Nightstools were an indispensible part of daily life in Shanghai at the turn of the century. Nightstools are waterproofed buckets with a wooden seat on top. Every household had two: one clean and empty, one not-so-clean and not-so-empty that was being used. Nightstools could only be emptied before 8 AM into a nightsoil cart, which came around shikumen neighborhoods at around 4 to 5 AM. Since no one wants to be up at 4 or 5 AM, the nightstool was usually left at the front door late at night so that the nightsoil operator (jokingly known as the “Emptying Master”) could pick it up and dump it into the cart. If you didn’t, the household was stuck with two dirty and smelly nightstools for a day, or you had to keep using the nightstool that was in use the day before. Neither is an attractive, or healthy, option.
After the nightsoil operator has left (and the household has started to wake up) it was time to clean the nightstool. This job was traditionally a woman’s job and was generally done by mothers or grandmothers, the first to get up in the morning. A bamboo scrub brush would be used to scrub off whatever might be stuck to the sides of the nightstool with water and muscle power. This would be a rather noisy half-hour in the neighborhood, most of the women enjoying going outside and getting a chance to socialize a little before the city bustle began. After being cleaned, the stool would be left outside to dry in the air, and be taken back inside before noon.
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