It has recently come to my attention that next year, the ‘Year of the Rat’, we are to have an Olympic Games in Beijing, China. On Australian TV we are being subjected to that little rat bastard himself, Jackie Chan, leaping about ('cos he does his own stunts right, he's that fucking cool) over the heads of normal everyday folk trying to view the spectacular sight of Olympic glories, all because he wants a better seat. Now, I'm pretty sure that if anyone can get a good seat at the Olympics, it's going to be 'The Chan'. He's like their biggest export behind, erm, food, but this isn’t the point I'm here to rant about. What worries me more than anything about this forthcoming Olympics is that people in attendance who choose to venture out of the big cities like Beijing or Shanghai are going to be dramatically affected in such a way that they may never be the same again.

China is a land of little shame. I spent some time there last year in and around Fujian province, and it was an eye-opener for me in many, many ways. The first thing I noticed on arrival is that people spit the biggest loogies right in your face when you're talking to them (not in your face as such, but on the floor… now that would be an eye-opener… or eye-closer, as the case may be…), often coughing up lungs, the odd pancreas and other organs considered non-essential. They carry on with this spitting whether it be it on the bus, in a shop, in your room, while eating dinner in restaurants, anywhere- girls, boys, rich, poor, everyone! Man, it takes some getting used to, I tell ya’, but after a few days YOU can do it too, and you do! It's great, and no one bats an eyelid. I spat up half a crab on the floor while eating in a 'restaurant' there -just because I wanted to- and locals looked at me like they were pleased! I was fitting in, and it went down a treat with the locals who embraced me by spitting even more!

But that's not the worst of it. On some trains it gets so crowded you can’t move at all. Sure there’ll be a seat here or there containing the inevitable old-time farmer with random animals on his lap (my nearest neighbor had a wicker basket full of ducks on a string, hung nonchalantly from his arm, and not paying them a care in the world), but the rest of the carriage generally contains an assortment of regular townspeople crushed together far too close, so much so that it almost gets sexually ‘interesting’. Inevitably on these trains, amid all the usual spitting and (excessive) littering, there also comes a point at which some passengers need to go the toilet. Seeing as moving is pretty much impossible with no one budging from their spot for anything, when you gotta' go, they'll go just there. On your shoe if need be, not on purpose of course (them trains really roll about) but you can guarantee that if they're next to you, you’re going to be sharing more than just floor space, floor space that becomes a soaking mess of phlegm, rubbish and piss, slopping about and soaking into your trousers. Now I personally cannot imagine the shock experienced by a gaggle of Olympic tourists who, like me, also had the misfortune of being unable to read ticket information at the station (which, of course, is only written in Chinese) and ended up in 3 rd class putting up with these lovely conditions. I had a really hard time with it, and I'm a person who's usually into things like that, so God help those poor bastards.

This neatly brings me to a wonderful experience I had a few days later. I'd met some guy -an Israeli- on the bus. He was the first non-Chinese person I'd 
seen for 10 days, I hadn't spoke to anyone at all barring a few words of Mandarin I'd picked up -'good morning' and all that carry on- and no-one had spoken any English to me for a long time, so we made friends. He was okay, a bit up his own arse, in the 
Army (shooting kids for throwing stones, was it?), the usual shit. Anyway, 
after six hours, the deluxe 'European Style' bus I'd plumped for (after them fucking trains) pulled up for a piss-stop. Now the toilets on the bus absolutely stank/were broken, and I'd been cultivating a little brown baby for a good couple of hours, so was pretty ready to go. The 
Israeli guy (called ‘Orr’, I think) was in the same predicament due to the toxic mix of local food and hygiene he’d encountered during his stay so we were off, straight into the second worst toilet I've ever seen in my life, the bus having been the worst.

It was basically a ditch -like a trough on the floor- no partitions, no walls, just one, long, stinking trench. Great, I thought, at least I can't miss my target. We both headed to one 
side of the trench each, politely kept away from each other and put in some good distance between us as was deemed proper in desperate times and took to trot. Pretty much as soon as we got 'on the case', however, this tiny little guy came in and started laughing his fucking head off at the fact that there were two (TWO!) tourists taking a shit in the trench. Sure enough, over he came, positioned himself about 10cm away from me, dropped his pants and proceeded to give the most astounding show of taking a dump ever known to 
man, grunting, groaning, wheezing, farting, splattering, all whilst chatting 
away to me in what I assumed was Mandarin, though I was obviously unable to understand a thing he was saying and was still busy wondering why it was he'd decided to take a seat practically on my lap. Then, much to my own surprise as well as to Orr -who'd been busy giggling at my 
newfound predicament- the Chinese shitter scooted over, holding it in I guess, wheezing and grunting and 
farting (now sweating too), all the while still laughing and talking onehundredmilesanhour before he took up a new position on the trench and continued to chat and shit beside my Israeli companion.

Orr spoke a little Chinese, so he made some conversation (fuck knows what 
they were talking about in the trench loo) till he was interrupted by the guy who, finished, jumped up very abruptly (did he wipe? I don't know) and began pointing at Orr's cock while squealing with delight. Now, I believe that people from Israel are generally Jewish, so their men have thusly had a certain part of their member chopped off when young. The Chinese don’t have all that much chopping going on, and I guess it was all pretty new for our friend who promptly ran out to 
grab a buddy from outside and show him what he’d discovered missing on Orr's pole. We were trying to finish up quickly at this point but poor Orr couldn't leave before the final whistle, so he had to sit/squat while both of these Chinese gents -one fresh from a fabulous fecal face-off- pointed, laughed, stared at and debated his circumcised penis until he’d finished his business a good ten minutes later. 


Do I know the meaning of shame? No way, man, not after my experiences in China. There is no such thing as shame for me any more. I can never be embarrassed again and I will happily take a dump in any toilet you can offer me, anywhere because I've been to China. Between all the spitting, train phlegm, shoe-pissings and toilet-trench voyeurs I’ve seen the worst there is, and I now know a little about what it is to be desensitized. Just think of the gains in this respect that all those tourists will soon also be making come the Beijing Olympics in 2008. What a great nation, what a marvelous culture.