Public not too keen on fancy urinals

NST: KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysians are not keen on urinals that resemble the mouths of men and women.
The public is uncomfortable at the thought of using the odd-shaped basins suggested by the Housing and Local Government Ministry and the Kuala Lumpur City Hall.
Their online responses to a New Straits Times article on the idea showed their disapproval.
While there were some, like Indonesian Retno Ika who complimented City Hall on the unique urinals, most respondents were against the suggestion.
Housing and Local Government Deputy Minister Datuk Robert Lau had said plans were afoot to introduce the urinals in the Klang Valley by August.
He said yesterday City Hall and local councils should be creative in making public toilets more attractive.
He said the local councils could learn from countries such as Japan, China, South Korea and Taiwan, which had successfully installed such fancy urinals.
According to J. Singh of Seremban, the urinals looked vulgar and were in poor taste.
"Is the minister joking? I would not want them in my toilet."
Another respondent, Ravi, said it was demeaning to pee into "mouths".
"The user, and not the urinal, is the problem here. We do not need a task force to know this."
Amir, of Shah Alam, said Malaysians did not need the "silly-looking" urinals to learn know to urinate. "It’s a waste of taxpayers’ funds."