This entire post is an excuse for this. You caught me.
The bowl itself was not a concern. The disposal of paper into the bowl was easy to get used to. That’s fine.
Filling your drinking water 25 cm away from the crapper? I didn’t like that conceptually. But it’s running water. I get how people can be used to that.
The problem was the lack of bidet.
CW: peepee poopoo
The first few times I had to evacuate my bowels there was a genuine experience of IRL body horror. I felt so dirty and kept washing my hands very long every time I went for it. I had to prepare myself psychologically to shit for 5 minutes and then go through the grueling process of cleaning myself with nothing but flimsy paper. Wetting the paper didn’t help and only made it more fragile. My relationship with the biological concept of excreting solids is forever changed and not for the better. I felt like I was shitting in the woods.
And none of the food has as much fiber as I’m used to.
The toilet situation is the single thing I will miss the least. Every bathroom I am willing to use here has a handy little handheld bidet. You power wash the shit off, obviously?
When I got back with a bag of laundry I didn’t know if/feel like it was sanitary to put that stuff in the washing machine. That’s how bad it is for me.