Thursday, January 21, 2010

Profit from Pee?

We are becoming nostalgic about our time in Belgium. Only 3 more months left on this wild, crazy ride. There are so many parts of European living I have been able to embrace.

---I have learned to bag my own groceries and haul them home - no problem.

---I have learned the crazy Belgian driving rules always giving priority to those on the right - strange, but ok, when in Rome and all that...

---I have even accepted that when dining out the service will be slow and unfriendly. It perplexes me that it has to be that way, but hey I am a glass half full kind of a gal.

BUT there is one thing I will never understand or accept about living in Europe. It will always get my panties in a wad. I despise the charge for public restrooms here. I never seem to have the right change and fumbling with it when we need a potty sends me over the edge. You may rationalize the money is to pay for cleaning the restrooms, but honestly the ones I pay for are often the dirtiest. Now that I travel with a potty-trained child it irks me even more because there have been a handful of times I pay to pee and it is a false alarm! Ugh.

The most enraging use of the toilet toll is when inside a restaurant or most especially a movie theatre. I mean, come on, we are already paying to be there so why levy the potty tax?

Most of the time the toilet fare is about $0.50-$0.75 but just check out this bathroom rate in Finland - $1.50!!! When I saw that my bladder shaped up and we decided it could wait.
I tell you. People must be getting rich off of our pee profit with $1.50 per head in a central potty location!

1 comment:

julie said...

The lady who collects the euros to pee in the bathroom at the Louvain-la-Neuve Mall drives a Mercedes!!!!!