T.P.

Research

I spent all of this week at a conference in Gaborone at a Government sponsored workshop on developing and implementing research projects in each of the districts in Botswana. It was at a reasonably high level and I guess as interesting as statistical analysis, quantitative and qualitative sampling can be. Each district brought its chief public health officer and HIV/AIDS officers, as well as one member of the community. Many brought their Peace Corps volunteers as well, since almost all of us had had exposure to research in one way or other. We were briefed on methodology and formed district groups to plan a research project which we would complete and present to a National seminar next May.

Our district came up with an interesting and potentially valuable study that will look at teenagers’ knowledge, outlook and willingness to be tested for HIV. Current BW law does not permit those under 18 to get an HIV test without parental consent. Virtually every healthcare worker thinks it is a bad law, but this is a fairly conservative country and the testing centers are bound by the law. Like virtually everywhere in the world, there are a number of sexually active teens under 18 who want to stay safe, yet do not want to have a dinner table conversation with their parents about their sexual activities. We hope with our survey we will generate data to go to the parliament to get the law changed. It would be a very worthwhile and productive outcome if things work out. Normally a week in a hotel for a Peace Corps Volunteer is a desirable treat, but in Africa, things never go according to expectations…..

T.P.

Question: What turns a fine honest upstanding man into a heartless thief without remorse inside of 10 seconds?

Answer: Why T.P of course

A little explanation might be in order………
I got my first, and hopefully last, bout of GI flu on Tuesday night at the conference. It almost surely was not related to food or water since Maureen had the same thing back in Ramotswa. Thankfully the purity and safety of the food and water is a non-issue here in Botswana. We have eaten and drank without any concern, wherever we have gone. So a virus it was, and from this episode I have learned a number of things:

--The GI flu here is virtually identical to the GI flu in the States. This was not a particularly comfortable insight. 'Nuff said.

--As might be expected, during the next 48 hours, I got on a first-name, up close and personal relationship with toilet paper (or T.P. as it is known both in English and Setswana)

--I had not spent much time pondering the issue, but I have now decided that T.P. here in BW is made out of construction paper coated with a few granules of gravel.

--No doubt in an effort to sell more T.P., the manufacturer of T.P. is particularly diabolical. Each roll has the outside sheets attached to the rest of the roll with a variation of super glue which penetrates down at least 15 more layers. This categorically precludes the possibility of opening the roll without digging down into the roll at least a half an inch in an attempt to rip off the first few sheets. After tugging, wrestling and ripping, the outside paper you obtain is a useless mass of shreds which are absolutely unusable for the intended purpose and is only suitable for mattress packing.

--Now, somewhat exhausted, you are left with approximately 2/3 of a roll, which you place back on the cylinder in the holder, but a new question emerges. What good are “perforations” in a T.P. roll if there is a zero probability that the paper will tear along the “perforations.” In fact the paper is unlikely to tear at all without the use of two hands. The usual one-handed T.P. snatch and rip which is often useful in the States is quite unproductive. Even in those rare instances when you are able to extract a mis-shapen shard of paper one-handed, the cylinder continues to unroll at lightning speed resulting in a massive pile of unrolled paper on the floor.

To solve this problem, one must therefore use two hands to get a usable piece of T.P. In Botswana however, the dispenser is never positioned in such a way that you can reach it with two hands without standing up or staying seated and executing a half-gainer combined with a full twist.


What does all this have to do with theft? Well, when you are at a conference at a nice lodge, there is only one thing worse than visiting the john every 60-90” ----this is urgently arriving at the john and realizing that there is not a single roll of T.P. in any stall. (This is a common, almost universal occurrence in BW)
-- Upon arrival in the bathroom, panic quickly sets in as you try to calculate the distance to the nearest alternate bathroom. Instinctively you begin to scurry out the door, but you are halted as you realize that this requires an extensive journey across open ground circumnavigating the swimming pool. The final decisive factor that stops you in your tracks is the knowledge that this second bathroom also may be totally out of T.P.
Logic, urgency and a desire to let the future take care of itself holds sway and you decide that a bird in the hand is worth public humiliation in the bush. You hustle back into the stall with urgent releas….er…. relief.

