When I say desperate in the title, I mean really desperate. Can’t-hold-it-in-any-more desperate. I’m-about-to-piss-myself desperate. Perhaps the following will explain why.

During the October national holiday week, after failing to book train tickets anywhere on account of them being sold out, we decided to get a bus to Yining, in the predominantly-Kazakh Yili prefecture. The journey itself was fairly standard; as good as one might hope six or seven hours on a hot and crowded bus to be.

The landscape rolling past was farmland, followed by sandy wind farms, followed by grasslands leading off into snowy mountains and sapphire lakes. Inspiring stuff. We passed a recently-added suspension bridge two times: once across it, and once underneath, having looped around the mountainside. Past that we were properly into the hills. It’s a pity we were only able to snatch a couple of photographs through the dusty bus windows; I scrapped most because of the reflected glare.

This was all very pleasant; Becca and I kept ourselves occupied writing, dozing, and enjoying the scenery. And then we stopped for lunch at a remote roadside cafe. Feeling hungry, but also needing to relieve myself, I joined the line of fellow passengers following the signs for the W.C. around the back of the building.

The loos were perched at the top of a steep incline and overhung a bank onto the fields beyond – a simple drainage system for the – uh – ‘waste’. Upon reaching the front I was greeted with a smell defying description and realised, to my horror, that it originated from three small toilet-shaped holes in the floor of the men’s. I made the mistake of looking down one of these holes to a sight now etched into my corneas (I’ve tried bleach but nothing seems to work): a stinking, sloppy stack of turds, toilet paper, and a rather worrying amount of blood. Someone needs a cancer screening, that’s all I’m saying.

Trying desperately not to add a significant amount of puke to the pile, and realising that the other occupants of the room were waiting intently for me to start (apparently curiosity in the size of Westerners’ genitals is not unusual), I hastily retreated to the relative breathability of the cafe. It actually saved me money on lunch, though, as it took several hours for me to regain any semblance of appetite.

On the way back I was wise to this danger and stayed put firmly by the bus. This didn’t do much for my nerves, as the driver was hastily taping some piping back to the underside of the bus, but I deemed anything to be better than returning to those loos. Becca was somewhat braver. I can’t imagine the women’s will have been any better.

—TJC

Featured image: Becca and I on the coach to Yining.