Cloudy in Beijing Blogging about my time in China

Public urination

I may have stepped on to some baby urine today. Ugh...

Over the course of my time in Xi'an, I've learned that public urination is quite common here, especially among toddlers. From what I can tell, diapers are never used, and instead young children don open-crotched trousers. So every so often on a city street I'll see a small child, accompanied by their parent, peeing on the soil below a city-planted tree. It's more environmentally friendly if you think of it; diapers generate more trash, and water is excessively wasted when one flushes a toilet.

But it was a bit uncomfortable today when while on a bus, a small boy next to me had to go. He was maybe two years old, dressed in a white baseball cap, and he peed inside the bus, on one of the steps leading down to vehicle's second door. A puddle formed at the bottom as the boy's grandmother stood behind him watching. They then went back to their seat, the toddler falling asleep in his grandmother's arms. All of this while the bus was speeding along.

As I stood there, I looked around: none of the other passengers seemed to care. One person stood right above the puddle, like it didn't matter. I felt kind of queasy. Once I got off at my stop I made sure to try and step over the mess, but I may have touched it a bit. But yea, when you gotta go, you gotta go.