WEBVTT - Bidets: Now More Than Ever 0:00:01.120 --> 0:00:03.400 Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of My 0:00:03.600 --> 0:00:12.600 Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. 0:00:12.680 --> 0:00:16.159 I'm Josh. There's Chuck. We've lost Jerry sometime ago, but 0:00:16.880 --> 0:00:21.160 this remains as always Stuff you should Know because Jerry's 0:00:21.200 --> 0:00:24.959 here in spirit. I can tell you that Jerry's a lie. Okay, 0:00:25.400 --> 0:00:28.800 that's very very ominous. It totally did know that you 0:00:28.880 --> 0:00:32.120 mentioned it. We lost Jerry. She's here in spirit. Jerry's 0:00:32.240 --> 0:00:36.000 may not, she may not have ever existed. Who knows. 0:00:37.159 --> 0:00:40.320 It's all one big weird dream, right, Yeah, did you 0:00:40.360 --> 0:00:43.120 see what I titled this episode? By the way, no, 0:00:43.240 --> 0:00:46.720 I haven't looked yet. Bidats colon now more than ever. 0:00:47.960 --> 0:00:51.639 That's great, good job, man, because that is true, like 0:00:52.120 --> 0:00:54.760 having a Biddat right now can really keep you out 0:00:54.760 --> 0:00:57.320 of the rat race to find toilet paper dude the first, 0:00:57.360 --> 0:00:58.680 because you know, I used to have one of the 0:00:58.680 --> 0:01:01.400 toilet attachments and it got lost in the in the 0:01:01.480 --> 0:01:04.399 renovation and move and I kind of forgot about it. 0:01:04.480 --> 0:01:06.880 And the very first thing I did when I heard 0:01:06.920 --> 0:01:10.200 about this toilet paper surge was get online and buy 0:01:10.200 --> 0:01:13.440 another one of those things. Yeah, yeah, we had had 0:01:13.600 --> 0:01:18.360 just happened to get one um for other bathroom right 0:01:18.400 --> 0:01:20.640 before all this happened, So we're all set on the 0:01:20.680 --> 0:01:28.200 rear situation with the water application clean bottoms. Yeah, I'm so. 0:01:29.080 --> 0:01:32.600 I was raised the toilet paper guy, of course, and 0:01:32.640 --> 0:01:35.840 I know how you feel about that. Every once in 0:01:35.880 --> 0:01:38.920 a while though, I'll remember in our toilet paper episode you, 0:01:39.240 --> 0:01:41.840 I'm just gonna come out and say it wiping using 0:01:41.880 --> 0:01:44.720 paper to wipe your bottom with and that's it is 0:01:44.800 --> 0:01:49.000 just gross, gross gross, And like, like, seriously, I hear 0:01:49.040 --> 0:01:53.360 that in my head a lot. It's hilarious. But um, 0:01:53.400 --> 0:01:58.240 to me, that's that to me is like, okay, this 0:01:58.240 --> 0:02:00.800 this makes sense, feels normal, and I've gotten used to 0:02:00.920 --> 0:02:04.440 a bidday, but even still like I'm using a little 0:02:04.440 --> 0:02:07.240 bit of toilet paper there too. Also, we should probably 0:02:07.280 --> 0:02:11.000 say this episode is chuck full of t M I 0:02:11.280 --> 0:02:15.200 so just buckle in for that. But yes, I if 0:02:15.240 --> 0:02:16.840 I use a bid day, I still use a little 0:02:16.840 --> 0:02:19.880 bit of toilet paper. Um. And the thing that I 0:02:19.880 --> 0:02:21.840 think got me out of all of this chuck. I 0:02:21.919 --> 0:02:24.560 just want to stay up front is the science is 0:02:24.560 --> 0:02:28.800 still out on which one actually is more beneficial for 0:02:28.919 --> 0:02:33.200 you health wise. There are people saying toilet paper is yeah, 0:02:33.240 --> 0:02:35.520 I've seen it, and I think this is what I suspect, 0:02:35.639 --> 0:02:40.680 because there's such a dearth of studies on this, and 0:02:40.760 --> 0:02:42.959 some of the studies that have been done are showing 0:02:43.000 --> 0:02:46.840 mixed results. That it basically depends on how your doctor 0:02:46.960 --> 0:02:50.600 or whoever you're asking um feels about toilet paper or 0:02:50.639 --> 0:02:53.880 bid days. That's that that that's what they're going to recommend, 0:02:54.080 --> 0:02:58.840 doctor or whoever likes the bus driver. Min doctor drives 0:02:58.840 --> 0:03:01.880 a bus too. Yes, but these are hard times, alright. 