6 things we hate about hawker centre toilets

Last Updated on 2016-05-30 , 9:36 am

It’s the same in both Singapore and Malaysia hawker centres—the toilets are usually poorly maintained and if given a choice, you would rather hold off your bowel movements until you’re in a shopping centre. Have you ever wondered why?

No toilet paper
It’s most frustrating when you realized everything is in place and went on to do your “business”. After that, you realized you’ve forgotten one key thing: toilet paper. If you have this experience before, you’ll tend to have learnt your lesson the hard way and ALWAYS ensure there’s toilet paper before taking off your pants.

10-cent entrance fee
When all you have are a few ten-dollar notes and a load of shit waiting to be released, you’ll rather use one of the notes as the entrance fee. The other notes are the solution for the previous point.

Extremely dirty and smelly toilet
Next time, when you are near the entrance of a shopping centre toilet, look to your left or right. There will be a schedule of when the janitor needs to clean the toilet. For a hawker centre? You’ll see a dirty toilet.

Damaged door lock
When you see a cubicle empty, you rush in only to realize that the door lock is not working. Now, you have to be decisive: should you risk using it and allow people to open the door as you do your business, or should you wait for the next available cubicle? Or maybe you’ll use one hand to hold the door close as you do your business?
We usually learn decision-making skills in a toilet.

You don’t know where it is
Unlike shopping centres whereby you can use the signs to direct you to the toilet, finding a toilet in a hawker centre takes skill and luck. Sometimes, you might even believe that there isn’t one there.

It’s so small, you can’t move at all
If you’ve been to one, you’ll understand. Yes, space is money, and we’re only there for one minute, but don’t they understand that as space gets smaller, aiming gets more difficult?