THE CYPRUS attempt to form the world’s longest toilet queue yesterday to mark World Water Day proved to be a bit of a bummer when only 16 people showed up for the event at the municipal public facilities.
Like dozens of organsiations around the world, the Soroptimist International Club of Nicosia attempted to create the “World’s Longest Toilet Queue to highlight the value of water.
Lining up by the public toilet in the park between Eleftheria and Solomou Squares, participants had hoped to amass enough people to qualify for the Guinness Book of World Records.
However only 16 people turned up to the event in Nicosia, half of them club members.
Club president Lia Georgiades asserted however that the disappointing turnout was due to the club holding the event during the workday and not because Cypriots do not care about water-related issues. Ex-president and current member Anastasia Aslanides agreed, saying if they had held the event after working hours “we would have had more success.”
Georgiades said Cypriots do care about water issues, citing the fact that “many people” signed a document beforehand, which the club also circulated at the event, affirming their support. “They have signed our document, so we have a lot of people who are interested in water that is life,” Georgiades said.
The toilet queue competition is part of the club’s “Water is Life, Sanitation is Dignity” campaign aimed not so much at winning a mention in the famous record book but at getting people to recognize access to clean water as a human right that not enough people enjoy and which needs to be more effectively addressed, said Georgiades.
“We are trying to make the people, especially in the rich countries, sensitive and help the people of Africa and Asia, because 4,000 children die every day because they do not have access to a clean environment, water, and sanitation,” she said. “So we call upon all politicians and all people to act immediately for the children who die every day.”
According to the club’s web site, the Soroptimists compose “an international women’s organization for business and professional women who work to improve the lives of women and girls, in local communities and throughout the world…Soroptimists are women at their best, working to help other women to be their best.” The organization boasts approximately 95,000 members in 120 countries and stages campaigns to stop the trafficking of women and girls, end domestic violence against women, and “inspire women to live their dreams,” among others.
Last year Belgium earned the title when over 750 people queued up outside a fake toilet.
