Hello Potty
Dear Hello Potty,
Last week I traveled with my Filipino roommate Fely to Inner Mongolia. Last week was China’s National Week, during which the whole country has a week vacation to celebrate the 1949 founding of the People’s Republic of China. Probably half of the 3 days was spent on the bus, driving down alternatively smooth, bumpy, or nearly nonexistent roads. This was my very first guided tour, you know, the kind where you all travel together on a bus, and no one knows each other, and everyone has cameras hanging around their necks, and there are quick fifteen-minute potty stops and the tour guide harriedly yells “Fifteen minutes!! Only fifteen minutes!!” (Only in this case it was “Shiwu fenzhong! Nimen zhiyou shiwu fenzhong!!” Same difference).
And on one of these famed fast-forward potty stops, I met you, my dear Hello Potty! I walked into the restroom, and there you were! Five lovely squatty potties, with no stalls, no doors, no dividers. A Hello Potty! You squat down to do your business, and then turn to the squatter next to you and say “Hello!” So i just pretended that this was a normal everyday occurrence, nothing out of the ordinary, except perhaps a little breezier than usual…. Really, dear Hello Potty, you’re not that bad!
The first night, we slept in yurts, those round Mongolian tenty things, and just about froze our pattooties off. We ate extremely fresh lamb (maaa-maaa-dont eat me-maaa) and rode horses for several hours, which chafed our pattooties off. Poor pattooties. Anyway, we enjoyed some horse milk candy and milk wine, both Mongolian specialties. Then we drove several hours into the desert, where we rode camels and enjoyed insulated walls and drowned in sand (I think there is still some in my ears). The return trip was ten hours back to Beijing, which suddenly appeared to me the cleanest, best-smelling, most civilized city I had ever seen in my life. Beijing Beijing, I love Beijing!
So, that’s my trip to Inner Mongolia in a nutshell. Til we meet again, Hello Potty!
Bethany