I Almost Avoided Shitting Myself In India, and So Can You.

I have probably written of it before, but I went to India in the June of 2012. I had to look that up as my date memory is famously shitty. Reading the visa application form is, at three years later, like relearning something about yourself. I am an un-married atheist, for the record.

Anyway, I am sure if and when I did write on this before that mentioned I was going for a friends wedding. Which, in my opinion, is about the best reason to go to India. I got to dress very colourfully (and on the cheap), saw a monkey at the ceremony and fought over a shoe. Just splendid.

India was splendid also, what a country. In some ways it is kind of an unknown unknown, something you think you know but don't. At least you don't know the extent of its awesomeness. Everything is cheap, for a start, and it is hard to imagine many places where getting ripped off feels entirely reasonable. The bars don't kick you out after two beers, you can smoke in the bars, they do this spiced nut combo version of bar nuts. I guess it is fair to say I had a fair bit of fun in the bars.

But the country, at least what I saw of it, is splendid also. After hitting Europes hot-spots the year before it was nice not to see another Australian. I saw two white people (not connected to the wedding or my party) while I was there. I cannot mention the food, it is tough for me in the same way as reminiscing on a dead relative.

Now to brass tacks. What was not so splendid was what we call Delhi Belly. I am pretty sure more than the food was to blame, but I shan't elaborate as I may incriminate myself.

I had become used to, and an avid fan of, the Indian method of wiping ones bottom. That is, ironically, not a wipe at all but a purpose built tap to wash out the orifice once defecation has taken place. I found it works better than any deck of shit-tickets I have come across and, on the whole, seems a more economic option. I saw one in the house of an Japanese friend of ours and was, to say the least, overjoyed.

But naturally, like the kidney shaped swimming pool or the self-cleaning oven, the shitter tap is not afforded every home or venue. In India, at least in Bangalore, proceedings are stretched longer than they are here in Australia. Here, be it our penchant for alcoholism or our busy and important lives, the 'Special Day' is just that, a day.

In India, it is more like a week. They know how to commemorate and or party. The day of the wedding is, traditionally and from what I have learned, teetotal and sober. The day after is what we would call the 'reception'. A meal and money on the bar. The latter appealed to me so I hooked in

We had danced a lot the night before, me never really grasping the Indian style. Im no natural dancer, all the more proved by the style and grace of the Indians. I was well and truly punching above my weight.

The next day, the reception, there was more dancing but it was more relaxed. It felt less like anyone cared and so I, particularly after the open bar, let loose. And somewhere in the throng of emo tion, colour, smiles and splashed drinks my bowel hit red alert. I rushed to the toilet and did my devils work looked for the little shower I was used to.

I instead found an ice-cream tub full of water. I washed up the best I could and thought hard on sacrificing a shirt or a pair of jocks. I was shocked, this place was like a god-damned Novotel, and it didn't have the cool little shower head.

Cigarettes have done a good number on my sense of smell but emerging from the primitive toilet I immediately smelled myself and thought of going home. I opted instead to go and smoke and hope good company would eventually need to smoke also.

As a smoker I am used to sitting out of nose-shot of others, but this was something else. Among smokers I had to sit further away. Pretty young women sat next to me to have cigarettes and I did my best to manufacture a reason to move.

Eventually my friends and I left and the crisis was over. Except that we were due in two days to go further south, an eight hour bus ride. I enquired about toilets.

'Well it stops every couple of hours' my Indian friend deadpanned back to me.

At that point every couple of hours might as well have been every couple of days. I couldn't leave a perimeter that wasn't within running distance of a toilet. To their credit, my friends stayed with me.

I had been there two and a half weeks and could not believe this hadn't happened sooner. I spent three days on the toilet. I almost got away with it, my weak guts almost conquered India.

And I would've gotten away with it, if not for those scheming kids.

NP.