0:03:01.919 --> 0:03:04.880 So we're talking about bidets, which is if you don't 0:03:04.880 --> 0:03:08.520 know what this is, uh, you have been living under 0:03:08.560 --> 0:03:11.440 a rock. But for a lot of Americans, and we'll 0:03:11.480 --> 0:03:13.680 get to why Americans haven't been hip to them a 0:03:13.680 --> 0:03:16.440 bit later, but some Americans still might not be hip 0:03:16.520 --> 0:03:19.280 to these. A bidet is a little and they can 0:03:19.320 --> 0:03:22.680 be different things. But the kind of classic modern bidet 0:03:23.360 --> 0:03:28.040 looks like another little toilet installed beside your toilet or 0:03:28.280 --> 0:03:31.440 near your toilet. Not quite right though. There's something you 0:03:31.480 --> 0:03:33.560 can't put your finger on. It ain't quite right about 0:03:33.560 --> 0:03:35.960 that toilet. Yeah, Like if you walked into a room 0:03:36.000 --> 0:03:38.240 and you never see it seen one before, you wouldn't 0:03:38.240 --> 0:03:42.920 be like, well, there's one for pooping and one for peeing. Yeah, 0:03:42.920 --> 0:03:45.040 I think that definitely does cross your mind either that 0:03:45.360 --> 0:03:48.760 where else you go? Oh gool. But there are different 0:03:48.800 --> 0:03:51.760 ways that you can have these modern bidets. Some of 0:03:51.840 --> 0:03:54.920 them have little water streams that scored up, some of 0:03:54.920 --> 0:03:58.280 them have a little like a shower handle. Um. But 0:03:58.360 --> 0:04:00.640 the long and short of it is it's another appliance 0:04:00.640 --> 0:04:04.600 in your bathroom with water and a little basin that 0:04:04.680 --> 0:04:09.280 you straddle after you do your business and uh and 0:04:09.400 --> 0:04:12.320 clean yourself up with water instead of dry toilet paper. 0:04:12.880 --> 0:04:16.719 That's the classic bidet, right, Yes, the classic bidet, not 0:04:16.839 --> 0:04:20.320 the biday of olden days? No, no, Um, should we 0:04:20.320 --> 0:04:22.760 talk about the other types or go back to the 0:04:22.760 --> 0:04:24.920 olden days? Now, let's go back to the olden days 0:04:24.920 --> 0:04:27.320 and we'll catch up again. All right, that's a little 0:04:27.320 --> 0:04:29.760 tease everybody. We're gonna talk about other types of the 0:04:29.880 --> 0:04:32.800 days eventually. Yeah. And I didn't see exactly. I saw 0:04:32.839 --> 0:04:37.039 anywhere from lateteen sixteen hundreds to early seventeen hundreds, but 0:04:37.160 --> 0:04:42.240 definitely European and the first bid days. Uh. The word 0:04:42.240 --> 0:04:47.080 means pony or cob, which is a kind of a short, little, 0:04:47.120 --> 0:04:50.479 short legged, strong horse. Yeah. And at the time the 0:04:50.520 --> 0:04:53.120 frends were crazy about those kinds of horses. Yeah, and 0:04:53.160 --> 0:04:55.720 apparently that has something to do with how you're supposed 0:04:55.720 --> 0:04:58.680 to use it. I still don't fully follow that. So, 0:04:59.000 --> 0:05:01.560 like these original days, it looked like a little kind 0:05:01.560 --> 0:05:04.159 of mini bathtub, but it also had something like a 0:05:04.240 --> 0:05:07.320 saddle shape and you squatted over it like you would, 0:05:08.160 --> 0:05:10.960 almost like you were riding like a little cob horse. 0:05:11.360 --> 0:05:12.800 All right, Well that makes a little bit of sense, 0:05:12.800 --> 0:05:15.679 I guess. And it also had like four legs coming 0:05:15.680 --> 0:05:18.120 out of the body. Did you know, if you think 0:05:18.160 --> 0:05:20.040 about it, kind of makes sense that it looks like 0:05:20.080 --> 0:05:23.320 a little tiny horse without the top half or a 0:05:23.320 --> 0:05:25.560 head or a neck, or ears or a main or 0:05:25.680 --> 0:05:29.360 tail or hoofs. But other than that all that, it's 0:05:29.400 --> 0:05:31.680 the spitting image of a cob horse. Yeah, I think 0:05:31.680 --> 0:05:34.120 it looked They looked a little more like Ottomans with 0:05:34.160 --> 0:05:38.200 a little chamber pot in the center. Yes, but Ottomans 