Stinky Pile of Poo

LÜN, Mongolia — I don't need to say what's absent from a Mongolian rest stop, but I will anyway. No McDonald's, no Sbarros, no chain restaurants selling foot-long sandwiches, no refillable Big Gulp glasses that hold more than a liter of soda and cost under a dollar, no windshield wiper fluid or premium grade gasoline, no friendly Mexicans who wave as they mop the filthy floors. This is not a place for swanky service - here, a rest stop is classy if it has a bathroom.

(Disclaimer: The following post contains some frank discussion of human bodily functions. If offended, please don't continue — but keep in mind Everyone Poops.)




There's no room for the picky eater on the wide open Mongolian transportation system. On our first day, we left Ulaanbaatar in the mid-morning and were off the pavement less than half an hour later. When the sun made it to the highest point in the sky, Bobby, our de-facto guide, turned around and posed a question.

"There is a place where we can have lunch. It may not be open. Should we stop?"

Our stomaches, rattled though they may be from our van's questionable shocks, demanded nourishment. And since we had not passed an eating establishment for hours, we could not be choosy. Fortunately, the small wooden house optimistically called a café was open, and we took seats at the largest of three tables inside.

Traditional Mongolian dishes were served, or more to the point, a traditional Mongolian dish. After having the group study the menu for five minutes, Bobby emerged from the kitchen to inform us that we would be eating mutton stew with a side of rice. We stopped by on New Year's Day, and were not surprisingly the only customers. That meant freshly prepared food, and we had to wait for the stout chef to cut every hunk of meat and simmer an appropriate amount of time. Mongolian wrestling, live from Ulaanbaatar, was the only distraction on the television. I watched for several minutes as two obese men attempted to force each other out of a ring. I now understand why many top sumo wrestlers are Mongolian.

The rumbling on the set caused a rumbling in my bowels. This was a bit unusual, as I believe my intestinal track has a sixth sense and intuitively knows when I'm entering a new territory. I normally have two, sometimes three days in unfamiliar ground before I need an outhouse. Out on the steppe, I got just six hours.

Asked about a bathroom, the chef pointed out the window towards nowhere. I walked outside, expecting to pop a squat in an open field, but instead I followed the specified plane and saw a small brown shed a couple of hundred meters in the distance. On closer inspection, the structure used the same primitive log cabin design as the restaurant, except here the boards seemed thrown together rather than carefully laid out. The latrine had three sides, an open entrance which meant relieving oneself while facing The Great Outdoors, and a low ceiling. Once inside, I surprisingly smelled no odor; the waste was frozen solid.

I did my business, and then looked down into the hole. In a hole that appeared eight feet deep, there was a long, thin pile of poo reaching six feet back toward the earth. It was the refuse of thousands of protein-rich meals, all ejected in the same alignment.

I did some quick mental math: at this rate, the latrine could be overflowing before spring. And then I had a new candidate for world's worst job: knocking down a frozen pile of feces in the bottom of a cesspit. What tool would be right for the job? A hoe, maybe a spade. Maybe that wouldn't be enough to cut through the solid matter. Perhaps an ax would be needed, or pots of boiling water to soften the mound.

I should be thankful. The latrine's three walls protected my nether regions from the biting winds, and there was no chance that any fecal matter would accidentally wind up on my shoes. Mongolia isn't the most developed country in the world, but they haven't let the shit overflow — yet.