Kanazawa "At Home at Ryokan Service"
How does work a Japanese toilet?
Given that in the Japanese Ryokan (traditional hotels) usually there is a small room that contains only the toilet and that to enter in this room you must wear special slippers at the entrance, in Japan there are two types of toilet, defined of Japanese style (or traditional) and Western style.
Those in traditional style have the following form:
If you are using it correctly you have in front of you the half-dome of the toilet.
In this site there is an eloquent sequence on how to use a traditional toilet http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~AD8Y-HYS/movie.htm
The other type of toilet is the same as that is typically used in the western but in most cases this WC has an added electronic structure for washing of private parts .
In the latter case, after having done your expulsion work, you can proceed washing using the semiautomatic system built into the toilet and then you can dry your parts with normal toilet paper.
By the way, is good to have some paper towels in public places, in order to use them instead of the normal toilet paper if this one is finished (but this applies to anywhere in the world).
Usually the electronic toilet is similar to this:
and with a control panel like this:
The usually pink key is used for cleaning the private frontal parts of women, while the other key with an eloquent symbol is used for the rear part. The button with the square is the stop and usually there are two buttons to adjust the intensity of the water jet hitting the area to be cleaned.
Apparently the Japanese toilets are very popular on the web, so here are some pages that speak of that subject:
Miscellaneous guides: http://www.japaneseguesthouses.com/about/ryokan/toilets.htm
The history of the toilet: http://web-japan.org/kidsweb/hitech/toilet/toilet01.html
The site of the most famous electronic WC manufacturer: http://www.totousa.com/default.aspx?sectID=3
Finally, this document contains a (perhaps) interesting piece on the history and celebration of the toilet in Japan: http://www.oitaplaza.jp/english/uploads/photos1/56.pdf