Try asking the athlete to squat and the comeback is most certainly 'no!'

Chinese Olympic organisers are rushing to replace the squat toilets at three flagship Olympic venues following complaints about a lack of Western-style sit-down toilets, an official said yesterday.

Beijing is reported to be spending at least US$40 billion (S$55 billion) on the venues and infrastructure, all designed to feature a modern country that has grown in three decades into a political and economic powerhouse.

But the designers seemed to have overlooked the kind of toilets foreign athletes and visitors are used to.

The toilet issue came up again over the weekend when the San Diego Padres played the Los Angeles Dodgers at the new Olympic baseball venue. The portable toilets trucked in were the squat variety.

'After more than 30 test events, a lot of parties have raised the question of toilets,' Mr Yao Hui, deputy director of venue management for the Beijing organisers, told reporters yesterday.

'We have asked the venues to improve on this, to increase the number to sit- down toilets.'

He suggested it would be difficult to change every toilet in the 37 venues, 31 of which are in Beijing.

So he said the focus would be on satisfying three groups of visitors: athletes, journalists and the Olympic family, meaning primarily VIPs.

He said renovation was under way at the three main venues - the 91,000-seat 'Bird's Nest' National Stadium, the 'Water Cube' and the National Indoor Stadium.

Beijing is expecting about 500,000 foreigners to attend the Games from Aug 8 to 24.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

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