People may be too embarrassed to openly talk about it, but everyone does it, toilet or not. World Toilet Day helps people celebrate the importance of sanitation and raise awareness for the 2.5 billion people who don't have access to toilets and proper sanitation. This video by the nonprofit WaterAid highlights the luxury of having a toilet.

Celebrating your can may seem silly, but not having one can not only lead to embarrassment, lack of dignity and safety issues, but also preventable diseases and even death. When people don't have toilets, they're forced to relieve themselves in open streets, fields, or back alleys. The result? The contamination of drinking water and food sources, which leads to a slew of health risks. Lack of sanitation is the world’s biggest cause of infection and kills 1.8 million people, mostly children, a year. Even countries with abundant toilets have to deal with problems ranging from unhygienic public toilets to waterway-destroying sewage disposal.

Vanilla, blogging on Let's Look At It This Way from Singapore, says that people should care about toilets:

“I know this is a crappy topic to most people. It is unfortunate that it is a ‘taboo' topic to talk about openly and many people remain ignorant about the scale of the problem. I fail to understand how this can be an unimportant topic when, on an average, we visit the toilet 2500 times a year, or 6-8 times a day. In our life time, we would have spent 3 years in the toilet.”

Organized by the nonprofit The World Toilet Organization, World Toilet Day is being celebrated globally with various events. To further increase awareness, WaterAid announced the launch of its new ToiletFinder UK App for iPhone users this week. The free app helps Brits find the nearest public toilet while reminding them how lucky they are to have clean and safe toilets. The largest event today, called The Big Squat, asks people to stop and squat for one minute in a public place to raise awareness. These photos show people squatting globally, including this one of preschoolers in Singapore:

A blog from Brunei, the world according to panyaluru …, also shows appreciation for the toilet by putting it into perspective:

“Imagine if we are walking along in the row of shops in Kiulap or Gadong. Suddenly the tummy grumbles, just like the worst ribut you can think off. No rest bite. Grumble and grumble. Rumblings. The light is on amber and ready to turn green. But no toilets in sight. Not a single public toilet in the rows of shops…Add to that no water, no tissue, nothing! That could be the worst day of your life, your worst nightmare, ever worse than the nightmares those kids have in the Nightmare on Elm Street Movies. On this day, let’s show our appreciation to our toilets.”

Despite its serious side, many people have used humor to celebrate World Toilet Day. In the U.K., the blog London City Drains features a 10-question toilet quiz, while in this video high school teacher Matt Cheplic sings about the day.

Some bloggers point out that toilets alone may not be the answer. Sandhya, blogging on Maradhi Manni in India, says many men don't use available toilets:

“In a city like Chennai, where the climate is hot nearly 10 months of the year, I see men urinating on the roadside all the time. When women can control and go home and relieve themselves, why can't men do so, I don't know. So, first of all people should be fined heavily for doing this crime (yes, it is crime) on the spot. I have seen them doing this on the wall of the public toilets! In Srirangam, I saw them urinating on the compound wall of the temple even though every street surrounding the temple had toilets, which were clean, but pay toilets!”

While lack of sanitation impacts everyone, the taboo around toilets can disproportionately affect women. In some countries, modesty forces women do their business in fields before sunrise or to hold it until after the sun sets, leading to health and safety concerns. Joanne Sprague, blogging on Overturning Boulders in India, observes that women are absent from the morning toilet run in Chennai, while in Ethiopia the blog AN ADVENTURE IN ADDIS notices a similar situation:

“I’ve heard so often about the lack of toilet facilities for women or lack of toilets in general; that teenage girls in the countryside get up at 4 am to go out in the dark to do their business so they don’t get bullied by the boys at school or stop going to school altogether. Men just pee anywhere, cigarette in hand and there’s an assumption that women don’t need to, if they are thought about at all….I want to see a huge billboard in Amharic saying ‘Girls go too’ with a picture of Barbie sitting on a toilet.”

