And people eat with their hands a lot too. This is why its considered disgusting to eat with the left hand in many places. Right hand for eating, left hand for washing your ass.
One of the benefits of having travelled a lot in Asia is you will never again be phased by running out of toilet paper.
People in SE Asia don't eat with their hands, you must be thinking about Central/South Asia. Spray cleaning really isn't that bad, you should be washing your hands after anyways.
Really? I never saw anyone eating with their hands in SE Asia, well, anything but street food. Its hard to eat a rice or noodle dish with your hands, especially without bread!
I know people eat with their hands in south/central Asia (including Burma), as well as in Muslim areas (Malaysia/Indonesia), I just never saw that in Tai areas of SE Asia. Well, you learn something everyday I guess.
My wife grew up in Malaysia, eating mostly with her hands. Hand, rather, normally the right, but the practicality of this is not (no longer?) related to toilet hygiene -- more just that it's really useful to keep one hand clean to pick up your glass, hold serving dishes and implements, etc.. She was raised to be rather more hygienic than I was, interestingly, and has rules that I still forget and break occasionally.
Nowadays many people are westernized enough that they have switched to eating w/ utensils (either chopsticks or fork/spoon, depending on type of cuisine, and the Chinese segment of the population have been using chopsticks all along), but eating with the hands is still quite common.
The houses where I've spent time in Malaysia had western toilets but often with a bucket & cup or sprayer for cleaning; toilet paper sometimes also present, but not always.
Thanks for clearing that up. Apparently, it is a common misconception that it is 'phase' and 'faze' is the incorrect spelling: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/faze
And people eat with their hands a lot too. This is why its considered disgusting to eat with the left hand in many places. Right hand for eating, left hand for washing your ass.
One of the benefits of having travelled a lot in Asia is you will never again be phased by running out of toilet paper.