Photo of the Week #10 – My Bathroom

The Ghanaian 5 pesewa coin (less than 4 cents) has a special role in my daily life: 5p is what it costs me to use the public toilet across the street from my house. So, in Canada, I don’t think I EVER talked about toilets, or anything even remotely related to the bodily functions that require their use. In Ghana, that all changed; these subjects frequently come up as normal dinner conversation. And I’ll warn you now, it’s not pretty.

The public toilet building is known as a “10 seater” (even though there are no seats) and was built by the Christian Children’s Fund of Canada (illustrating how omnipresent development agencies are in Tamale). There are 10 holes in the ground on both the men’s and women’s sides separated by concrete walls on three sides (like a line of bathroom stalls with no doors).

 

With no exaggeration, the first time I went inside I nearly threw up. There was shit everywhere. Everywhere. 8 out of the 10 holes were full and the centimeter long maggots that characterize every latrine on earth were having a freaking field day. I’m sure you can imagine the smell. When I went to use one of the not-full holes, maggots crawled up and swam about in my pee.

There were flies landing on me and all I could think about was what those flies had landed on before they got to me. Oh, it was horrible. I made a mental note to scout the nearby fields for potential “free-range” locations telling myself it would be like camping.

About a week later (after using my free range spot under cover of darkness), a man started sitting out side of the toilet and charging 5 pesewa for its use. In the light of day I had no other choice so I went to see him, paid my 5p and was OVERJOYED at what I saw: A (relatively) clean toilet. The shit was gone. The smell was better. The flies were barely noticeable. And only 5 of 10 were full. And I’m thinking “Wow, buddy, I will happily pay you whatever you want as long as you keep these toilets looking like this!” And this is why 5p will always hold a special place in my heart and my intestines.

As a dénouement to this tale, I see this guy on a (hopefully) regular basis. He always smiles and tries to get a conversation going (“Ah, I didn’t see you yesterday, are you constipated?” or “Second time this morning. You are running.”). It’s a bit strange, I mean, considering the circumstances, and often I’m in a bit of a rush but I think it shows how not self-conscious Ghanaian culture is about bodily functions that Canadian culture is really uptight about.

Another way to illustrate this is through how many breasts I have seen since arriving (sorry guys, no photos for this one).

Breast-feeding women have no shyness about suckling their baby in front of you and even absent-mindedly leaving their breast hanging out of their dress after the baby is done. To me this is an un-self-conscious acceptance of the reproductive role that women play and I see it as a real freedom to publically display this maternal ability. 

Any chance of this becoming more accepted in Canada any time soon? <<Sigh>> Probably not, eh?