To celebrate World Toilet Day, blogger Jonathan Stray, takes readers on an international tour of toilets he's visited, from Thailand and the U.K. to West Africa and Oman, concluding:

“We in the west with our flush toilets and toilet paper and sparkling shower stalls are the exception; the rest of the world thinks a bathroom is a wet, smelly place, when they have a bathroom at all. A good toilet means you probably have a very good quality of life, so enjoy yours. Happy World Toilet Day!”

Photo of Tiled Toilet by nedrichards on Flickr, Creative Commons.

An edited video of the event can be seen below:

You can learn more about the Omani bloggers campaign against H1N1 by visiting the Omani Bloggers Wall.

Oman had its first Twitter gathering last night at Al Masa Mall. The main organizer of the event was blogger Sangeetha at Digital Oman who coordinated the process and planned the program. More than 25 users of Twitter attended, including male and female, locals and expats. A raffle was held at the beginning of the event and goodie bags were awarded to the attendees.

Blogger [R] at Dear Raed posted about the event saying:

overall 3ashra 3alla 3ashra (10/10)… next time i think it needs to be less formal and more relaxed so people can get a chance to talk more and get to know each other .. this can become a start to what can eventually become an official Omani On-Line community.. or maybe not ..

Blogger Muawiyah described the event in Arabic:

On Twitter, Maithams tweeted that he expects to feel more comfortable using Twitter now that he knows the identity of other people online.

Muscati tweeted that he would like to have more similar gatherings:

All Twitter updates relating to this event were tagged by by #MuscatTwestival including picture updates.

The recent initiative taken by Omani bloggers to help raise awareness about the spreading swine flu in the country managed to attract media attention and raise money to help take the initiative further. The campaign that was started as an online idea and then as a gathering in a local market was covered by the Arab new channel Al Arabia, and was later supported financially by a local securities company.

On Friday of this week bloggers have arranged for a public awareness event in which bloggers will again inform the visitors of a shopping mall about protection methods and will distribute masks and sanitizers. The event will include a street dancing session by a local freestyle dance group and will be sponsored by some local companies and newspapers.

Bloggers have also announced a new poster design competition to raise awareness about the flu. The first place winner of the competition will be awarded a Wacom Bamboo drawing tablet and the top submissions will be published in The Week and Muscat Daily newspapers.

Bloggers organising this campaign have started a new dedicated website to cover the latest updates happening in the Omani blogosphere and to publish the latest events for swine flu campaign.

Oman celebrated the first day of Eid al Fitr yesterday, a day after most of its neighboring Gulf states. The celebration, which culminates the end of Ramadan - the month of fasting, is determined after the sighting of the new moon, and not all countries, or sects for that matter, celebrate it on the same day.

The outbreak of swine flu in the Sultanate was also supposed to put a damper on Eid. The Government ran TV and newspaper campaigns urging people to take precautionary measures - such as avoiding giving hugs, kisses, or even shaking hands if possible during this event. The Ministry of Interior Affairs also ordered the Mayors of towns not to hold any public receptions for Eid. On the first day of Eid, unlike most other Eids, Oman TV did not broadcast Sultan Qaboos bin Saeed attending an Eid prayer.

However, the scare of Swine flu did not seem to take from the joy of people celebrating the first day of Eid. Instead of having mass public prayers areas, some places performed the morning Eid prayer in regular mosques which accommodated a smaller number of people than larger places.

Omani tweeps were making updates throughout the first day of Eid. Omanizer_muscat tweeted that even though OmanTV ran all these awareness messages, this was the Eid in which she had the most kisses ever!

The majority of people seemed to be going out and socializing without any fear of the flu as Alucard187 tweeted on the night of the first day of Eid that all the tables in restaurants in the capital Muscat seem to be fully taken. Otheroman also tweeted that the traditional Souq of Matrah seemed to have thousands of people hanging out around the corniche.

