I was reminded of a line from Paul Auster's City of Glass:
As
it happened, he was sitting on the toilet, in the act of expelling a
turd, when the telephone rang.
Modern Toilet began in Taiwan. Now, there are over a dozen Modern Toilets, in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Japan, among other places.
Upstairs, I took a seat at a table. My seat was a toilet. The table had a glass top. Under it, there was a bowl. In the bowl, there was a plastic swirly turd. The place mats were decorated with smiling turds.
Originally, Modern Toilet was devoted to ice cream. Today, it serves all kinds of foods. Wanting to stick with the theme, I ordered two sundaes. The first sundae was a pile of brown balls that looked like shit. It was served in a pink bowl that was shaped like a toilet. The second sundae was a large swirl of chocolate that looked like a turd and was served in a black dish that looked like a toilet. The chocolate balls had a creamy chocolate filling. The chocolate turd came with chocolate flakes.
In theory, children may be more interested in Modern Toilet than adults. About 50% of the people in the packed place were parents with small children. Children, after all, have a different relationship to going to the bathroom than adults. For kids, bowel movements are new, their first act of creation, an event celebrated by a fawning parent who perhaps proffers a gold star or some such commendation.