our incredible toilet

Well, here goes, our house is pretty interesting since so many things are different than houses in the united states. It just took a little while to get used to it all, and now it all seems to work out really well for us. The first really interesting thing is the toilet. its a normal enough looking toilet, but its in a really small room which is next to the main bathroom. its just a little bit bigger than an airplane bathroom, because that is all the space that is needed for it. but when you get in there you can't find the sink to wash your hands. then you notice a little sink on top of the toilet bowl. I couldn't figure out how to turn the sink on at first, but then I flushed the toilet. Water starts coming out of the little faucet immediately. The water from the faucet actually is filling the reservoir at the same time as you're washing your hands with it. and the water keeps going until it is full, so more than enough time to wash your hands. but everyone is usually confused about how to turn it off, because it keeps going for quite a while. its just kind of neat how it uses water that is clean but will clean the bowl on the next flush. We've seen some other cool toilets also, I had a really snazzy one in my hotel with i first got here. It actually has a seat warmer, two different flush settings, and a built in beday. This is different from the public toilets, which are sometimes just holes in the tile of the floor. Well, then it probably doesn't make sense what is in the other room, the other room has a larger sink and counter area for toothbrushes and stuff. it also has a bathtub which we haven't used except to wash off addy. We haven't used it because the standard way to take a shower in japan is right on the bathroom floor. there is a normal handheld showerhead that could be used over by the tub, but under the showerhead is a large drain, so you just take a shower in the middle of the room. it was the same at my hotel. And one other trick is the hot water. our hot water comes from a kerosene powered tankless water heater. so anytime we want hot water we have to flip on the switch and we get hot water about 5 seconds later. When i was in the hotel for the first two weeks i didn't know about this feature, so the first day I took a freezing cold shower. which i am sure helped to build character. anyways, more later, we were supposed to go scuba diving with whalesharks today, but that cancelled due to bad weather. so instead we are going up to our friends the Austins because it is Katie Austin's Birthday. Due to the absolutely insane driving restrictions we will probably stay the night. the legal limit for driving here is .03, which in most cases is less than one beer. so we really don't mess with drinking and driving here. luckily everyone understands, and we have alot of things to do and places to go within a short walking distance of our house. ohh, and audrey was the third woman to finish the Camp Schwab Aquathon last weekend. it was an event were you run 1.5 miles then swim a half mile then run 1.5 miles again. She did awesome.
L8R