and white linoleum, half 1960s stained gold blob flowers). I also removed the big plush stained pink kitty carpet, the big plush stained pink kitty toilet seat cover, and the big plush (not stained!) kitty toilet paper roll cover (good god!). Maybe I’ll buy a small area rug, maybe not.
I really don't like the idea of putting *anything* in that room, including myself.
The Japanese bathroom system is as such: there is a room the size of a decent closet and it is completely tiled all the way around with enough space for two bathtubs. Only about ¼ of that space is actual bath tub, I have a traditional sitting tub which is about half the size of a U.S. tub, but it’s a lot higher. The other ¼ of that space is filled by the machine that heats the water. Everything is gas and it’s old, so there’s a complicated water system: I have to open the knob on the gas hose, switch the dial to open, hold down the dial, crank the flint (?), continue holding until the little blue flame gets big enough, turn it to shower, and then turn on the water. At that point, hot water runs from my faucet and I can control it with little numbers. There’s another dial that controls between shower handle and tub faucet…yeah…
I usually just shower in the tub because the plastic in the tub is treated to resist mold and the plastic boards that make up the floor outside the tub are ridged for traction and I see them as giant mold traps. I do have the traditional Japanese system, a small open space in front of the tub with a plastic bucket overturned so you can sit, and a plastic basin for pouring water over yourself. I have nothing against this system and if I ever go to an onsen or somewhere else where people will be watching me bathe (lol) then I’ll do it, but for now I kind of don’t like the idea of sitting bare-assed on a bucket.
Because I’m having house guests for the weekend (I wrote this on August 29th lol), I scrubbed the crap out of the bathroom, which is annoying because there’s so much tile. It took me 30-45 minutes on 3 separate occasions to finally get the whole thing done, but I’m sure in the future it’ll take a lot less time since I’m maintaining it, unlike The Pred. I’m glad it’s finally clean though. I assumed everything was going to be quite stained, but surprisingly enough after I scrubbed the turned it all back from grayish black to baby blue.
It’s kind of strange to me that this room has a shower door and opens right into the living room, but there is a curtain you can pull that blocks the view. The toilet is not in this room. The toilet, again in Japanese style, is in its own tiny closet-sized room (porto-potty size) off the entry way, not in the actual apartment. This kind of makes sense, toilets are gross and you might want a few more doors between you and your roommates when you’re attending to business, but since the room is so small and poorly ventilated, it does nothing for that sewage smell I mentioned before. Sometimes people use slippers going into the bathroom. In Thailand where the toilet was in the fully tiled shower room it made sense because it was always wet or skanky, but this room is relatively clean and if you keep it clean, well, I don’t see the need to use slippers in my own home. The toilet itself has the sink attached so that the water you don’t use on your hands goes into the toilet tank, which is very eco-friendly, but it also upsets me because the basin is shallow, you always get water everywhere, the water only comes out when you flush the toilet, and you can’t make the water hot. So in short, I use the kitchen sink for pretty much everything. There’s a little cleanser ball in that toilet sink that’s supposed to automatically clean the toilet when you run the water, but pretty much all its succeeded in doing is making the room smell like old lady flowers and sewage instead of just sewage (not an improvement) and on occasion it stain things blue because water inevitably splashes from the sink.
The toilet’s not all bad though, it comes with a “little flush” and “big flush option,” and the seat is heated, which will be nice in winter because there will not be heat in the genkan and it’ll be like doin’ your business outside.
Well, my toilet room is on the up-and-up anyway. Just last night I finished the linoleum project The Pred started (when I arrived it was half pink and white linoleum, half 1960s stained gold blob flowers). I also removed the big plush stained pink kitty carpet, the big plush stained pink kitty toilet seat cover, and the big plush (not stained!) kitty toilet paper roll cover (good god!). Maybe I’ll buy a small area rug, maybe not.
I really don't like the idea of putting *anything* in that room, including myself.
Tags: