I love seeing signs around the world that have been mistranslated into English. You know the ones, maybe it’s a sign on a construction site in China that says, “Pardon Our Erections.”

Hilarious. But what I love even more, are signs telling you not to do something so bizarre, but so SPECIFIC, that you have to assume this bizarre thing happens to them quite frequently. Or at least, frequently enough for them to put it on a sign and hang it up.

In the botanical garden near my house, they have a sign that says, “If your baby has diarrhea, do not bring it into this fountain.” Very specific, right? So this must happen all the time. Someone’s baby is a shitty mess, but here’s this beautiful (and clearly decorative) fountain, so what’s the problem? Can't we just dip our baby's ass in this fountain? Oh. There’s a sign. Damn. I guess we’ll just have to take it into the bathroom, which is literally also right here, a few paces from us and within eyesight of this beautiful antique fountain. We would have never thought of that. Thank goodness this sign is here.

The sign is professionally made, and it’s been there for years. So either this happens all the time, or the one time it did was so horrifying, that they immediately contacted a sign maker. “Never again!” I envision a distraught 1990s Dallas Arboretum employee yelling at the top of her lungs, as she raises one fisted hand to the sky, and dials the sign maker on the telephone with the other...

In Iceland, they didn't have any signs about diarrhea babies, but almost every public (and sometimes even private) restroom had some version of the sign you see above. Which leads me to believe that the confusion about what to do with a western style toilet is not an isolated incident, but something that happens quite regularly.

I remember the first time I encountered a TURKISH-STYLE TOILET IN PERU, I walked in and right back out telling everyone that it was out of order. I thought it was. The commode was missing, there was just a hole in ground. (AKA, the Turkish toilet).

“Ryan, do you not know what to do?” someone asked.

“Well, I thought I did, I’ve had about 40 years of practice, but why don’t you come in and give me a refresher…”

So contrarily, if that is all you are used to -- squatting on the ground -- then people must look at our western-style toilets and think we have put it moronically up on a precarious and unnecessary pedestal.

“Don’t these Icelandic idiots know there’s an easier way to do this?” they are probably thinking, as they try to leap up on top of the toilet rim to assume their usual position.

Hence the signs everywhere.

I imagine in several instances, people probably even got hurt. I’m very dexterous, so I tried to do the very thing the sign was advising against, just to see what would be involved. I abandoned it almost immediately, as it’s actually very awkward to try and perch up on the rim of the commode like the man in the drawing, I'd even daresay dangerous.

But ever since I got you to thinking about it, you want to try it yourself now, don't you?!

Don’t lie.