Toilet cafe in Indonesia seeks to raise awareness of public cleanliness

Semarang, Indonesia, July 21 (efe_epa). —  Dogs and cats drink from the toilet out of convenience, and in Semarang some people do too but for awareness of sanitation.

The Jamban Cafe in this Central Java city has been open since April and is operated by Budi Laksono, a public health professor at Diponegoro University.

Visitors to Jamban, which means ‘toilet’ in Indonesian, sit on toilet seats and, following open discussions with Laksono on public sanitation, enjoy drinks and food served in toilet bowls.

“Mostly they are surprised and some are laughing. Some don’t want to taste the food, but I eat first and then they laugh and then they try,” Laksono told an epa journalist Thursday.

“I’ve prepared a bucket for vomiting for them, but so far no one has vomited,” he added.

The cafe is part of a longstanding campaign by the professor to raise awareness of sanitation in the archipelago, where millions of people lack access to toilets and answer the call of nature out in the open, which raises health risks.

“Jamban is one of my strategies to promote the issue and I invite people who care about sanitation to come and discuss how they can work on improving sanitation,” he said.

The professor doesn’t charge money for refreshments at his cafe, but visitors are welcome to give donations.

Laksono has for years been involved with toiletbuilding programs across Java and has worked with the Indonesian military to build 175,000 toilets.

But he says his efforts still have a long way to go, as 24 million families in Indonesia do not have toilets.

His sanitation mission will on Aug. 16 see him begin a 500kilometer walk, during which he will give speeches to promote public hygiene, and will end when he arrives in Jakarta, where he plans to meet with Indonesian President Joko Widodo.