Jeff Vrabel: How could the World Toilet Association have escaped our notice?
If I were to tell you right now that a guy in South Korea built a giant toilet-shaped house to commemorate the inaugural meeting of the World Toilet Association, would you be more stunned that 1. People are at this very moment living in a giant Toilet House in South Korea, or that 2. There is a World Toilet Association, and you didn't know about it?
Really, in this age of YouTube and digital video and cameraphones and widgets (I'm not sure what this last one has to do with anything, other than I like saying the word "widgets"), and given that ours is not a culture that traditionally prizes the highbrow, and given that most people reading this went to the eighth grade, how is it possible that a World Toilet Association has escaped our notice until now? You'd think this would be all over the Web, a standard punchline for running jokes for high schoolers across the land. It'd kind of be the great equalizer, really -- imagine a world where all our kids, young or old, black or white, rich or poor, could all rely on the single, hard fact that though times are hard and adolescence can be hell, everyone can rely on a good World Toilet Association joke to pull them out of the doldrums.
This brings up further questions as well, such as: Where does a World Toilet Organization meeting take place? Who is invited into this group? Do they have a mascot? Business cards? Tax-exempt status? Is there hazing, or some sort of requirement to enter? If so, are there people walking around who have been turned down membership in the World Toilet Association, and if so, is it fair to say their life has gone down the crapper? Because that kind of just seems mean. (Incidentally, if I can back up for a second, I think we're all pulling for them not to have a mascot.)
Luckily, there are a few answers to be found. The WTO -- not the one that always results in protests and rock-throwing -- has the full support of the South Korean government, and states among its goals the enacting of a "toilet revolution," by getting people to keep their bathroom doors open for the sake of improving hygiene. How this is accomplished I'm not entirely sure, but I'm all for it, for the simple reason that if there is a massive worldwide toilet revolution, you do not wanna be the guy left behind to clean up the old ones.
(For more on this, you could check out www.worldtoilet.org, a Web page to which Google offers a Photo Gallery. And I have to tell you, I may not be the sharpest saw in the shed, but it's going to be a long cold day in hell before I click on Photo Gallery.)
Anyway, I'm making a lot of jokes here, mostly because I'm drinking beer, but it turns out that the WTO is a multinational group dedicated to aiding the 2.6 billion people in the world who are without any form of "improved sanitation." That's billion there, with a "b." You know how you go to like a gas station bathroom, and you get sort of weirded out because it's gross in there? Yeah. Multiply that by 2.6 billion, that's what's going on there.
As such, the WTO this year dedicated Nov. 19 as World Toilet Day, so yeah, you just missed it, but on the plus side you should be able to get really good clearance deals on cards and costumes right now. The purpose of this day is to "increase awareness of a toilet user's right to a better toilet environment, and to demand for it from toilet owners." Jeez, when you put it that way, it's sort of impossible to argue against, really. Unless you HATE AMERICA. You've also just missed the World Toilet Summit, which featured self-cleaning toilets, a bathroom made of cookies and candy, and what I can only imagine is the most bizarre assortment of raffle prizes you'll ever see in your life. (It is perfectly acceptable, I'd guess, at the World Toilet Summit to greet fellow festgoers with a polite frat-boy nod, so as to avoid shaking hands.)
Which brings me back to the Toilet House (actually, it doesn't, but I've never been good at transitions). The house's owner, Sim Jae-duck, is a South Korean politician who's made it his life's work to advocate the improved-toilet thing, so he built a house to raise awareness about the lack of quality plumbing in many parts of the world, which it did, because it is a giant toilet-shaped house, and you could get people interested, however briefly, in annual trends in farm subsidy disbursement if you put them on a toilet-shaped house. So check out www.worldtoilet.org for more information. It might not change your life, but it will briefly make you flush with excitement.
Jeff Vrabel is a freelance writer who's disappointed in himself for how long he went for that last lame joke. He can be reached at www.jeffvrabel.com.