0:05:38.240 --> 0:05:40.719 came from the Turks, and the French probably hated the 0:05:40.720 --> 0:05:44.880 Turks at the time because that was geopolitics, so they 0:05:44.880 --> 0:05:48.000 would never made that comparison, even though it was like 0:05:48.040 --> 0:05:52.040 this great elephant in the room's right, but these things 0:05:52.040 --> 0:05:56.200 were in the bedroom in France in the early seventeen hundreds, 0:05:56.240 --> 0:05:59.520 next to the chamber pot and the very idea of 0:06:00.480 --> 0:06:04.200 uh of pooping and peeing in your bedroom, it was 0:06:04.240 --> 0:06:06.599 pretty new, like the outhouse was like that, you still 0:06:06.640 --> 0:06:09.760 had an outhouse, but from what I saw, chamber pots 0:06:09.760 --> 0:06:12.760 and bid days were for nighttime business. Like when so 0:06:12.800 --> 0:06:16.320 you don't have to leave your bedroom, right? Yeah, I 0:06:16.360 --> 0:06:18.680 mean it's really kind of sweet if you think about 0:06:18.680 --> 0:06:22.080 It's like poop and pee in you your bedroom, especially 0:06:22.120 --> 0:06:25.159 on a cold night. But eventually people were like, well, 0:06:25.200 --> 0:06:28.159 there's a lot of collar around, there's a lot of typhoid. 0:06:28.640 --> 0:06:32.039 We should probably move these two a separate room. And 0:06:32.080 --> 0:06:36.520 eventually they did, and they called those bathrooms, yeah, or 0:06:36.640 --> 0:06:42.240 restrooms or toilets or w c's or poop station bills 0:06:42.360 --> 0:06:45.800 or lose. Oh I've got one for you. I wanted 0:06:45.839 --> 0:06:48.040 to say this in the last episode we recorded, the 0:06:48.080 --> 0:06:51.920 wastewater episode. All right, let's hear it. So you know, 0:06:51.960 --> 0:06:55.360 the word lou means bathroom or toilet in the UK 0:06:55.560 --> 0:06:59.920 at least, if not more. And they think so when 0:07:00.040 --> 0:07:02.640 we were in Edinburgh doing those shows, remember you took 0:07:02.640 --> 0:07:04.840 a nap and I got all bored, so I went 0:07:04.920 --> 0:07:07.840 and walked around the city by myself. Well, I went 0:07:07.880 --> 0:07:14.640 to old time Edinburgh like old time. I must have 0:07:14.680 --> 0:07:16.920 been napping when you went, because I don't know why 0:07:17.000 --> 0:07:18.640 you wouldn't have just gone with me when I tried 0:07:18.680 --> 0:07:22.200 to wake you up. But regardless, on this tour, maybe 0:07:22.200 --> 0:07:25.640 you'll remember this. The the the tour guide said that 0:07:26.120 --> 0:07:30.040 they think the word lou came from the Scotch people, 0:07:30.080 --> 0:07:34.440 the Scottish people saying guardiloo when they threw their waste 0:07:34.440 --> 0:07:38.400 water out into the streets, like they would shout guardilou. 0:07:39.120 --> 0:07:43.200 And they think that guardi lou came from guard de lee, 0:07:44.960 --> 0:07:49.840 which means watch the water in French. And so they 0:07:49.880 --> 0:07:52.280 think that um, guardi lou came from wash the water, 0:07:52.320 --> 0:07:54.480 and then lou came from guardi loo. And then that's 0:07:54.480 --> 0:07:57.040 where we got that term for the toilet in the UK. 0:07:57.440 --> 0:07:59.760 I love that. That's that's one for your next dinner party. 0:08:00.840 --> 0:08:03.680 Oh oh, I cannot tell you how many dinner parties 0:08:03.720 --> 0:08:07.800 I busted that out at so b days. Uh back 0:08:07.800 --> 0:08:11.440 to the Biday. They are or were more of a 0:08:11.520 --> 0:08:14.120 high society thing, like you know you were using an 0:08:14.120 --> 0:08:18.280 outhouse if you weren't, I don't know necessarily aristocracy, but 0:08:18.360 --> 0:08:20.840 you had to be like middle and upper class to 0:08:20.920 --> 0:08:23.960 have a bidat in your bedroom or in your house. Uh, 0:08:24.000 --> 0:08:26.880 and probably a chamberpot even for that matter. Well, for 0:08:26.920 --> 0:08:29.440 a couple of reasons too. I think one, you typically 0:08:29.440 --> 0:08:31.640 had servants who were going to take it away for you. 0:08:32.120 --> 0:08:35.480 This number one, you got to change the number number two, right, 0:08:35.559 --> 0:08:37.959 and the number two. You know, if if this bidat 0:08:38.000 --> 0:08:40.760 is basically just a wash basin with water, they didn't 0:08:40.800 --> 0:08:42.760 have running water at the time, which meant you had 0:08:42.760 --> 0:08:45.240 to haul water, so you probably had a servant hauling 0:08:45.240 --> 0:08:48.040 water for you as well. So yeah, you were probably 0:08:48.880 --> 0:08:51.520 this thing that's that that was like a luxury to 0:08:51.559 --> 0:08:53.160 the rest of the world, was just nothing to you 0:08:53.240 --> 0:08:55.600 because you didn't have to do anything. You just used it. 0:08:55.760 --> 0:08:58.559 You didn't have to do any prepper takeaway or anything 0:08:58.600 --> 0:09:01.160 like that. That's right. And they don't know for sure 0:09:01.200 --> 0:09:05.800 who invented it, but this dude, Christophe de Rosier UH 0:09:06.120 --> 0:09:09.000 made one for the French royal family in seventeen. A 0:09:09.040 --> 0:09:11.640 lot of people point to him as being the inventor 0:09:11.679 --> 0:09:15.440 of the bidet. Uh didn't take long, you know, within 0:09:15.440 --> 0:09:18.360 the next thirty or forty years or so, they started 0:09:18.400 --> 0:09:21.120 having things like things like little hand pumps, so you 0:09:21.120 --> 0:09:24.160 could kind of have a little rudimentary spraying device to 0:09:24.200 --> 0:09:28.680 help herself out. That's nice. It is nice. It is 0:09:28.720 --> 0:09:31.160 I mean because prior to this, it was just again 0:09:31.200 --> 0:09:33.480 a wash basin that you would straddle and just kind 0:09:33.480 --> 0:09:36.440 of flip it up onto your underside, your fanny as 0:09:36.480 --> 0:09:40.240 it were, your hand, right with your hand, and eventually 0:09:40.280 --> 0:09:42.640 that that water comes back down and mixes with the 0:09:42.640 --> 0:09:45.920 water you're flipping up and you reach some critical point 0:09:46.320 --> 0:09:50.120 tipping point is Malcolm Gladbo would put it, and now 0:09:50.160 --> 0:09:53.280 you're just flipping poop water up onto your nether regions 0:09:53.320 --> 0:09:56.280 and it's no longer helpful. So the idea that you 0:09:56.280 --> 0:09:58.520 could just sit there and and spray a pump a 0:09:58.559 --> 0:10:00.840 stream of water on there and have to just flick 0:10:00.880 --> 0:10:03.600 the stuff out of the basin onto you. UM, that's 0:10:03.600 --> 0:10:06.480 an enormous advancement. And they came along pretty early. I 0:10:06.520 --> 0:10:10.040 think the seventeen fifties, right, Yeah, that's about when the 0:10:10.080 --> 0:10:14.360 little spray spray thing came along. That's beautiful. And chuck 0:10:14.400 --> 0:10:17.000 one other thing too. I think about the same time 0:10:17.040 --> 0:10:21.160 that that pump handle came along. They also UM installed 0:10:21.200 --> 0:10:23.440 like a refillable tank, so you fill the water with 0:10:23.559 --> 0:10:26.400 tank and the everything that was in the basin was 0:10:26.440 --> 0:10:30.360 all just wastewater, So you were good to go by 0:10:30.400 --> 0:10:33.720 seventeen fifty as far as bidats were concerned, Yes, everything 0:10:33.800 --> 0:10:39.000 was totally clean and totally safe by seventeen fifty. Nothing 0:10:39.040 --> 0:10:43.080 could possibly go wrong. So these were big. Obviously in 0:10:43.120 --> 0:10:46.440 Europe they spread. Italy and Portugal were really big on 0:10:46.480 --> 0:10:49.480 the bidets still are. I saw Italy may have been 0:10:49.520 --> 0:10:52.040 the actual inventors of them, and that the French possibly 0:10:52.080 --> 0:10:55.760 just popularized it. I could see that. Yeah, French and 0:10:55.840 --> 0:10:59.920 they steal everything they did. But at the same time 0:11:00.000 --> 0:11:02.160 they were also they were a superpower at the time, 0:11:02.679 --> 0:11:06.080 and they were also basically global taste makers. So once 0:11:06.120 --> 0:11:08.800 they became into it, got into bidets, the rest of 0:11:08.800 --> 0:11:10.920 the world followed suit pretty quickly, or most of the 0:11:10.960 --> 0:11:13.240 rest of the world. Not if you were England or America, 0:11:13.320 --> 0:11:19.439 you probably went no, thank you frenchman. Yeah, Uh, South America, UM, Argentina, Venezuela. 