Makorani kept updating us with funny quotes she heard during Eid. Fatmanoor posted pictures of her homemade version of the traditional Omani Eid meat dish “Shiwa”, while alucard187 showed us pictures of the real thing getting dug up from the ground and unwrapped, and then ready to be eaten. Whole villages take part in the cooking of Shiwa, which consists of a whole cow or goat roasted for up to three days in an special oven prepared in a pit dug in the ground.

Eid al Fitr in Oman is celebrated over a period of three days after the end of the month of Ramadan.

Omani bloggers have started their Swine Flu Awareness Campaign yesterday by going through Souq Matrah to spread the message and educate people. The campaign which was originally initiated by Hamed Al Ghaithi, and then was taken to its next step by the cooperative effort of Bader Al Hinai, Ammar Al Mamari, Waleed Al Nabhani, Hashr Al Manthari, and Muawiyah Al Rawahi. These bloggers distributed sanitizers to restaurants and coffee shops and guided their staff on the proper method of cleaning the tables after the customers. The restaurants and coffee shops were very receptive of the advice and seemed to take it seriously, probably as some of them thought the bloggers were an official delegation from the Ministry of Health.

The bloggers then moved to taxi drivers to inform them about the benefits of using alcohol hand sanitizers and face masks for reducing the risk of infection. The majority of the taxi drivers had no idea what the sanitizers were and thought that these are liquid soup that required using water to wash it off.

The final state of the program was walking around the souq to inform visitors about the benefits of using alcohol hand sanitizers.

Blogger Muawiyah wrote a detailed post with pictures on how the event went and the varied reactions they received from the visitors of the souq.

Another event in the campaign against the Swine Flu is supposedly scheduled during the Eid break, but no specific details about the event can be found online yet.

Oman had a relatively big swine flu outbreak. With the number of fatalities in the country reaching 16, it is the largest announced number in the Gulf. Schools and universities were supposed to start by September, but were postponed to the mid of October. The biggest festival in the country due in January has already been canceled in fear of the flu.

Most Omani bloggers do not seem to be happy by the coverage provided by the local media and believe that more awareness activities should be carried out, especially as the disease could further spread during the celebrations of Eid ul Fitr, which begins tomorrow. Blogger Hamed Al Ghaithi started a bloggers' swine flu awareness campaign in which he suggests:

• Urging Omani media to transform into crisis mode that educates people about best practices, personal hygiene, and the recommendation not to shake hands, cheek kiss, or group prayers.
• Urging the government to impose restrictions for attending shopping malls and large social and religious events such as weddings and Eid celebrations.
• Canceling the whole of the first semester of the current academic year, and if the crisis is not mitigated by February, canceling the whole year.
• Launching a campaign for sanitizing public service institutions such as public markets ans schools.
• Monitoring the health status of arriving expatriate employees and putting them in quarantine if they are found to be infected.

Not all of these suggestions can be logically carried out, for example canceling a whole academic year, but it is still nice seeing Omani bloggers brainstorming ideas and spreading the message for taking precautionary measures to minimize the risks of infection.

Blogger Bader Al Hinai reported that the first offline activity in the bloggers campaign against swine flu was to be started today  in which some bloggers were supposed to go to a local market to educate people on the proper use of sterilization products. No updates can be found online on how the event went. According to Bader, future events to be held after the holidays are expected to be published soon.

There are blogs and forums that explicitly publish leaked government documents and shame high government officials, yet the government in most cases uses legal methods to prosecute such authors if they are residents in the country by relying on the criminal law legislation and the controversial Omani telecommunication law. Though rarely ever tested, Oman does guarantee the right for freedom of expression after all. Websites such as YouTube, Facebook, Flickr, and Twitter were never blocked in Oman.

In Oman, we have a different problem with censorship. The issue of censorship is taken care of by a public company called Omantel that occasionally, due to human or machine errors - we don't know - blocks out random websites. Though initially it sounds like a silly problem, due to the blackbox nature of the censorship department, once a website is blocked, it is a nightmare to get it unblocked.

