American Plumber Sees a Japanese Toilet: "Everything in My Bathroom Feels Like a Mistake"

A plumber from Columbus, Ohio, walked into the bathroom of an eighty-four-year-old woman outside Tokyo... and the toilet lid rose to meet him before he said a word. Marcus Feld has set somewhere near nine thousand toilets. His first reaction to all the buttons was pure contempt. Electronics on a toilet, in the one room built to get wet, looked to him like a rich man's gadget and a service call waiting to happen. Then a Japanese plumber named Kenji held a paper cup under the seat and pressed one button, and Marcus heard himself say a hard thing. Everything in my bathroom feels like a mistake. This one is about a toilet seat that washes with warm water, a small flush of under a gallon, a public restroom with almost nothing to touch, a hand sink built into the top of the tank, and the thing the old woman said on the first morning that Marcus did not understand until the last day. Remember the roofer who found out an American roof is built to be redone every twenty years? Same lesson, a different room. A toilet any plumber can fix with a wrench and a cheap part has a real place, and Marcus lives in it. This is no funeral for American plumbing. It shows what a fixture becomes when it is built around the person instead of around the lowest price. New stories from the bench go up on a steady schedule. Pull the boots off and stay a while. I'm showing you what I've seen with my own eyes and my own hands. Buy what fits your work and your wallet. Nobody here is telling you what to do. Look at the thing itself and decide for yourself. #japanesetoilet #washlet #bidet #plumbing