Jordana Stier | LIFE REPORTER

Cleaning up vomit, feces and used condoms is just another day for Humber’s janitorial staff.

“Somebody’s got to do it,” said Joel Umana, manager of custodial operations.

Finding the brutish leavings of people with barnyard manners in bathrooms – and sometimes hallways – is something that custodial staff have becomed accustomed to.

“People get sick and then they just (vomit) all over the toilet seat and the wall,” Umana said.

She said the worst thing to clean up is puke.

“People who don’t make it to the toilet, puke all over the floor or in the sink… and in the hallways,” Umana said.

Working as a janitor for 17 years and at Humber for nine, Umana knows how to brace himself for the mess students leave behind.

“I try to properly prepare myself, use the equipment properly, and away I go.”

Umana said during the day cleaners focus on offices and washrooms.

The night shift is when everything else gets done, which gives students a lot of time to leave feces “all over the toilet, all over the walls and the stalls.”

With Humber’s class schedule extending into later hours, more janitors are moving off day shifts onto nights, “which hampers, to some degree, our ability to deliver good day-time service,” said David Griffin, manager of maintenance and operations.

A staff member for 23 years, Griffin has seen the waves of change the college has gone through.

“Obviously if school is in from eight in the morning until 10 at night, a good 14 hours, it only leaves me with less than 10 hours to get finished and get out of here,” Griffin said.

Their janitorial duties allow cleaning staff a unique window into student manners.

“I don’t think any one year is the same but you seem to go through these flows of positive behaviour and not so good behaviour,” he said.

Umana said women’s sanitary napkin dispensers have been broken into over the last three months, which may be a result of students trying to steal money out of the machines, or just a sign of vandalism.

Ann Williams, another janitor, said maintenance staff tries its hardest to make the school the best it can be.

“Students come and students go. Some are very nice, some students are very rude… you just have to take it one day at a time.”