Poop-idemic

There is a serious problem in Wuxi, and I don't know how to combat it, so I thought I'd come to my blog and complain. The problem is public pooping. You read that right.

Maybe it was the idiotic taxi driver I had today who drove me around for the better part of an hour in a vain search for the UPS store. Maybe it's the fact that this is the 75th straight cloudy/hazy/pollutiony day here in Wuxi. Maybe it's that I almost tripped on the sidewalk last week and had I fallen I would've face planted right into a fresh steaming sidewalk-turd.

But I'm in a bad mood and I'm not going to let this one pass because of "cultural differences" or whatever other BS people use to justify the crapola (literal and otherwise) sometimes encountered in China.

I was walking down Zhong Shan Lu last night, the biggest street right through the heart of downtown on my way to a friends apartment when what do I see? A mother, crouched down on the sidewalk, pulls down her baby's pants and gently taps its behind until nature takes its course. Right there on the sidewalk. In full view of everyone. And then she walked away, leaving the poop unattended, as if God, or nature, or some mystical force were responsible for the piece of shit and not she.

I've lived here almost three months and I've witnessed this spectacle dozens of times. Dozens. And no, I am not exaggerating the number for effect. It happens everywhere: sidewalks, public parks, restaurants...everywhere but the friggin WC, it seems.

Now I've only seen babies doing it, with their matronly accomplices, if that somehow excuses it in your eyes forgiving reader. I have heard tale of, but have yet to encounter first-hand, the mythical grandmother-public-poop. Given enough time I'm sure I will. I can't wait.

Come to think of it, tho, I can't imagine a better metaphor to describe Wuxi than to say that its residents shit all over it.