--With some time on your hands, you can now more slowly evaluate the consequences of your decision. You cautiously leave the confines of the stall and explore the options of T.P. substitutes. I don’t know exactly how this goes for women, but for men, this involves using your left hand to raise your shirt tail above your waist and using your right to tightly grasp your underwear, belt and trouser waistband in a manner that keeps them away from your posterior midsection, while keeping them from falling to the floor. You then assume a modified duck posture and waddle around the bathroom to carefully assess what assets you have at your disposal while feeling a distinct rearward cool draft. Pickings are slim. There are no towels, paper towels nor in fact is there anything that is not bolted to the walls. During this phase you are, of course simultaneously hopeful and terrified that someone will walk in. Hopeful because they could be a lifeline to go for T.P., but terrified as to how you will explain to them in broken Setswana why you look like you are walking around as an entrant in some kinky, half naked three-legged race.

Cultural creativity sets in and you recall bidets. You have never actually used one while in France, but you know that there is a whole segment of the world’s population that never uses T.P. at all, but simply wash themselves clean. This holds promise until you waddle over to the sink and begin to calculate just how high you will have to jump blindly backwards in a modified Fosbury Flop to achieve a somewhat soft landing on your rump directly in the sink with no margin for error. This would also risk sudden detection by a Motswana man walking in on you and you trying to explain your pose as “The Thinker” sitting backwards in the washroom sink with water running down your backside. Drying would also create a severe challenge since it would require an ankle-grabbing jack knife posture under the electric hand drier with your butt in the air high enough to trigger the motion activated blower. This almost certainly means jumping repeatedly with the hope that you can stay airborne long enough to trigger the ON switch. The whole bidet idea gets abandoned since you simply cannot come up with even a semblance of a rational reason to explain to a non-English speaking intruder why the crazy white guy is repeatedly trying to hop into the air to reach the air blower with his butt.

--Rationality is gradually turning into desperation as you begin to waddle out of the men’s room and call for help in the ladies room. No such luck as everyone is in the lunch line for food. You briefly consider opening the one remaining door to the outside world until you realize that it opens directly onto the end of the buffet line where all your esteemed colleagues are filing past with full plates of food in hand.

--I will not get into the grizzly details of the end of this saga, but you resolve that it will never happen again, and before lunch is finished, you go on a hunt to discover which bathroom might have T.P.

--Your first two attempts come up empty, but at last you strike it rich. There is a hidden away, little used bathroom where a stall has one precious roll of the blessed stuff. You feel as if you have won the Mega-Bucks, hit the Comstock Lode, found the Treasure of Sierra Madre and stumbled onto the Holy Grail. Now without even a wisp of compunction, you grab the roll and surreptitiously put it into your pocket for personal, portable fail-safe protection, without which you will not go anywhere for the next day or two.

--No this is not my personal T.P. Yes this is T.P. that the Lodge has put there for everyone to use and it is technically stealing, but do you care? Nnaaahhh! As you exit, do you spend any time contemplating the fact that you have absconded with the only salvation of the next poor bloke who follows you? Nnaaahhh. It only takes a few seconds of “finders, keepers” to rationalize this dastardly theft. Besides doesn’t Adversity Build Character? This next guy coming down the hall looks like he needs more character anyway.

--Not wanting to be the total ugly American, you do tell him that there is no T.P. in this bathroom, and that you will inform the Lodge staff about the problem. The man suddenly looks ashen and quickly hurries off in the other direction. This is because he knows that the request will be acted upon in “Botswana Time” which means there should be a new roll replaced a week from next Thursday.
.
--So I am now a heartless felon. I no longer care about anyone’s welfare but my own. My conscience has been silenced and I have begun the inevitable slide down the slippery slope into further crime and debauchery. What’s next? Hotel room towels? Pictures off the wall? Multiple copies of Gideon’s Bible? I fear I am doomed to a progressive descent into depravity. Although I believe that I will have enough self control to avoid committing buggery with a hippopotamus, you will undoubtedly soon catch sight of my mug shot on BW Wanted posters for bank stick-ups, insurance fraud and car-jackings.

Kgosi