Vietnam 6 - A bum gun and other cool things in our Hoi An house

Renting a house as opposed to being in a hotel can be fun as we work out what some of the unfamiliar items are used for.  Some are obvious, and clearly a great idea …. but some exude a bit of mystery.

Mystery cupboard at first

The first thing we noticed in our new home was a cupboard above the kitchen with just a rack type of arrangement at the bottom.  Is this some sort of Asian bread box for produce??? 

Nope. 

It is a very cool rack for draining dishes and letting them dry.  Neat idea eh?  We don’t have that many dishes so for us it is also our dish cupboard.  So far, the only issue is the door height.  While I can walk under it, it seems diabolically set up to catch Bob’s head.  At least this has not resulted in dishes being only my job.

The kitchen sink also has removable, but built in, traps to pick up food scraps that might enter the drain.  I know you can buy something like this at home, but these are integral to the design of the sink.

A sweep out threshold.  I imagine this is impossible at home for climate reasons, but it is oh so nice to just sweep all the stuff right out the door – with a soft very wide broom that catches everything.  

Now if they could only make the damned broom handles about 2 feet longer I would be happy.  They are not even long enough for a Vietnamese person to sweep with, standing upright.  That said they only require one hand to use, not two.

A flippable ice cube tray.  The trays remove to be filled with water.  But once frozen you flip them over, in place, and the ice cubes fall into the bin below.  I don’t quite understand why they fall right out without twisting the pan, but there you go.  

Easy peasy.

Cool ice cube tray

And of course the bum gun.  I have seen these in various WC around the world, but never in Canada.  I was never quite sure if it was to fill a pail of water for cleaning….or to wash the actual toilet…. Or as a hand held bidet??

The Bum Gun

Turns out #3 was the winner.  Here is the bum gun described when we googled how to use the bathroom in Vietnam (and yes we googled it).

What’s a bum gun? And how do you use it?

The ‘bum gun’ is a colloquial term many travelers use to describe the spray nozzle and hose contraption you find mounted alongside each toilet in many establishments in Vietnam (and indeed, throughout South East Asia). When we first came across these, we were a bit unsure what they were for. Initially, I thought it was an alternative (or an adjunct) to flushing – an extra jet of high pressure water just to sluice the pipes, so to speak. Or perhaps they were for cleaning the toilet instead of a brush?

But no. The bum gun is actually used instead of toilet paper as a cleaning mechanism. Aim it at the soiled parts of the body in question, press the nozzle and a cleansing spray of water hits the spot. Except you can’t be sure what the water pressure of that particular bum gun is going to be. Some spurt water at barely a dribble. Others are like a Karcher high pressure washer. As a result, bathrooms with bum guns in use are often awash with mis-aimed water.

And then, when your…ahem…areas are clean, THAT’s when you use the toilet paper (if it’s been supplied). Pat dry. Deposit paper in the bin next to loo.  So, it’s just wet paper in the bins, not smelly, smeared paper. (What? Too much information?)

Luckily the cold water here is not too, too cold.  Canadian cold tap water might be, um, a bit startling.