Too funny you mention this. I was thinking the same thing: a few months ago I left the booth of a restroom in Osaka airport, only to see a female attendant kneel in front of an urinal cleaning it, while a Japanese was using the urinal next to it... I don't know which of the two arrived first.

When I read the first part of the OP's story, I thought it was weird that an attendant would roll his or her cart into the bathroom just at the moment a customer was about to use it -- another difference in culture.

HTB.