Typically my recipe for sweet relief is to always travel with one of these nifty packets in my purse. Tissues. You can pick some up from many of the street walking vendors.
Since I’ve been out on the road in the countryside of Senegal, I have not exactly found myself working in places that resemble the Grover Cleveland Rest Area. And I will admit, extensive travel in Africa and Asia leaves me more or less unfazed against most states of toilet or hole in the ground. Furthermore, you will be a bit reviled to learn that I developed impressive quad strength while out on many a college weekend where I was forced to utilize facilities with surfaces that were more or less inhospitable to my feminine configuration.
Have I given you Too Much Information yet? Good, because I’m not done (literally, as the case may happens to be).
Sure these buildings may boast a physical bathroom, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that things are in sound plumbing order. In fact, running water out here in the villages often becomes the exception.
Normally, une coupe d’eau– a lack of running water- can be overcome by stationing a supply of water next to the toilet….
…like with this bucket here. Today as I sat in another fisheries building and served as a budding maritime software translator, I was sad to discover that this bathroom facility had no water in zee toilet. Or in zee bucket. Merde. Maybe the sink for some magical reason will have working water that can help me with some gravity plumbing.
I think that there was moss or a great spiderweb growing out this drain. Ocean, ocean everywhere but not a drop to drink. Did I mention that I haven’t been feeling so well all day? Le sigh.
This marks day three of me working in buildings offering no running water. Of course I saw this situation unfolding long before I left Dakar last week- and while at home I usually down sugar free purple Kool-Aid like a dehydrated four year old- out here I’ve cut back significantly on my hydration. Not the smartest idea I know, but I’ll take this restriction over finding a bush that won’t shield me from a crowd of cute kids yelling “
toubab!” as soon as I step outside. If I’m on the road and in the middle of nowhere I have no problem popping a squat- but if I’m hanging out in the middle of a village, I’m just gonna have to suck it up. Literally.
And in case I’ve not yet brought this beloved blog down to a new all-time low, I will close by making one final observation: I finally get why I see so many Senegalese penes out on display as I make my way through my daily routine. Bathrooms are often a real luxury, and the men are downright lazy in terms of finding a low profile place to relieve themselves. I have never in my two years and three months living in Senegal seen a woman doing anything more than looking quite refined while out in public.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have somewhere that I’d like to go.
