What Do You Mean, "This Is The Bathroom"??

If I didn't have a proper toilet at home, I think my bladder would explode. This might fall into the "too much information" category, but I can't pee squatting. I guess there are muscles you need to relax when you pee that I just can't relax when I'm squatting. Or maybe it's the unusual environments I find myself in.

They're very laid-back when it comes to bodily functions here. When I was on the beach with Ouade and his sister Yasmine, we were walking towards the water when the little girl just squatted, moved her underwear to the side and peed right there on the beach without a second thought. !!

You really have to watch where you put your hands here, because nothing is really sanitary! I certainly realize how often I (used to) touch my face. No more of that. And I wash my hands at every opportunity.

You see men peeing on the side of the road all the time. Really makes you wonder what the women do when they have their period.

Last Sunday, after a day of drinking beer at the beach, I asked Roger if he could show me to the toilet, "Tu dois uriner?" Yes, I have to urinate. He brought me to the back of the restaurant where there was a kind of alcove with a concrete floor and a drain at one end. No door, no curtain, just 3 walls and a drain.

Um, do you have a real toilet?

Not understanding what I meant, he brought me to his house a block away where I met his dad, and he showed me to their bathroom. Same thing! A freaking hole in the floor! The beach bathroom was better than this one, but I wasn't going to say anything. So I peed a little bit, but couldn't really deal with being there too long, knowing that he was waiting for me outside. Happily I had kleenex with me in my bag and I was wearing a skirt, because otherwise it would all have been too much for me to handle. I admit I threw the kleenex on the ground when we made our way back to the beach because of course there was no where for me to get rid of the paper. I really don't want to know how they wipe. Really.

Later, Lud took me to Diana's to meet some of his friends and I thought, OH! There's gotta be a bathroom here. So I asked her where the toilet was and she pointed to an alcove right off the front patio. I walked in and again, an empty space with a drain in the corner. NOOO!! So I peed a little bit more and put my kleenex in an empty bucket on the ground. The bucket is normally full of water to throw on the ground when you're done, but it was empty so I used it to throw out my kleenex. There was a sink at the exit which I used to thoroughly wash my hands.

At work, the toilet closest to my office has a seat that broke off and is just sitting behind the toilet, so everytime I go I have to put the seat on. I had to clean it off cuz it was dusty and had cobwebs. The other toilets don't have seats. They all have toilet paper, soap and towels to wash your hands, which is great!

I am so not made for this. But I suppose I am. Humans went for a really really long time without sit-down toilets. I'm really glad I haven't gotten a bad case of diarrhea while I've been away from home! I DON'T UNDERSTAND WHERE THEY POO!!

I guess I'll have to practice squat-peeing at home. I have never felt so priveledged/spoiled/suburban. As if I don't know how to pee without sitting down!! What kind of human being am I?

Another thing I took for granted: I flush the toilet, my excrements magically disappear and I don't have to worry about them anymore.

Here the toilets gurgle when you run water in the kitchen sink and when someone flushes upstairs the toilet gurgles downstairs, really driving home the fact that all the plumbing is connected.

Like the garbage though - where does it all go? To a magic poo hell in the depths of the Earth? Honestly, I don't want to know where and if they treat the water here once it's flushed. I'll leave it to the poo gods and hope that when rainy season comes I don't get any drainage surprises.