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The Rise of the Japanese Toilet

nytimes.com

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Re: The Rise of the Japanese Toilet

#131

Post by [deleted] »

op00to wrote: post #120
layer8 wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That link talks about plastic items, but the wet wipes I’m familiar with are 100% plant-based and biodegradable, and dissolve in water. Edit, to clarify: The wipes in question have been certified according to the EDANA Flushability Guidelines, which have been adopted into law in some countries, and there is also a related Spanish standard UNE 149002:2019 (“Acceptance criteria for disposable products via toilet”). The…

At least in the US, the “plant-based”, “biodegradable”, sewer or septic safe wet wipes are anything but sewer and septic safe. They cause such problems that in my town with older sewers there are huge fines if you’re tracked down flushing them.

[deleted]

Re: The Rise of the Japanese Toilet

#132

Post by zdc1 »

gruez wrote: post #42
unhappy_meaning wrote: post #24

In almost all of SE Asia, especially Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, all of the toilets come with a hand-held sprayer. They also had this in the Doha airport and I'm not sure how common this style is outside of SE Asia but I'm guessing it's common. Japanese style bidets are very common in Korean households as well and I'm sure its easily a billion dollar business. It is nice but the functionality is quite difficult for…

>If its not aimed correctly, where does the splash go? If you're lucky it stays in the toilet boil. However if your aim is off, you can completely miss your anus and either shoot to much under or over which will shoot the water outside of the toilet bowl. so slowly squeeze the trigger to confirm the aim is correct, rather than going full blast at the start?

The triggers can be quite stiff. If you're unfamiliar it's easy to try to incrementally add pressure and still go from 0-100 with them.

Another option is to adjust the water connection valve at the start of the host so its not fully open, but by the time you notice the valve, you're probably already familiar enough to aim straight.

The water pressure can also be startlingly strong, but you also get used to that.

Re: The Rise of the Japanese Toilet

#133

Post by BearOso »

BLKNSLVR wrote: post #127
layer8 wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That link talks about plastic items, but the wet wipes I’m familiar with are 100% plant-based and biodegradable, and dissolve in water. Edit, to clarify: The wipes in question have been certified according to the EDANA Flushability Guidelines, which have been adopted into law in some countries, and there is also a related Spanish standard UNE 149002:2019 (“Acceptance criteria for disposable products via toilet”). The…

There was a news article on Australia a few years ago about these wet wipes that were advertised as biodegradable and dissolved in water, but they were either outright lies or they didn't degrade / dissolve in anywhere near the timeframe that made them suitable for flushing down the toilet - hence an increase in the fatberg problem. The news article was essentially a public service announcement to not flush those wet…

And I read a study a while back that researched this, and analyzed several fatberg deposits. They concluded that there was no trace of biodegradable wipes. And that follows purchasing patterns--99.9% of those bought aren't the biodegradable kind. People just don't care and continue to flush wipes, diapers, fats, cat litter, and who knows what else.

Re: The Rise of the Japanese Toilet

#134

Post by zdc1 »

raincom wrote: post #46
unhappy_meaning wrote: post #24

In almost all of SE Asia, especially Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, all of the toilets come with a hand-held sprayer. They also had this in the Doha airport and I'm not sure how common this style is outside of SE Asia but I'm guessing it's common. Japanese style bidets are very common in Korean households as well and I'm sure its easily a billion dollar business. It is nice but the functionality is quite difficult for…

Those hand sprayer versions are bad to use and unhygienic too, because fecal matter gets sprayed beyond the toilet bowl. I know why Arabic countries prefer hand sprayer versions: istinja practices of Islam.

They are also very, very cheap to install and replace (US$1 or less in low cost of living countries). So for some it's better-than-nothing.

Re: The Rise of the Japanese Toilet

#135

Post by LoganDark »

scotty79 wrote: post #34
unhappy_meaning wrote: post #24

In almost all of SE Asia, especially Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, all of the toilets come with a hand-held sprayer. They also had this in the Doha airport and I'm not sure how common this style is outside of SE Asia but I'm guessing it's common. Japanese style bidets are very common in Korean households as well and I'm sure its easily a billion dollar business. It is nice but the functionality is quite difficult for…

> you grab the handheld sprayer and turn it upside down and reach behind you Why not from the front? It makes way more sense. Easier to aim and your butt seals against the back edge of bowl hole so the water doesn't splash out.

Balls

Re: The Rise of the Japanese Toilet

#136

Post by 0x073 »

rayiner wrote: post #31
unhappy_meaning wrote: post #24

In almost all of SE Asia, especially Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, all of the toilets come with a hand-held sprayer. They also had this in the Doha airport and I'm not sure how common this style is outside of SE Asia but I'm guessing it's common. Japanese style bidets are very common in Korean households as well and I'm sure its easily a billion dollar business. It is nice but the functionality is quite difficult for…

What’s weird about it. I assume you do clean down there with soap periodically … right?

Dont use soap down there. Water is enough normally.

Re: The Rise of the Japanese Toilet

#137

Post by layer8 »

AStonesThrow wrote: post #129
otherayden wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fixed! You can now throw urls with or without the protocol (protocol is the "http(s)://" part of the URL) and it will work!

The protocol or scheme is the "http" or "https" keyword. The colon is a separator . The "//" introduces the "authority component" or host. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/URL#Syntax Whatever the user is "throwing at you" if it doesn't have these things in the front, it is not a "URL". It is not even a "protocol-relative URL".

You are technically correct, but for this use case it doesn’t matter, and everyone knows what is meant here. The parent also didn’t claim that a “url without the protocol” is itself a URL (nor, to be technically precise, a relative URI reference).

Re: The Rise of the Japanese Toilet

#138

Post by seanmcdirmid »

op00to wrote: post #122
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the spray nozzle sure. It would only work in particularly hot climates though, so maybe Arizona and Florida in the summer. There is a reason northern Asia goes without or with heated Japanese toilets instead (they also warm the water so you don’t hate yourself).

Bidet (no hand sprayer, just a toilet seat based jet) works fine in this US household. I don’t notice the cold in the winter. Maybe I have an exceptionally robust asshole, but our water gets very cold in the winter.

Do you have decent central heating? Japanese households didn’t (and still don’t, it’s not required by law even in Tokyo), so heated toilet seats and heated water is considered essential. There is a reason kotatsus never caught in the states I guess. You won’t encounter nozzles in southern China either because the winters are too cold and they have even less heating than northern China (which is why everyone is wearing winter jackets indoors).

Even in the US, I can’t imagine installing a nozzle here in Seattle, but we also don’t have central heat (just a heat pump with remote units in a couple of rooms).

Re: The Rise of the Japanese Toilet

#139

Post by mulmen »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #114
mulmen wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have lived in close to a dozen places built over the entire second half of the 20th century and into the 2010s and never had a bathroom with more than 6 feet between the toilet and an outlet.

My master bathroom in a 2016 build has a separate toilet room, and only one outlet that is definitely more than six feet away, it would also require drilling a hole somewhere.

Weird. That’s certainly not common in apartments.

Re: The Rise of the Japanese Toilet

#140

Post by layer8 »

otherayden wrote: post #117
layer8 wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By the way, it would be useful if https://unbloq.us/www.nytimes.com/2025/05/29/business/toto-t... worked as well, for manual use (just typing “unbloq.us/”).

Fixed! You can now throw urls with or without the protocol (protocol is the "http(s)://" part of the URL) and it will work!

Thanks!
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