0:11:19.480 --> 0:11:22.120 They're pretty popular. Uh, in the Middle East, and of 0:11:22.160 --> 0:11:27.160 course Asia and Japan very much leads the way in 0:11:27.679 --> 0:11:31.880 not only bidet use but bidet technology these days. Yeah, 0:11:31.920 --> 0:11:34.439 It's a classic example of what I've talked about before. 0:11:34.480 --> 0:11:37.000 The Japanese say, oh, I really like this invention. We 0:11:37.000 --> 0:11:39.360 can improve it by a hundred and thirty pc. So 0:11:39.440 --> 0:11:41.839 let's do that, And that's exactly what they did. That's 0:11:41.880 --> 0:11:46.440 a good Japanese accent. Thanks. I added a little vocal 0:11:46.480 --> 0:11:49.040 fry there at the end to make it particularly confusing. 0:11:50.440 --> 0:11:53.559 So maybe let's take a quick break, go cleaner uh 0:11:53.760 --> 0:11:57.200 bombits as my daughter says, and we will talk about 0:11:57.840 --> 0:12:01.679 what's the deal with America and why we hate cleaning 0:12:01.679 --> 0:12:28.080 our butt holes the right way? Right after this, to 0:12:28.160 --> 0:12:30.520 check you, we're talking about butth holes, I believe before 0:12:30.640 --> 0:12:34.240 the break, let's pick up. Let's pick up where you 0:12:34.320 --> 0:12:37.240 left off. Yeah, what's up, America? Why don't you clean 0:12:37.240 --> 0:12:39.719 your butt hole the right way? I thought this was 0:12:39.760 --> 0:12:42.960 pretty interesting. There's a guy who I guess is a 0:12:43.000 --> 0:12:47.400 bidet expert um who was speaking with the New York Times, 0:12:47.400 --> 0:12:50.520 and we happened to overhear it. He had some theories 0:12:50.800 --> 0:12:54.600 about why America didn't like bidets, and one you kind 0:12:54.640 --> 0:12:58.559 of touched on before, which was that England hated France 0:12:58.760 --> 0:13:01.400 at the time. They were I have a world superpowers, 0:13:01.960 --> 0:13:06.200 much akin to America and the United States during the 0:13:06.200 --> 0:13:10.080 Cold War. I mean in the USS are America, USSR 0:13:10.559 --> 0:13:15.520 Draco versus Rocky during the Cold War? Right, Um, so 0:13:15.720 --> 0:13:18.719 the English hated everything associated with the French and they 0:13:18.720 --> 0:13:22.600 would just have never gone from bidays. But that seems 0:13:22.600 --> 0:13:26.640 to have carried over into the colonies like America, which 0:13:26.760 --> 0:13:29.880 is a pretty good theory for why Americans have never 0:13:30.080 --> 0:13:32.760 adopted bidays. Yeah, and those were you know, in the 0:13:32.760 --> 0:13:36.480 early days of non adoption. Uh, World War two happened 0:13:37.200 --> 0:13:41.160 and and this is uh, this sounded kind of like 0:13:41.400 --> 0:13:43.160 I wasn't sure I believed this at first, but then 0:13:43.200 --> 0:13:45.520 I saw it in a different way in a bunch 0:13:45.520 --> 0:13:48.520 of different places, So I do believe it. Yeah. But 0:13:48.640 --> 0:13:52.880 apparently American soldiers would go to brothels in Europe and 0:13:52.920 --> 0:13:55.760 in Japan, and depending on what theater of war you 0:13:55.800 --> 0:14:00.640 were stationed at, and you would see these bays and 0:14:00.720 --> 0:14:02.680 you would associate it and there were a few different 0:14:02.679 --> 0:14:05.160 things going on. You might associate it with sex work. 0:14:05.520 --> 0:14:10.480 I think you gross um. At the time, the there 0:14:10.480 --> 0:14:12.880 were people that thought using a bid day after sex 0:14:13.360 --> 0:14:17.680 uh could be a contraceptive practice. Not true at all. Well, yeah, 0:14:17.679 --> 0:14:22.960 they thought that douching was a reliable contraceptive practice, and 0:14:23.080 --> 0:14:25.240 it wasn't until like the twenties or thirties where it 0:14:25.320 --> 0:14:29.360 was proven basically indisputable that no, it basically does absolutely nothing. 