Two months ago, I discovered that a blog I keep on IT law in Oman got blocked while I was abroad. It took me a whole month to get it unblocked where I had to make an official complaint to the Telecommunication Regulation Authority to have my website unblocked.

While the blocking of my website might have only caused me to lose a whole month of traffic and have a whole month of hosting fees wasted, having a number of services by Google such as Gmail, Blogger, and Scholar blocked for more than a day by mistake has a serious impact on the lives of people.

Currently, it seems that does not seem to be any method to hold Omantel accountable to its various censorship mishaps, other than complaining to the Oman's Telecom Regulation Authority, which will order Oman to unblock a website, but is very unlikely to issue any other sanctions. The future of the situation and control of the censorship department is unknown as the second fixed line internet service provider starts its operations. Hopefully something will change.

Meanwhile, it is worth noting that Global Voice's own Bangla portal is now blocked in Oman.. probably by mistake. I already wrote to Omantel to have it unblocked, but I have no idea how long it will take, if ever, to have it unblocked.

Mohammad Iqbal is an Indonesian who lives in Bahrain. He tells us the story of one worker he met:

I recently met a Bangali [Bangladeshi] who works for a hotel as a casual housekeeping attendant. He is actually Public Area attendant, one who takes care all public areas in a hotel, cleaning glass windows, or mopping floors of the lobby. He is not in charge for guest rooms. He does not make up rooms. What’s not fair? He spent BD1,500 (3980 USD) to get working visa in Bahrain. He’s entitled 2 year permit. He’s paid BD10 (26 USD) a day, it means he earns BD240 (636 USD) a month. It’s pretty good pay? Wait..! He has to pay his flat, water, electricity, meal and of course sending money home.

Let’s calculate. For housing, he spends a sharing flat for let say BD50 (132 USD) a month. Then water and electricity will be additional BD10 (26 USD), and then meal for BD40 (106 USD) a month. Don’t forget, since he has a landlord or agent who arranged his employment, including job placement in different places, he has to pay for the agent fee at least BD25 (66 USD). So, total take home pay will be only BD115 (305 USD) a month. In a year (12 month), he can save BD1,380 (3660 USD). This amount is still not enough to pay back the “visa” or “entrance fee” which is BD1,500 (3980 USD). I have no idea whether this amount is legal or not, but one thing I really don't get is that within 2 years he can only save BD1,260 (3340 USD) net. As a conclusion, he spends 1,500 (3980 USD) and sacrifices his two years working very hard for only BD1,260 (3340 USD). To extend another 2 years “working visa” he has to invest again BD1,000 (2652 USD). This means, within 2 years, he gets only BD260 (690 USD) net to save and I still have no clue how he pays for his flight ticket. I really don’t understand since it’s just not fair!

Francine Burlett, a French writer based in Bahrain, had a conversation with an Indian woman called Yasmina on a flight from Muscat to Bahrain in May. This is Yasmina's story:

“Pas facile, la vie à Chennai (Inde), chez moi, tu sais. J'ai deux filles au Collège. Un jour, elles seront docteur. Mais d'abord il faut payer, payer et payer encore. […] Tu sais, je viens de vivre presque 2 mois à Salalah, à Oman. J'ai laissé mon travail là-bas hier. J'étais dans une famille Omanaise. Madame avait 10 enfants - 8 filles et 2 garçons- et fin mai elle va accoucher du 11e bébé. Tu te rends compte? 11 enfants… C'est beau ça. Mais je ne serai pas là pour voir si c'est un garçon ou une fille. Je dois partir. C'est dur de la laisser seule, sans aide, si prêt de son accouchement mais je ne peux pas rester.

