Bog roll, toilet paper, bathroom tissue. Call it what you like; we all use it. Well, most of us …
In fact, it used to be the case in the ‘good old days’ in Egypt that, when you went to visit an interesting site which had been open to the public for years and years, you absolutely never went without a bog roll (oh, and probably some streptotriads, just in case you got struck down with what my father-in-law used to call ‘the screamers’ — I wonder what happened to them (the streptotriads, not the screamers)?). That didn’t mean to say that there would necessarily be any kind of bathroom facility, let alone even a hole in the ground. But, if there was one, you could be 99.99% certain there wouldn’t be any bog paper.
Nowadays, things are much improved in that respect. I think most sites are equipped to a greater or lesser extent, but you’d still be advised to carry a tissue or two, in my opinion.
One of the things that really gets to me in the western world, or at least in the UK (I’m now pondering whether I’ve come across this phenomenon in other countries and simply can’t remember …), is the lockable toilet roll holder. Well over half the public toilets I have used in this country have some kind of security device on the bog paper, presumably to stop one nicking the precious commodity.
- The charming CORT23, available from janitorialdirect.co.uk.
Hard to resist the temptation to steal that lovely-looking paper, but, oh no! it’s locked
I have to say, I cannot imagine wanting to take home the paper that numerous miscellaneous other people have handled, even if it was ever so slightly. Surely, anyone needing to steal paper from a public toilet is either totally desperate, in which case they’re welcome to it, or a kleptomaniac. If I’m wrong, dear reader, please let me know.
But why?
Why lock the blessed stuff up in this way?
It’s not as if it’s difficult to find something at least as good in the shops.
And, you see, there’s a much more annoying aspect to this in my view. Actually, a couple of more annoying aspects.
First of all, it’s often been my experience that I’ve found the lockable toilet paper dispenser both locked and empty, with at best a stack of loose paper on the top of the box, or a bog roll perched precariously on top of the roller. More often than not, however, there is a whole lot of paper on the floor in the form of loose sheets, or a roll which looks like the Andrex puppy has been busy.
Call me fussy, if you like, but I freely admit I don’t like to use paper that’s been knocking about on the floor of a public bog, even if it is dry (which it usually isn’t).
So, there’s a problem: you’ve gone to the loo, and there is paper available but it’s not really useable, and the toilet itself looks like …, well …, crap.
One can only assume that the cleaner responsible either couldn’t be arsed to unlock the damn thing, or else has lost the key to it. Either way, the paper has still effectively been lost, even though it hasn’t actually been stolen. And it’s really annoying. And pointless.
Secondly, I think it demonstrates a pretty sad lack of trust. These days people seem to buy far more in supermarkets than they can possibly consume in the time available before the stuff goes out of date, and the quantities of waste generated in most households are increasing. So, people have access to enough money to waste things and don’t need to steal bog paper, do they? Do they?
This is demonstrated rather neatly at my own place of work where the loo I use most often has one of the dreaded lockable dispensers. Nearby, carefully stacked on the window sill, is a pile of extra loo rolls, just in case. No one steals them, as far as I can tell. But maybe no one’s going to Egypt in the near future …
So, I ask myself frequently, what’s the point? BIIK
2 responses so far ↓
1 ShaunO // Aug 1, 2008 at 9:05 am
stolen by aspiring authors?
http://flickr.com/photos/olivander/349685340/
2 HelenS // Aug 6, 2008 at 9:57 pm
This is a very sensible suggestion and one which I had not thought of. (Probably indicative that I’m not as sensible as I thought I was…)
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