0:14:30.000 --> 0:14:31.840 But the idea that you would use the bid day 0:14:31.880 --> 0:14:36.720 to do that, um, kind of further associated it with 0:14:36.760 --> 0:14:39.600 sex work as well. Yeah. And then the other thing, 0:14:39.640 --> 0:14:43.600 which is incredibly sexist, uh and maybe throw in just 0:14:43.640 --> 0:14:48.320 a dash of misogyny, is that uh, women on their period. 0:14:48.800 --> 0:14:52.680 It was it hasn't been that long that women have 0:14:52.800 --> 0:14:56.560 been able to get products to deal with that and 0:14:56.600 --> 0:14:59.320 to talk about it as if it were just a 0:14:59.360 --> 0:15:01.240 normal thing that happens to the human body. It was 0:15:01.320 --> 0:15:04.160 very much under the table. Um, I think we should 0:15:04.200 --> 0:15:06.200 do something, man, if we if we dare go down 0:15:06.200 --> 0:15:11.200 that road on Springtime Flower Blossom episode, well, I was 0:15:11.240 --> 0:15:15.520 thinking maybe a shorty just on um like tampons and 0:15:15.560 --> 0:15:18.280 maxi pads and the development of of those things, because 0:15:18.480 --> 0:15:21.520 it took way too long, uh for the for the 0:15:21.560 --> 0:15:24.840 awful awful reason that manufacturers just didn't want anything to 0:15:24.880 --> 0:15:28.280 do with that. Right, Yeah, for sure, Um, I'm down, 0:15:29.040 --> 0:15:31.320 all right, Well let's do it. But menstruation had a 0:15:31.320 --> 0:15:34.640 lot to do with uh BI days not being used 0:15:34.640 --> 0:15:37.640 in America because no one wanted to talk about menstruation 0:15:37.920 --> 0:15:40.360 for a long long time. So you've got g i's 0:15:40.440 --> 0:15:44.400 returning from uh overseas where they visited brothels and aren't 0:15:44.400 --> 0:15:48.160 particularly looking forward to introducing their wives to bidays because 0:15:48.160 --> 0:15:51.200 they associated them with sex work. They're also really useful 0:15:51.280 --> 0:15:54.880 for menstruation, which wasn't talked about at the time. Um, 0:15:54.920 --> 0:15:59.400 and then they remind everybody the King of France, who 0:15:59.480 --> 0:16:03.240 everybody hated. And you put those three things together, that 0:16:03.280 --> 0:16:06.360 makes it really difficult to market in America. And so 0:16:06.400 --> 0:16:09.760 they think that one or all of those reasons are 0:16:09.840 --> 0:16:13.880 why Americans never really got into bid day's not until 0:16:13.920 --> 0:16:18.560 the Japanese said, hey, everybody, UM, check this out. But 0:16:19.080 --> 0:16:23.840 we'll get to that, not quite yet. Yeah. Another reason, 0:16:23.880 --> 0:16:26.080 and this was mentioned as a chicken or the egg thing, 0:16:26.800 --> 0:16:30.360 I personally think because the idea is that American bathrooms 0:16:30.400 --> 0:16:33.720 aren't big enough for this extra thing in there. But 0:16:33.760 --> 0:16:35.600 I think had we adopted it to begin with, we 0:16:35.600 --> 0:16:37.880 would have made our bathrooms a little bigger to fit 0:16:37.920 --> 0:16:42.320 these things personally totally, because I mean, our bathrooms are 0:16:42.560 --> 0:16:44.720 enormous now and they could totally fit a bid at. 0:16:44.840 --> 0:16:47.920 But if you if you look at most bathrooms, they're 0:16:47.960 --> 0:16:51.080 like a master bath in the suburban house. Like the 0:16:51.080 --> 0:16:53.600 bathrooms big, but the toilet is still small the little 0:16:53.640 --> 0:16:57.320 toilet area. So yeah, I think we totally would have 0:16:57.320 --> 0:16:59.680 expanded our bathrooms to allow it. I think we just 0:16:59.720 --> 0:17:02.240 didn't need to have bigger bathrooms because we didn't have it. 0:17:02.320 --> 0:17:08.119 So I say, disdaining for biddat lead to smaller bathrooms 0:17:08.200 --> 0:17:12.000 rather than vice versa. Where do you fall? Yeah? I agree. Um, 0:17:12.080 --> 0:17:14.200 I'm kind of mad