At Least the Toilet Seat Wasn't Freezing....

So, today was a little touch of reality.

It is cold. Very cold. Not Alaska cold. Not Siberia cold. But it is cold. Down in the teens cold outside, in the low 60's cold inside. Sitting around the house wearing three layers plus an afghan cold. It feels warmer outside than inside cold. I wonder if my fish are going to survive this cold. Cheyenne thinks we are abusing her cold. Shiver me timbers cold - except, I don't think that one quite fits.

Russia and Ukraine continue to argue about gas. At least we still have gas, which is more than Bulgaria can say. We heard that the heating plants shut down completely in Sophia, Bulgaria. Here they have just turned our heat down so low that in public buildings pipes are actually freezing.

Which happened at the place we are currently meeting for church. I, of course, had two cups of coffee this morning, plus drank some water. Church doesn't start until 1:00 now so I thought I was safe. Made sure to do potty stops before we left the flat. Got to church, first thing I see: a sign on the doorjamb that leads to the basement saying the туолет не робетет - or in English - Toilet not working, or Toilet out of order or something along that line.

I knew, right at that very instant, without a shadow of a doubt that I would need a toilet before we got home again.

Sure enough, about half way through the service, sitting there in a heavy sweater over a turtleneck, wearing my heaviest coat and boots and jeans, it hit. Cold. Cold induced bladder overwork. Brrrr - I really need to go right this exact instant help me please!.

Sergei announced before the service started that the toilet was not working and if anyone needed one there was one located next door at the school. So, I understood all of that. I thought I understood which school it was, too. You see, there is a school on each side of the place we are meeting. So, as we stood after the closing prayer and before the singing could start again, I hurried forward and asked Valentina to go with me and help me find the toilet. She is my translator during Sunday School and I wanted to get back before the group of kids arrived for Sunday School. And if I needed to talk to someone about said toilet when we got to the school, I wanted someone who could hurry the process. :) :)

We went outside (she made me snap my coat closed although it felt warmer to me outside than inside). We walked over toward the school on the left, but we couldn't see any way through the fence. So we walked back over toward the school on the right. There was a group of guys out playing soccer in the snow there and she asked them where the front door was and they pointed in "that" direction. We walked around the building. We walked up to the front door. It was locked. She pounded on the door - but no one came to open it.

I was starting to do a little jig by then, but figured we would just have to have a very short Sunday School - or maybe I could find a secluded spot out behind the school somewhere or something......

We went back in to our meeting place. When the service totally ended I asked Sergei where the toilet was at and Valentina explained what we had done and he said, no, it was the wrong school, go to the one on the left.

About that time Jamie left with Timmy and we kind of followed them out the door. And then they went a bit farther than we did and lo and behold there was actually a hole in the fence over there that was the gate and voila! we were in the school yard and walking over across the empty playground toward the school.

But wait! Valentina explained to me that we were not going to the school, we were going to that little building over there at the side. That little building, I asked and she said, no - that one was a garage, no - that one over there inbetween the garage and the school. Oh! Gotcha! THAT one. The one without a door!

And so I was reminded of where I live. I don't live in modern America. I don't live in the wilds of Alaska. I live in Kherson. Where a school has an outdoor toilet without a door. In the middle of a city of 400,000+ people. Yep. For sure.

BUT it was not a little outhouse without a door. No. It was a big outhouse without a door. A 7 or 8 holer outhouse. Without inside partitions. Without toilets. Without water. Just holes in a cement floor on the ground. No heat - unless it's summer time. No electricity, no lights - except for whatever light came in from the doorframe without a door and I think there was actually a very dirty window as well, but I might be wrong about that.

I was very focused, you see, and really didn't waste a lot of time looking around. And to be frank, I've been in much worse toilets here. This one was not too bad. It was not very dirty at all. Just a little unusual in that it could hold so many people at one time, with no partitions between the holes in the floor and no door on the outside door. Community, you know, - living in total community....

The one great thing about these kinds of toilets - at least the toilet seats aren't freezing when you sit down.

ha ha ha (Hysterical laughter) Sit down. ha ha ha No way, Jose! I couldn't help but think of the toilet room - ok, the restroom - at our home church in the States. I remember the last time we were there - winter and it's like someone had turned off all the heat in the restroom for some reason. The toilet seats were, uh, lets just say no one wanted to spend very much time in there. :) ha ha ha

Oh my. I am mentally wiping the laugh tears from my internal eyes. It is halarious to me. But maybe you have to be here?

The only thing - and I mean that - the ONLY thing that bothered me was that Valentina was so embarrassed by it all, feeling like Ukraine was so backward and horrible and how this must have been so awful for me. No! NO! Not even a little bit. I laugh now, but I never thought it was horrid or awful. I'm just glad there was some place I could go! I've seen a lot of outhouses in my life - in campgrounds, in Alaska, in Ukraine, all across the Western half of the US out in the woods. I just wish it had not been so painful for her to be with me.

I also wish The McGowan family had still been here. I think they could have used a little more cultural learning. (Don't you, John and Martita??? You've been 'south of the border' so I have a feeling it would not have been all that shocking to you, just unusual, as it was for me.)

ha ha ha ha ha ha

Oh my. :)