traveling with clean hands

Having just finished visiting Japan I can tell you I have now been in 3 international airports, three majour train stations, an untold number of subway stations, at least half a dozen UNESCO World Heritage sites as well as one of the largest convention centers in Asia. As you can imagine I have also been to the bathroom at most of these locations as well and having been raised in America, I can tell you that to my eyes, Japanese washrooms are some of the most interesting on the planet. For example, at the convention center, did you know that they have speakers playing random bird sounds to mask the usual noises from the 'customers'?

As befitting the home of climate change initiatives, the Kyoto convention center tries to minimize their carbon footprint by reducing the amount of paper waste by encouraging the use of hand dryers. Seems to me an easy choice, no wood pulp to convert to paper, no paper to have to transport to manufacturing location to warehouse to convention center, no paper waste to have to burn / recycle / haul away.

What's not to like? Have you seen how high-tech these dryers have become lately? You may not miss the paper as much as you think....