Thursday 25 November 2010

What’s with washrooms anyway?

I remember all those nice lounge-like public washrooms in the Philippines because it’s rare to find clean and nice smelling “comfort” rooms there. I tell you, what’s normal there is totally the opposite of that word “comfort”. We used to go to hotels to attend corporate events and it really feels comfortable using the washrooms there. When Lito and I were still working in the cities of Makati and Mandaluyong, we used to frequent the hotels in those areas and use the washrooms there. They are really neat, brightly-lit and with ample supplies of toilet paper, soap and paper towels. The mirrors are all over too. Lito’s favorite is Dusit Hotel Nikko and Intercon and mine is Shangri-la Edsa. The malls have decent but paid washrooms where you can have a private moment and comfortably sit in the bowl without pressure coming from the people lining up in each cubicle in the public ones. There are soaps, toilet paper, lotion and hand sanitizer to use after doing the deed. I liked the washrooms of Rustan’s, the paid washrooms of Shangri-la Mall, Ayala Malls both in Makati and Alabang Town Center. I remember my first experience with the automatic flush in the new Greenbelt malls (they set the trend) but I especially liked those bowl-like basins of Nuvo and Café Havana resto and bars in that area and in Eastwood too way back when the other posh malls like Podium, Powerplant and Bonifacio High street are still under construction. I can still remember the smell of these washrooms, it’s too nice I think the scent lingered with me for quite some time now.
Years passed and I was able to travel and experience using the public washrooms of other countries and airports even. When you think of your own, you will be ashamed. Ours doesn’t even have water or toilet paper to use. A friend of ours from the US who recently visited the Philippines took pictures of all the washrooms he had been to in Manila and in the provinces and I was not too thrilled to hear his stories. I wonder how the washrooms are there now.
I am now in Canada and the public washrooms here are better (but some doesn’t smell nice too). I just got from a lunch meeting in our favorite resto near our office and it was my first time to use the washroom at Moxie’s Grill @Attwell. I was so impressed that it prompted me to do this blog. It was so nice and comfortable you wouldn’t want to leave. It has a fireplace, TV, round lounge chairs with movable mirrors and spotlight you can use when retouching your make up. The lights and over-all interior tells you that you’re actually in a lounge and not in a washroom. I hope to be back there so I can take a picture and you will know how this washroom captured my heart.

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