Toilet Paper in Panama – So up until now I’ve only used North American toilet paper, but I was unable to get any, so I had to resort to getting Panamanian toilet paper & I was shocked.
- The first roll I purchased (they sell them by the roll here too) was the soft kind. I brought it home, opened it up & WOOF, the smell of the toilet paper nearly knocked me over.
I ignored the smell, put it on the toilet paper holder, went back to my desk & then even hours later I could smell the chemicals in my office. That’s how toxic the smell was.
It was apparent to me that whatever they put on the toilet paper is toxic, & there’s no way I would be able to use it.
I wrapped it back up, stuffed it in a bag so the smell wouldn’t leak, & lost money there.
- Then I bought the cheapest toilet paper they had which looks like grey cardboard.
It was sooooo thin, I don’t even think it’s considered 1 ply by North American standards. This means you use twice as much toilet paper because you have to get some sort of padding. I couldn’t even get a square as it pulls out like a thin streamer.
It also had a smell to it (just not as pungent), but it’s not as bad.
Again, they must be using chemicals in the toilet paper, as I’ve never in all my years smelled something like this.
I do recognize the smell from public washrooms here in Panama, I just never knew what it was before. I think they put this garbage smell on the toilet paper because they used to throw the toilet paper in garbage cans, NOT in the toilet. In fact many Panamanians still use garbage cans & don’t throw the toilet paper in the toilets. Then there’s Panamanians who still use out houses as their toilets.
Now if you think the toilet paper must be really cheap, think again. Each roll cost me around 65 cents. When I went to look at the price of the 24 pack of Charmain from Price Smart which runs me around $14, even though it may not have as many sheets on each roll of the cardboard type (it has more sheets than the soft roll I purchased), it’s much less in price by around $4-5 AND it’s normal toilet paper.
JUST NUTS!
Just so you know, Panamanians aren’t the only ones who throw toilet paper in a garbage can. I know many Colombians do it, & I’m sure many other Latin American countries do it.
I believe it’s because they never build their pipes properly. They built them very thin as they don’t know what they are doing, & so the toilet paper backs up in the pipes.