17 hours in a Tokyo airport bathroom

The grumbling began as I rode down a busy street in Jaipur. What at first was a quiet murmur of discomfort rose gradually to a steady chorus of displeasure, and then quickly to alarming distress. Sweat glowed on my forehead and my focus narrowed. Annoyance turned to worry turned to panic as the demons in my depths stirred evermore violently, no longer seeking to be acknowledged but to be exorcised.

I looked around at my beloved friends, their innocent smiles betraying sweet ignorance to the emergency brewing within me. My ears became deaf to their benign conversation and my mind raced.

Like Doctor Strange I furiously contemplated the million logical paths of time branching out from this moment, searching desperately for the one that would avoid what was becoming a more and more certain future – devastation.

Second by second, every conceivable path turned to ash and the conclusion I sought frantically to avoid suddenly became truth. Unlike the Marvel universe, there was no stopping this Thanos.

“STOP THE CAR!” I yelled, as the demons clawed their way up my throat and down my bowels. I tumbled out into the world and the quiet, stale environment of the taxi gave way to the utter chaos of this random Indian city street. It engulfed my senses.

Heat. Stench. Dust. Noise.

These things overwhelmed me and my brain began to shut down. I needed privacy, fast. I ran into the nearest hotel to book a room, and luckily my friend followed to translate. The confused staff escorted me quickly to the closest available room, and immediately I shut the door.

Thank God, I was alone.

But just when I allowed the demons the opportunity to escape… instead, they retreated.

I was perplexed.

I sat on this dingy hotel toilet, trying furiously to coax them out, to no avail. The demons laughed heartily from within me. What cruel torture was this?

After two hours I stood, crestfallen and furious at this sadistic denial of relief. Though the grumbling was somewhat diminished, it was still present and volatile, promising to return in full force at a moment’s notice.

As I stood on this knife’s edge, this fragile purgatory that promised to swing into either heaven or hell in an instant, I rejoined my friends. For the rest of the day we continued to travel. I visited many toilets, each time being denied satisfaction. My plight endured.

Onward to Tokyo

The next day I was on a plane leaving India, on a long flight to Tokyo for a seventeen hour layover. As I flew, the airplane toilet became a casino and I a gambling addict — every time I entered with blind hope, and every time I left with despair.

Would nothing salve my wounds? Could no man-made place of personal business facilitate my relief?

As the plane landed at Tokyo Haneda airport, that question remained unanswered. I found a seat in the terminal to lie down on, and braced for what would be seventeen hours of yet more misery. Then, the urge came once again.

I was used to it by now. My body would signal its intent to expunge my demons, and then renege on that intent once I arrived at the agreed-upon destination (the toilet). But what I found at this airport bathroom was beyond the wildest musings of my bathroom-oriented imagination.

It was not a toilet, but a sanctuary. A private haven for my suffering. A pinnacle of art, and science, and probably philosophy combined to create a miracle of human comfort and engineering.

This toilet was my knight in shining armor.

Not only was it the cleanest toilet I had experienced since my efforts began, it was also the most spacious, comfortable, and private. The room temperature was perfect. The seat was preheated. It had a built-in warm-water bidet, with controls to manually angle the water and adjust the pressure. It even had a built-in warm-air dryer to dry my buttocks when finished.

The moment I sat down was like coming home. The entire contraption fit like a favorite glove, supporting all the right parts of my body. And for the demons locked within me, it was the key to finally opening the door.

What happened next, I’ll leave to your imagination — but strictly speaking, it was one of the greatest moments of my life. Over the next seventeen hours in Tokyo I enthusiastically returned to this palace of reprieve probably a dozen times.

It is in no uncertain terms that I hereby write… that this Japanese toilet saved my soul.

Of course… I was legitimately ill, so there is a chance my entire recollection of this event is somewhat exaggerated by illness-induced delusion. Regardless, I look forward to returning to the Tokyo airport – and to my precious toilet, my hero – in the future…