Russia, Mongolia, China - The Trans-Mongolian intestinal express
This is the story of the shittiest trip I've been on. It's not shitty in that it was shit - it was great in fact, but involved great piles of shit emenating from our shitters.

Me and a friend decided to go on a trip on the Trans Mongolian train to Beijing stopping off at a few places along the way. Lots happened on the trip so I'll just give you the shitty hilights. For me, the big D started in Moscow and lasted right to the end. The further along I went, the worse the toilet-facilities became. For some reason, toilet paper has only managed to travel as far east as the Russian border, and even further east, there's a toilet-seat border. One useful tip when travelling to a shitty part of the world. Share a single roll of toilet paper with your group that's about to run out. By forcing the discussion of your bog-roll usage habits with your mates, you overcome your squeamishness of talking about number twos.

Irkutsk (Russia): Desperate for a watery poo, I went into the only toilet in a nearby pizza-place. There was no toilet paper (alas, I forgot to ask my friend if I could be the bearer of the shared roll). The toilet had no toilet-paper, but it was the only toilet in the whole building. I was desperate so in I went. When I finished, I decided to look through the bin for anything I could use. I saw a used sanitary pad wrapped in toilet-paper (why do they bother wrapping them up before chucking them in the bin I do not know), unwrapped the toilet paper and used that to wipe my bottom (the paper - not the pad). Must have spent 10 minutes occupying the only toilet and didn't order any food (but in my defense, me and my friend did come back there later for a pizza).

Mongolia: The land of the poo, steppe, poo, nomads, poo, Airag and lots more poo. If you ever get out into the countryside and look on the ground, it can only be described as a turd pot-pourri (there are some truly amazing landscapes out there too, but that's besides the point). Looking at all these turds, I was starting to get jealous. How do all these animals manage to curl out such lovely solid turds when all my arse does is piss rusty water?

Anyway, we stayed with a couple of local nomads. We were offered some Airag. Basically, it's fermented mare's milk, but in my eyes, it was yet another diarrhoea-starter. I still took several sips. My friend and some other backpackers who had joined our group took a more gung-ho approach. Afterwards, my friend was starting to have severe arse-difficulties too.

The Mongolian landscape, although it's a giant toilet, does not offer any means of protecting your modesty. There's no trees or bushes anywhere - just an endless frozen sea of light-green hills. What we did was to take it in turns to climb over a large hill and use the hill to block the view of other nearby humans and just hope nobody comes over the next hill to see our naked bottoms hovering in mid air. Squatting does take a bit of practice to get used to. One thing I've discovered is that it must be easier to shit and piss at the same time if you're a woman because you have to use one hand to hold your willy downwards to prevent you from pissing all over your trousers, whereas women can use the second hand for additional balance. In a forest where only #1 is required, men have it easier - just whip it out and go (yes, I'm aware of this but I'd immagine it would take some concentration), but in the steppe with a bum like a firecracker, it's a different story alltogether. One thing I did learn is that it's possible to wear a type of coat that when in the squatting position reaches to the ground. This not only protects your modesty but keeps you warm as well. I never tried it but I'd immagine that being male, I'd have to put a hand inside so I don't piss on the inside of the coat.

As well as diarrhoea, I also was suffering from constipation. This makes it very hard to pick the appropriate medicine. Anti-diarrhoea medicine has constipation as a side effect, and anti-constipation medicine has diarrhoea as a side effect. Needless to say, I let nature take it's course and chose to go un-medicated. It was like I was turning myself inside out by shtting my entire body through my poohole. Constipation was just as bad. I often wished I had Anal Dynamite so I could unblock the blockage and force it out.

China: Worse was to come. If you've never seen a Chinese public toilet - don't. It can be best described as a crime against hygene. They consist of an unpartitioned trough at the side of the room and everyone shits together comunally and unpartitioned. I saw one with shit spattered on the side of the wall. I can only immagine they must have had an explosive dump while touching their toes.

