Toilet Paper



I knew this blog post was coming but i just couldn't bring myself to write it up. Could I really compare two lives through something so basic and necessary in the West as toilet paper. Well after just spending nearly $20 Australian dollars on 12 rolls of basic, not even super soft recylcled, toilet paper, I can no longer procrastinate.

It all started when we moved to Germany and fell Into the habit, just like any local, of buying our toilet paper in packs of 24, sometimes even 36 rolls. Nice, recycled, unbleached, reasonably soft white toilet paper. All for a few euro at a time. Like many Europeans, I shopped almost daily, the only thing other than mineral water that I purchased in bulk was toilet paper....well maybe chocolate, once in a while, after all it was dark, and fair trade, and very very yummy.

Now we are in India, and as some of my three readers may know, in India, if you have a toilet, you have a pressure hose right next to it. Whammo...no need to toilet paper...except for those sensitive western types who find themselves in situ, like us.

I first noticed the issue when Ada had a sore tummy and I went through three rolls in one night. A roll comes into our serviced apartment as a single item, wapped in plastic, with a thick (3mm) cylinder and lets say at a reaonable guess 24 sheets of semi rough, clearly unrecycled, whiter than white paper. Something was lost in translation 24 sheets in India and 240 sheeets in Europe and Australia.

I am sure that as time goes on other comarisons will be made ( not on chocolate as that one just makes me want to cry) but suffice to say today it is about the price one pays (rupee or otherwise) to wipe ones bottom.



PS ...am driving along as I tap away and have just seen my second accident for today. No lives left the planet as Ada would say....

Maybe the next entry will be about roads....

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