because this this was my chance 0:17:14.240 --> 0:17:16.920 when we renovated our house to put a real deal 0:17:16.960 --> 0:17:19.840 biday in there, and you want one. Yeah, I didn't 0:17:19.840 --> 0:17:22.479 even think about it. Um, But like you know, like 0:17:22.520 --> 0:17:24.919 you said, our our toilet is wedged in a little 0:17:25.520 --> 0:17:28.959 zone like all toilets. We could have made our shower 0:17:29.119 --> 0:17:33.760 smaller and stuck a Bidday next to it. I guess uh. 0:17:34.400 --> 0:17:36.840 I can see you like dropping your highlighter while you 0:17:36.840 --> 0:17:43.720 were researching this article, like when it struck you like um. Interestingly, though, 0:17:43.960 --> 0:17:47.760 the um kind of one of the bigger bidet models 0:17:47.800 --> 0:17:51.439 that was popularized around the world, was invented by an 0:17:51.440 --> 0:17:56.040 American named Arnold Cohen. In the nineteen sixties. Yes, dude, 0:17:56.119 --> 0:17:59.880 So I had no idea about this, but the bid 0:18:00.080 --> 0:18:04.120 day seat that you use, that I use that basically 0:18:04.200 --> 0:18:06.159 all Americans are starting to be like, hey, this is 0:18:06.200 --> 0:18:09.560 kind of awesome that everybody in Japan uses, that a 0:18:09.600 --> 0:18:14.159 lot of people around the world used today was invented 0:18:14.640 --> 0:18:19.440 by a guy named Arnold Cohen in the nineteen sixties 0:18:19.760 --> 0:18:23.800 in the United States. Yeah. I also saw him referred 0:18:23.840 --> 0:18:26.280 to as the bid At King. Yeah, man, and God 0:18:26.280 --> 0:18:29.240 bless this guy. He tried his best. Uh. He created 0:18:29.280 --> 0:18:32.199 this thing for his dad who was older and not 0:18:32.280 --> 0:18:34.719 doing too well. And we'll talk about medical benefits here 0:18:34.720 --> 0:18:38.160 in a minute, but um, if you have a rash 0:18:38.200 --> 0:18:40.560 back there, if you have a hemorrhoid or an anal 0:18:40.600 --> 0:18:44.440 fissure or something like that. Um, there is some research, 0:18:44.720 --> 0:18:46.879 like you said, not enough, but some research that shows 0:18:46.920 --> 0:18:49.439 that a biday can really be helpful if you have 0:18:49.520 --> 0:18:52.199 one of those conditions. And his dad did so. He 0:18:52.280 --> 0:18:55.240 was a former ad guy. He tried his best and 0:18:55.400 --> 0:18:59.400 it just didn't quite work out. In America for Arnold Cohen, Yeah, 0:18:59.440 --> 0:19:04.399 he aided a model called the American Sits Bath s 0:19:04.440 --> 0:19:06.679 I t Z Bath, which is weird because it's not 0:19:06.720 --> 0:19:10.200 a Sitz bath. No, and there are six baths now 0:19:10.520 --> 0:19:12.320 and I don't know if they predated it or and 0:19:12.440 --> 0:19:14.520 he just kind of adopted that or what. But he 0:19:15.880 --> 0:19:19.399 basically took a toilet seat and modified it, added a 0:19:19.440 --> 0:19:24.000 foot pump to pump water under your bum with um 0:19:24.080 --> 0:19:27.159 he uh. He went to trade shows, he tried to 0:19:27.200 --> 0:19:29.359 market it as much as he could, and he also 0:19:29.520 --> 0:19:31.720 was very much ahead of his time. And then again, 0:19:31.760 --> 0:19:34.040 this is the nineteen sixties and he was still a 0:19:34.040 --> 0:19:38.000 young man at the time. Um that that he was 0:19:38.040 --> 0:19:41.159 trying to He saw that it was a problem how 0:19:41.240 --> 0:19:45.040 much toilet paper Americans use. That was one of his 0:19:45.119 --> 0:19:47.359 driving forces, in addition to trying to come up with 0:19:47.400 --> 0:19:49.679 something that could help people like his dad who are 0:19:49.680 --> 0:19:54.040 suffering from rectial issues. Um. And he said, I think 0:19:54.119 --> 0:19:56.040 one of his quotes is nobody wants to hear about 0:19:56.040 --> 0:19:59.040 tushy washing one oh one. It was just too difficult 0:19:59.080 --> 0:20:02.360 to market and so he kind of he gave up. 0:20:02.359 --> 0:20:04.399 I guess to an extent, and I guess sometime in 0:20:04.440 --> 0:20:09.560 