Tuesday, December 19, 2006

Potentially counterproductive

Malaysia is tired. Tired of being saddled with Kuala Lumpur as the name of its capital city. Tired of floating along in the South China Sea. Tired of Indonesia getting all the attention in the neighborhood. Tired of the world just not taking them seriously as a tourist destination. So Malaysia is taking matters into their own hands, and they're planning for 2007 to be Visit Malaysia Year. The goal is to eclipse 20 million visitors to the country in the next calendar year. And they've already started the preparations.

They're getting cleaner toilets. Air-conditioned toilets. Self-cleaning toilets. Better toilets.

Now that's something that a tourism board can get behind, if you catch my drift. After all, what better slogan can there possibly be for a tourism campaign than "Malaysia - Now with Shinier Porcelain". Sure beats the stuffing out of Australia's "Where the Hell Are You?" campaign from this past year.

Needless to say, other countries are beginning to take notice, and we may soon see a rash of improvements as nations around the world attempt to lure in tourists. We could find sparkling crystal urinals installed in Monaco, or self-dispensing soap for sinks across China. We could even see toilet paper used in Jordan.

Obviously, Malaysia is taking the initiative in this potentially global effort, to teach the world a very important lesson; a lesson unheard of by Aesop or Giesl. That lesson?

Don't worry about cleaning the bathroom unless you're expecting company.

And I think that's something we can all identify with.

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