Video screenshot shows a child takes a dump at a corner of Tsim Sha Tsui station in Hong Kong. (Photo/Screenshot)
Netizens have started calling for the Metro Transit Railway (MTR) Corporation in Hong Kong to add more public toilets at its stations after a video showing a child who suffered from diarrhea inside a station went viral.
In the video, which has been circulating since last Saturday, a child used tissue papers to cover his excrement after he took a dump at a corner of Tsim Sha Tsui station. A Hong Kong woman was criticizing a man who was said to be the teacher of the group of children for letting the child go to the bathroom in public.
The teacher finally explained that the child was suffering a sudden stomach ache after the woman kept blaming him for not finding someone to help deal with it.
The video immediately stirred up debates on the Chinese social media as to whether it was a proper way to let the child defecate there.
“The educated people have hundreds of solutions while the uneducated have hundreds of excuses,” @DongL-O-V-ENancy commented on Sina Weibo.
“Whether in Hong Kong or cities on the Chinese mainland, the teacher who escorts the students should take responsibility. [The teacher] may find a staff to help look for toilets and should clean it himself rather than ask the staff to do that,” @Meiwaju posted.
“I believe that this child would never like to be seen dumping by the public if he were able to hold back,” @Wan Yee commented on Facebook and was concerned that this incident would cause a childhood trauma.
However, some net users have been questioning why the teacher did not take the boy to a restroom, which has been solved by some Hong Kong people, saying not every station has restrooms.
According to the official MRT website, the nearest restroom at Tsim Sha Tsui station is 200 meters away from one of the station’s exits while most MTR lines do not have in-station restrooms. The statistics offered by Kanknews, a Shanghai-based news portal show that only 52 MTR stations have public toilets among all 93 stations.
Complaints about the fact that it’s hard to find a restroom at MTR have been emerging. A male passenger decided to use the staff restroom after he asked for the authorization, but he was warned by senior staff and possibly faced a fine in 2015.
Some local netizens even drafted out a list to tell people in which stations have restrooms and how they can easily access them.
Chinese President Xi Jinping spoke of “the Toilet Revolution” in 2015, and the country’s tourism authorities started a three-year action to refurbish public toilets in 2016. As of the end of October last year, around 68,000 toilets were refurbished or constructed.
