I’ve never tried one, in the UK these do exist but are quite uncommon with paper being the “normal” method of cleaning down there, which still doesn’t seem to be a great method when you think about it.
1. How are these considered hygienic in a shared setting, does it not all kinda spray dirty juice everywhere?
2. Do you still use paper towels to dry afterwards, or do you walk around with a wet bum.
3. Are there any other methods around the world that are different to these two? Japanese toilet seems like a superior bidet that can dry and self clean etc.
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A bidet does not spray dirty water everywhere. The water rinses down into the toilet where the rest of the excrement is. If you happen to accidentally splash some water out then this water is most likely clean.
You can use a paper towel to dry yourself afterwards. It still saves on paper because you are already clean and just need a bit to wipe off the water. However you can also use a cloth towel as your bum is clean after using the bidet. Same as using a cloth towel to dry your bum after having showered is fine.
1. You use public water fountains for drinking, right? It works similarly. A jet of water goes from the tip of the device. No body part touches the device. The water that is sprayed generally just drips strait down from your bum into the toilet. It doesn’t “spray dirty juice” everywhere. If anything, it might spray some small water droplets that bounce off your ass to the inside of the bowl, but since the bowl is full of shit anyway, it’s really no more unsanitary or offensive than that.
2. You take a few sheets of toilet tissue and pat your bum dry when you are done. The toilet tissue will be so clean that you could blow your nose in it (but I wouldn’t recommend it). Alternatively, some of the higher end bidets have a small blower that will blow dry your ass with air.
3. I don’t know the answer to this question.
I’ve been using a BioBidet washlet toilet seat for 5 years now. It’s wonderful and I’d never go back.
The water from a bidet is the same water used to flush the toilet, which is the same water you clean your clothes and dishes with and the same water you drink.
Yes, you use toilet paper to dry/check cleanliness.
If you can think of a better way to clean your bum that’s not literally washing it with water, patent it and make tons of cash.
Yeah I always thought bidets were a little wacky – spray my ass with a hose? no thanks. Shit water running down my leg? no thanks. I’ll use white paper and wipe until it’s clean. Or if i’m eating right, i’ll just stick with no-wipe dumpers.
There are different types of bidets. The one that I have is self-cleaning. It sprays water in a way that it washes its own nozzle. While the nozzle hangs slightly into the bowl to direct at your butt while you’re sitting, the water comes from the water line, not the water that’s already in the bowl. All this to say, it’s always cleaning with clean water.
I use ordinary toilet paper to dry afterwards. Some people have dedicated towels. You could use paper towels and throw them away if you wanted to, I guess.
I’ve never used a japanese toilet, I have seen them, but I would consider one of their features to be a bidet. I’ve seen an argument online that “bidet” refers to one type of water-based butt cleaning tool from 18th century France or something, but to me, the semantics of a bidet are just some device for cleaning your butt with water after using the toilet. Just like an oven is still an oven when it uses electric heating elements and not woodfire.
In Thailand, and likely other countries across the region, it is popular to have what is commonly referred to as the “bum gun”. It is typically just a splitter on the water valve for the toilet that is essentially a hose with a spray handle. You spray your bum with it, like a bidet, and then dry yourself. It has the added feature of making it easy to get rid of any streaks left in the bowl, and generally easier to clean the bathroom.
>How are these considered hygienic in a shared setting, does it not all kinda spray dirty juice everywhere?
So there are various types of bidet. Most have a water jet that sprays you with clean water, which then falls into the pan of the bidet and drains away. There are various different types with the spray nozzle in different places, but ultimately they all work pretty much the same and the only things that touch you are the jet of (clean) water and the rim of the bidet (which you straddle).
Old-school bidets might not have a spray jet, but are instead simply basins of water that you fill up and then straddle to wash yourself. In this case the bidet should be rinsed between uses, but ultimately your basin of “clean” water previously held someone else’s used water and TBH I find that pretty gross.
>Do you still use paper towels to dry afterwards, or do you walk around with a wet bum.
Yes, you dry yourself. Normally this is with toilet paper, but it does tend to disintegrate when it gets wet (as it’s designed to – so that it can be flushed). In a home setting, you’d maybe just use a small towel – as someone else pointed out, at the point of drying your body is clean: it’s like drying off after a shower.
>Are there any other methods around the world that are different to these two? Japanese toilet seems like a superior bidet that can dry and self clean etc.
Japanese toilets are just combination toilets and bidets with some extra features like blowing warm air to dry you. There are other types as well.
In some countries you won’t ever see a standalone bidet but instead you’ll find a “bidet shower” (it has various names) will be present in virtually all toilets, including those in officers, public toilets. etc. This is a small showerhead on a flexible pipe that is mounted close to the toilet: you remain sat on the toilet and holding the showerhead in your hand you use it to shower your bum until it’s clean. Used properly, all the dirty water should fall back into the toilet bowel and the showerhead should remain clean.
In countries where bidets are common but not ubiquitous then you’ll often see people take a bottle of water into the toilet with them. Used with or without a plastic nozzle that screws onto the lid, these are used as an impromptu bidet shower. I once lived in a student hall of residence in France (where bidets are standard) where the communal toilets did not have bidets – every time I went to the toilet I was perplexed by the number of water bottles people had left behind and wondered why they were taking a drink into the stalls with them, but of course they were being used as bidets.
When wondering why using bidets think of this, if you suddenly got shit in your arm, would you just pick up a piece of paper, scrape it a couple times and call it clean? Or would you wash it with water?
Also the dirty water just goes to the sink of the bidet, meaning that the dirty water will just go down the drain.
Depends on the type of Bidet. In Thailand it’s a gun. It’s next to the toilet and you shoot up at an angle between your legs through your crouch some distance away. You move the gun up and down to get clean.
>How are these considered hygienic in a shared setting, does it not all kinda spray dirty juice everywhere?
No, because it falls into the bowl.
>Do you still use paper towels to dry afterwards
Yes
>Are there any other methods around the world that are different to these two?
I only know the gun type and the built in toilet seat type. The Japanese type have a heater with temperature that you can adjust.
Once you have got used to using one you will NEVER want to go back to using TP – it’s just skanky (moist tissues I can just about see). As someone pointed out, it can kind of limit you because it’s yet another reason I can’t face using a dump in a public toilet
Actually, I don’t have a bidet, I just use the bath/shower creatively, but it’s the same thing. Scouring the old rusty sheriff’s badge with a nasty bit of paper that makes you sore and never gets it all off (certainly not the smell) – never again.
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