How can I prepare an outdoor, emergency toilet?
“It’s OK! I’ll find an isolated place, dig a hole, and…”
“Maybe I’ll use a bucket?”
“I don’t want to think about that!!!”
What pops into your head when you think about preparing for emergencies? Most people have never even considered emergency toilets, even though we pee and poop daily, and we really can not hold it in very long! Toilets may not be our top priority, but we do need them.
Even in emergencies, the human body will continue to create waste – urine and stool – and it leads to urges to go to the bathroom, as we all know. In the midst of an emergency, you might just have your own smaller emergency. After a big disaster, you will not be able to use restrooms, normally (see post #61). Surely, you will be able to find a place to do your business that provides enough privacy, but will it be safe? Especially for women and children? If it’s raining or snowing, would you still dig a hole every time you have an urge? Your kids too? Moreover, if you are trapped in an elevator or on a train with a bunch of people, what you will do? I recommend you get some practical knowledge about peeing and pooping in emergency situations, and be ready. “No ifs, ands or buts!” Just do it!
Prepare an emergency toilet for your compact emergency bag
The compact emergency bag (see post #51) will be inside your shoulder bag, backpack, tote bag, crossbody bag, or the like, which you carry whenever you go somewhere, like school, work, or shopping. Mainly, you need the compact emergency bag to help you get back home.
Please add plastic bags or portable toilets to your compact emergency bag.
If a big earthquake hits your office, and it’s a 3 hour walk back home, you might need to go to the restroom. Let’s imagine just such a scenario. Your office nearly collapses from a massive quake, and you have to get out of the area, immediately. The roads are closed to automobile traffic, and public transportation is not operational. You have no choice but to walk back home. You’ve been walking for a half-hour when the urge hits you to go number two. After an hour the situation becomes desperate. You’ve been looking for pubic restrooms, but there’s nowhere to go. The places that have toilets are all either closed or are without plumbing, You finally come to a still-functioning restroom, a port-o-john at a construction site. But oh no! There’s a very long line of people waiting to use it… There’s no way you can wait in that long line. You just won’t make it.
OK! You decide to take action! You brace yourself and find a safe, private spot. A little alleyway, around the corner from the main street. You use your emergency blanket as a screen for privacy (a big rain coat or poncho could have provided some privacy too). You lay out a plastic bag. And you do it! Congratulations. This little story is an example of something called open defecation. Before we actually engage in open defecation, we should know a little bit about the topic. Check out this link: open defecation.
This is a Japanese portable toilet which you can carry easily.
This one is a portable toilet from the U.S.
You don’t need to buy these exact products. I usually carry one big black plastic bag, which I can use as a rain coat, as a container for water, for garbage, or even as a toilet. (Obviously, I wouldn’t use it as a raincoat after using it as a toilet. Once it’s a toilet, it’s only a toilet.) Also, we can make a portable toilet kit by ourselves if we get compostable toilet bags (Green Elephant),
and portable toilet absorbent gel (oceanengine). After we use it, we can dig a hole and dump everything into the hole. Actually, it would be good to find the right spot, before we pee or poo, so we won’t need to walk around with a bag of trash.
Remember, you might not have an actual toilet seat you can sit on. You can check the portable toilets in the stores, but do you really want to carry it around all the time? I do not. Actually, I grew up with the old-fashioned “squat toilets” in Japan. So I am used to used to it, and I can pee and poo in a squatting position, in the bushes. How about my kids?? This is my big problem. My kids and husband can not do the squatting position. I am thinking that it wouldn’t be that big of a deal if they miss the target. We would just pick up the poop with a plastic bag, afterward, like picking up dog poo. But if you have the opportunity, I recommend you try goint to the bathroom with a squat toilet. Please try it!! One day, you will be able to hit the target!
I will talk more about emergency toilets in my next post.
See you next time.
Remember, “Protect your life by yourself” （自分の命は自分で守る). You need to survive first, and then you need your emergency supply. No matter how well you prepared your emergency supplies, if you die, then all of your preparations will have been for nothing. First and foremost, keep your health up all the time. Build your stamina so that if you need to, you can evacuate as quickly as possible. Stay healthy.