Assalammualaikum!
About 1 year and 8 months ago, my housemates and I went to Warrington for the IKEA.
We have just moved into our "bungalow", and were in dire need of study tables and some other furnitures.
After much googling, we decided to be adventurous and head to IKEA in Warrington.
But that's not what I want to write about today.
I want to write about something I read on that day.
While on the train, there was an abandoned newspaper.
I flipped through the newspaper and read loads of petty, trivial news.
I can't remember what newspaper was it but I think it is the UK version of Harian Metro or Sinar Harian.
And there was this one article titled:
"More than 50% of the handphones are found to have traces of faeces"
(or somewhere along that line)
And I was like, yuck! Yuck yucky yuck!!
But I did not believe it.
I hate those articles in newspapers or the internet that begin with "Research says that......." .
Most of the time the sentences end with "Girls marrying older man are found to be happier" or "Yoghurt can increase life span up to 10 years" or "Coffee lovers perform better than tea lover".
I mean, who did these researches and how reliable are they?
Just because a bunch of Psychology students together with their tutor did a survey on 200 people within their community for the end-of-year project and found that people who eat yoghurt are generally older than 60y.o, that doesn't say yoghurt increases lifespan. Newspapers tend to "factualise" ANY research findings and gullible readers tend to absorb them like sponge.
But anyway, now I think the finding MIGHT actually be true.
That more than half of our handphones have traces of faeces on them.
You want to know why?
Be prepared...
It is simply because.....
There is no water hose/bidet in the toilet!
Imagine people only wiping instead of washing properly. You can't wipe your whole hands, or you'll start using half a roll of the toilet paper. I do not wish to explain further, although I can.
But my point is, while in Malaysia I have lots of water to use while in the toilet itself, to wash hands properly, that doesn't happen here. We can only wash our hands when we get to the sinks outside.
And for them who hold their handphones all the time, or worse (which I think is quite common), texting while in the toilet, they'll be holding their handphones with the unwashed hands!
How many people you see wash their handphones together with their hands?
Renung2kan! :p
Tu je la.
'til then
-Because life is a test-
-AkMaR-
http://nur-akmar.blogspot.com
I'm not going to defend unhygienic practices, but maybe shed light on why they happen.
ReplyDeleteMuch of Europe is very cold in winder, it makes 'wet toilets' in the home very unpleasant (v.v.cold) and might have frozen water on floors in deep winter.
People like to have 'lino' and some even have rugs/carpets in their bathrooms at home, making water use therein less likely than stone/tiles.
Westerners "clean" themselves by wiping with tissue on top of their hands (a bit like a glove) so minimising contact between dirty bottom and hand.
It's true tissue tears and is very porous so tissue use alone does have problems.
You can't beat the cleaning power of water.
A friend related to me a story. It went something like this: He was at a Mexican Christian ladies house. She spilt something on the table. She wiped it with a tissue. My friend said why not use water it will be cleaner. He make the analogy of going to the toilet. The Mexican lady was amazed and declared Shahadah after that. Allahhuakbar! Such a small thing brought someone to Islam.
We don't know the demographic of the supposed faeces survey, but I would guess westerners reading that would say it's Muslims who I have heard them say "wipe their 'bottoms' with their hands" (failing to mention water is used)