The train journey to the Chinese border was pretty uneventful. However, the Chinese are renowned for inventing torture-devices. I experienced one such device - a Chinese Sleeper bus. Once I got to the Chinese town of Erenhot (Erlian) in Inner Mongolia, I transfered onto a bus. I stayed in town for a few hours unable to find anything even remotely resembling a decent cable-laying facility. It's a pity my standards hadn't dropped sooner, because by the time I was on the bus, I felt like I was going to explode. There was a toilet on the bus, but that was quickly declared out of order. One thing I learned after 3 or so weeks of continuous diarrhoea is that the best way to prevent it was to only allow my body to be in certain shapes and orientations. If you feel like bursting for a shit, either stand upright, like flat on your back, or sit such that the back/leg-top angle and the leg-top/leg-bottom angle is 90 degrees. Also, I had a bottle of ice-cold water (thankfully, when I bought it in Erlian, it was just a block of ice in a plastic bottle), and putting that on my stomach helped a bit (probably cooled down the expanding gasses) but had to not over-use it or the ice would melt. To make things worse, the road to Beijing was extremely bumpy. In fact it was so bumpy that there were times when gravity couldn't keep up and I nearly collided with the bunk-bed on top of me. I wanted the bus to slow down so I wouldn't be thrown about but on the other hand, I wanted the bus to speed up so I could reach a decent thunderbox quicker. After several hours, we made a rest stop. It was dark by then so I had more options. Eventually, I found a hidden place (which turned out to be somebody's vegetable garden) and had one constipated shit (hardly anything came out). I told my friend and he too had a dump in the vegetable garden, and unlike me, it all came out. Lucky get!

After 16 hours, we finally reached the Urban Sauna that is known as Beijing. Due to an oversight, we ended up in a suburb so we had to get a local bus to get us to the hostel. I still hadn't pood by this time. The bus was the appropriately numbered number two bus. We walked the rest of the way and due to Chinese streets being well hidden, we took a detour that added at least 1km to our route. We finally got to the hostel. I wasn't going to wait until we had a place, I just dashed to the shitters and let it all loose. It turned out that there were no places for us but in the time it took to find that out, I must have gone to the bogs on three separate occasions. After about 6 hours since we got to Beijing, we finally found a place to stay. It was a 2 bed room with it's on private bathroom. My diarrhoea was recovering, but my friend was getting worse. Unlike me who suffered in the open steppe and the sleeper-bus, my friend suffered it in the comfort of a bed with easy access to a western sit-down toilet. Jammy get!

Needless to say, any time we have arse-difficulties, we refer to it as Mongolian Bumhole.


Apologies for length and smell and general crap-ness.
( mistaspakkaman and the inedible shifting caterpillars, Fri 28 Mar 2008, 13:41, 8 replies)

They get wrapped in paper
because otherwise they stick to the bin, and some poor fucker would have to peel them off.
( Madam Marlboro wonders if you've found her yet, Fri 28 Mar 2008, 13:54, closed)

it all comes floading back
oh sweet lord, the sleeper bus from Erlian. Hellish. Utterly hellish.

As for Mongolia - I had a similar problem. No amount of airag and chinggis fags could encourage my intestines to move. I blame the noodles.
( crackhouseceilidhband Fuck off back to Mumsnet, Fri 28 Mar 2008, 14:15, closed)

this is why I don't travel anymore
The problems outweigh the pleasures for me
(frankspencer, Fri 28 Mar 2008, 14:33, closed)

@Madam Marlboro
You learn something new about what women are taught every day on b3ta. One wonders if there's a secret women's academy where they learn about things that men never learn, and if so, are they also plotting to take over the world?
( mistaspakkaman and the inedible shifting caterpillars, Fri 28 Mar 2008, 14:37, closed)

@crackhouseceilidhband
I'm glad the sleeper bus from Erlian still rates as 'utterly hellish' on your scale despite your experience in Lybia. All I have to say is this:

I bow down before your superior arse-difficulties o' Flowing-Robe clad Frigging Messiah of Bodily Abuse.

.
( mistaspakkaman and the inedible shifting caterpillars, Fri 28 Mar 2008, 14:45, closed)

No secret academy needed;
it's just common sense. Fanny hammocks have adhesive backs, so a rolled-up one will stick to things. You're supposed to re-wrap it in its wrapper, which has a sticky tag on it so you can stick it to itself and it won't come unrolled.
( Bob Todd whee, Fri 28 Mar 2008, 14:51, closed)

@frankspencer
Don't forget about rosy retrospection. Fortunately, I remember the trip in a more positive light than what I describe above, but alas for me, these days I've only got one of the time or the money (but never both at the same time) to do another trip like that.
( mistaspakkaman and the inedible shifting caterpillars, Fri 28 Mar 2008, 14:53, closed)

@mistaspakkaman
I am going to spend the weekend writing Chapter 1 of Book 1 of my Wible. That, and drilling holes in things.
( crackhouseceilidhband Fuck off back to Mumsnet, Fri 28 Mar 2008, 19:27, closed)