the seventies he either approached a company called TOTO, which 0:20:09.600 --> 0:20:15.040 stands for Toyo Tokei or Oriental ceramics and Japanese um 0:20:15.160 --> 0:20:19.120 Or they approached him and they licensed his concept and 0:20:19.520 --> 0:20:21.800 kind of tinkered with it, made it better, made it 0:20:21.880 --> 0:20:26.960 much more automated, made it electronic, and um they deybuwed 0:20:26.960 --> 0:20:31.680 the washlet in in Japan, and it took a little 0:20:31.720 --> 0:20:33.639 like getting used to over there as well, but in 0:20:33.720 --> 0:20:36.119 very short order, the Japanese kind of clumped onto it 0:20:36.160 --> 0:20:38.920 and it became like part of their culture as much 0:20:38.960 --> 0:20:46.159 as like sushi. Sure, Sure, we did a great episode 0:20:46.160 --> 0:20:50.800 on sushi. We did. I was also gonna say chopsticks anime, 0:20:51.960 --> 0:20:55.640 um cuteness who knows a lot of stuff. You could say, 0:20:55.800 --> 0:21:00.240 Sure maple Japanese maples. A couple of those, M Yeah, 0:21:00.280 --> 0:21:03.119 they're beautiful. Man. Do you have the kind of like sweeping, 0:21:03.119 --> 0:21:05.840 spreading kind or the upright kind? I have. One of 0:21:06.280 --> 0:21:09.119 my favorite ones are the small low spreaders, and I 0:21:09.240 --> 0:21:11.560 got a couple of those. I don't think they're gonna 0:21:11.560 --> 0:21:13.440 be huge, but the way I have them in our 0:21:13.440 --> 0:21:15.399 garden and it's just very lovely. It's one of my 0:21:15.440 --> 0:21:18.200 favorite trees. Yeah, you don't want them to be huge 0:21:18.200 --> 0:21:20.080 when they're like that, because they're supposed to be kind 0:21:20.080 --> 0:21:23.920 of subtle, understated and like low growing. You know. Yeah, boy, 0:21:23.960 --> 0:21:25.679 there's one around the corner for me that I just 0:21:25.840 --> 0:21:29.440 I have Japanese maple envy in a big way. It's 0:21:29.520 --> 0:21:33.160 it looks like a it looks like a twelve foot 0:21:33.520 --> 0:21:38.280 umbrella that's about four ft off the ground. It's just gorgeous. Yeah, 0:21:38.320 --> 0:21:40.439 I'll bet it's old. Yeah, it's got to be. I 0:21:40.520 --> 0:21:41.960 just want to sit in it every time I go 0:21:42.040 --> 0:21:45.120 by their yard. You you probably lay under it and 0:21:45.160 --> 0:21:47.280 just tickle it. Did I say sit under it or 0:21:47.320 --> 0:21:49.760 sit in it? You said sit in it? Yeah, I'm 0:21:49.800 --> 0:21:53.359 in sit under it. Okay, you're gonna be the weird 0:21:53.359 --> 0:21:57.080 neighbor who just sits in people's yards. Maybe I've wanted 0:21:57.119 --> 0:21:59.679 to do that so many times and I just you know, 0:21:59.760 --> 0:22:02.280 and oh you can't do it, especially as they've grown adult. 0:22:03.119 --> 0:22:04.600 So what kind of a day do you have? You 0:22:04.600 --> 0:22:06.639 don't have the buzz market, But I got kind of 0:22:06.680 --> 0:22:09.280 one of the um like a seventy five dollar model, 0:22:09.320 --> 0:22:12.840 but that go under your existing toilet seat. But I 0:22:12.920 --> 0:22:16.080 know that some of these Japanese models it's actually part 0:22:16.119 --> 0:22:19.040 of the toilet seat and has dryers and they talk 0:22:19.119 --> 0:22:22.040 to you and all that good stuff. I will buzz 0:22:22.040 --> 0:22:25.520 buzz buzz, because I love mine. I have to total 0:22:25.640 --> 0:22:29.840 washlets and they it's not like the highest n one 0:22:29.880 --> 0:22:32.560 where like you stand up and it flushes automatically or 0:22:32.920 --> 0:22:35.280 um it talks to you or has lights. They have 0:22:35.359 --> 0:22:38.080 some that have like UV lights built in so when 0:22:38.119 --> 0:22:42.199 the lids shut like kills everything in sight. Um. But 0:22:42.280 --> 0:22:45.200 it's like it's like a good good washlet has like 0:22:45.240 --> 0:22:49.800 a heated seat and everything, um, and like it's it's 0:22:49.840 --> 0:22:52.640 just wonderful to have. It's just really that's the one 0:22:52.680 --> 0:22:55.840