Tous les soirs, son mari venait dans ma chambre. Tous les soirs, je lui disais: “Je suis ton employée, pas ton épouse. Retourne chez toi, ta femme a besoin de toi. Retourne dans ton lit. Tu n'as pas le droit de me faire ça. Laisse-moi me reposer, je suis fatiguée…”. Tu imagines? Dix enfants, le ménage, la cuisine, la lessive avec chaque jour des tonnes de dishdashas et de abbayas à repasser, les draps, les couches en tissus, les serviettes… Mais moi, ça m'est égal de travailler. Je ne sais pas faire autre chose. Je suis courageuse. Je n'ai pas peur des lourdes tâches. Mais la nuit, il n'avait pas le droit de me faire ça. Me toucher, m'ennuyer. Je n'ai pas réussi à l'arrêter. Pas assez forte… J'ai du me me décider à faire quelque chose. Vite.

Tu vois, les employés de maison comme moi qui viennent d'Inde, du Sri-Lanka, de Somalie ou des Philippines, ils ont deux mois d'essai et après, ils ne peuvent plus annuler leur contrat, revenir en arrière. Nos passeports sont entre les mains de nos employeurs et s'ils ne veulent pas nous laisser partir, on ne peut rien faire. Tu dois honorer ton contrat de 2 ans avant de pouvoir retourner chez toi. C'est la loi. Moi, je leur ai dit que je voulais partir avant la fin de la période d'essai, que c'était mon droit. Malgré cela, monsieur ne voulait pas.

Alors, j'ai attaqué une grève de la faim. Pendant 5 jours, je ne suis pas sortie de ma chambre, je n'ai pas mangé, pas bu, je ne me suis pas lavée. Ils ont appelé le médecin. Et c'est lui qui a appelé la Police. Voilà. Ils m'ont accompagné jusqu'à l'aéroport. Monsieur a dû payer mon billet d'avion jusqu'à chez moi, me rendre mon passeport. C'est la loi. Mais Monsieur a été méchant jusqu'au bout, tu sais. Moi, je ne sais pas lire. Sur mon billet d'avion, je ne pouvais pas savoir ce qu'il y avait marqué. C'est ici, à l'embarquement, que l'hôtesse de Gulfair m'a dit que je partais pour Ramanathapuram, et non pas Chennai, ma ville. Tu peux le croire, ça? J'ai refusé d'embarquer. Pour aller où? Dans une ville que je ne connais pas, sans argent, sans personne, à 600km de chez moi?… Heureusement, la Police a payé le billet de Ramanathapuram à Chennai. Monsieur devra leur rembourser. Ils ont été corrects, ces policiers, tu sais. C'était quand même 60 Rials (120€) de supplément… un mois de mon salaire!

Je suis déjà restée 5 ans à Dubaï où j'ai fait un “jump” (Faire un “Jumping”: partir de chez son employeur, en lui laissant le passeport, pour accepter une place plus lucrative ailleurs mais en tant qu'illégal). J'ai travaillé 2 ans en Arabie Saudite, 2 ans à Oman dans le passé. Je parle arabe couramment. Si tu as besoin de quelqu'un, n'hésite pas à m'appeler à Chennai. Je viendrai. Je t'aime bien. Mais pas tout de suite. Je veux d'abord voir mes filles et un peu me reposer… ”

In Bahrain, Internet users were surprised to find out that access to the video on YouTube had been blocked by the Bahraini authorities. Writing on popular online forum, Bahrain Online, which is also banned in Bahrain, user Mahdy notes:

Arab Lady, a UAE-based blogger, had only this to say about the video:

No comment!!Mercy Mercy Mercy on Earth ya Allahhhhhhhhhhhh

Twitter user tomsp, who is based in Dubai, drew comparisons between the U.S. government and that of the Emirates:

Muscat Confidential, an Oman-based blog, also brings up the U.S. in its assessment of the situation:

Tapes released by a former business partner of the Sheikh, and broadcast last week by US network ABC, showed the UAE Sheikh personally torturing an Afghan trader over a missing load of grain. The story was around in mid-2008, but now that ABC have broadcast it, the issue is again in the news: the main question is what will the new US Administration do?

The activist site UAE Torture, which is reportedly blocked in the UAE, offers more information on the story and its background.