From country to country you find a lot of laws and rules that don’t seem to make much sense to you at the time, but they’re usually laws like women having to cover themselves in public (Saudi Arabia), or it being illegal to step on the local currency (Thailand). They even make sense, given the cultural background of the area, or in the sense that stepping on the currency could be construed as a gesture of stepping on (disrespecting) the leader whose image is on that currency note.
I found a law in Singapore that kinda just blew my mind though. It is unlawful to urinate or smoke in the lifts (elevators), and there are signs posted by most lifts to remind you of the fact, as seen above. Reminding people to not smoke in an elevator is something I can understand. It’s a matter of common courtesy to non-smokers who have to share those same elevators, possibly with children, to get home. On the other hand, urinating in an elevator is just something that never crossed my mind. It’s just not something I’d ever even thought of. Are people’s mentalities really that different from country to country, that something as basic as only urinating in a toilet (or maybe in the bushes) is something a person has to be reminded of?
When I first saw these signs I was more amused than anything, but I recently stumbled across a forum where an instance of a person urinating in a lift was actually recorded on camera. And, to top it off, it was a woman.
Saw this in Xin Ming Ri Bao (17th Nov 2008).
A Gril was caught urinating in a HDB lift and it’s caught by the hidden camera.
The girl is believe to be in her 30s.
It happen in Sembawang GRC, but not sure where. Because the offender is facing away from the camera, they can’t identify her. The newspaper report that the town council is going to put up notice with her picture beside lift of HDB (Most likely Sembawang GRC) to warn others not to do it….
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I thought only boys or some dogs will do such thing in HDB lift… didn’t know girls also so daring….
I’m actually at a loss for words on this one. Is this just a cultural thing, or is it an individual fault? I would typically lean towards the latter, but the fact that there are signs up means that this must happen, or must have happened before, quite often.
Bradley Farless 