Cool Shalimar and the Bum Gun

On the inside door of the toilet in my family home is a copy of the Bristol Stool Form Scale. It has six pictures of turds of varying viscosity. It appeals to our sense of humour, a low-tech version of ratemypoo.com. To my relief, after turbulent intestinal times in Thailand, my offerings have calmed and settled at around Type 3 to 4.

Thailand truly is the best place to have the shits. Next to the toilet, occasionally alongside the bog-roll and occasionally replacing it, sits the Bum Gun. The Bum Gun is a high-pressure hose with a trigger, identical to those you wash your car with, plumbed into the cistern. When you’ve done, you blast (like a portable bidet), dry off with a single sheet of paper and go on your way. If you’re going 10 times a day, it’s considerably more comfortable than wiping with scratchy tracing paper. I’m truly missing it, Vietnam has fewer. The Bum Gun is a modern version of the bucket and scoop, which you still see everywhere that doesn’t have a Bum Gun. Bit trickier, that one, especially if you’re wearing anything below the waist.

I am gobsmacked that I haven’t mentioned the Bum Gun sooner. But there it is, preserved as one of the defining memories of my tour. Allegedly if you know what you’re doing and have really high pressure you can be a bit more thorough and self-administer an enema. Something best left to the professionals, unless you want river water starting its own eco-system in your gut.

Speaking of rumblings, I stayed in the very cold and very quaint Dalat for three days. The second night I took to my bed early (I had been coughing and clucking, ruffling my feathers a little) and was settling down to sleep when my whole body shook. It was like a palpitation that started in my feet and carried up to my shoulders and neck. As soon as I noticed it, it had gone. Then it happened again five minutes later. And again. I was a little worried. It took me a good ten shakes to realise that my bed was rumbling, not me, in unison with the traffic on the road outside. There’s me, three floors up, insulated behind double glazing in a room with a carpet, and the bed shakes at the passing of anything bigger than a bicycle.

I am now in Nha Trang, which is a beach and a picturesque one, but the weather is not kind to us. It’s rainy season and the swell on the water is impressive enough to put me off diving for fear of more internal turmoil. Consequently there’s little to do, other than meet folk and share stories. I picked a restaurant on the basis of its flyer on my first night in town. “Mai Anh Restaurant,” the flyer read. “Your satisfaction is our food.” But the clincher was further down the page: “Fun for single people and kids (Tom and Jerry Cartoons.)” I went as a single person and enjoyed the cartoons very much, interrupted only briefly by meeting people. As these things so often turn out, the next day I found I had agreed to submerge myself in four feet of non-organic mud before jumping in hot mineral springs. The mud-baths proved to be a great conversation-starter and I was happy to have 14 new friends to eat dinner with that night. I missed the cartoons a little, though.

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“No prostitution, opium or other social evils allowed in the rooms.”

“Viet Nam Customs - forbidden: children’s toys having negative effects on personality development, social order and security.”

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Front desk tried to talk me out of staying at their hotel. They told me that yes, they did have a room but they were terribly sorry, it was very expensive. Disappointed, I thought I’d look at where I wouldn’t be sleeping and asked to see the room. Wow! Teak floorboards, scented candles, air-con, mini-bar the size of a house, sea-views, enormous bathtub, room service, free breakfast, 80-channel television and most importantly, really tasteful, done out like a French planter’s villa at the height of the Indochine period. Downhearted, I asked the price.

At 20 dollars a night, I think I might stay here forever …