The back seat of a small car speeding down a winding, precipitous Bhutanese road is a fine place for worry.   In the wee tiny moments between waves of nausea and fear of a flaming free-fall into a wooded abyss, other anxieties still poke their way to consciousness.  

Leaping leeches for example.  The ones that fold into an advanced yoga pose and fling themselves from a meter away onto any exposed human flesh, swelling from anorexic toothpick to Cuban cigar in mere hours.

Squeaking red-eyed rats racing past travelers lying sleepless on dark nights in small village homes.

Full bladders with no private or well-light space to be emptied.

It’s the bladder thing on my mind now that we’re safely in the Haa Valley, after three hours on a one-lane road carved from vertical cliffs and the echo of a highly repetitive chant of anxieties.  Privacy has been no problem on the remote drive. Now, however, we’ve arrived at the farmhouse of my host’s sister.
 
Typical of Bhutanese style, Namgay Om’s first floor is for farm animals.  In this case, five doe-eyed cows with horns sharp enough to be drafted into the Royal Bhutan Army.  The second floor is for people;  the third is for crop storage. 

These floor plans are centuries old, designed way before indoor toilets.

To get to the people floor, we climb “stairs.”   Nearly vertical with two-inch wide footholds carved out of a ten-foot log, it’s reasonable to ascend, but unimaginable to descend without a white-knuckled grip of the poles on either side.   Directly below is a stone walkway, to both sides a foot-deep swamp of bovine excrement.  Falling is a disappointing option.

My bed is a mattress on the impeccable bare floor of Namgay Om’s sweet-smelling puja room, with an entire wall devoted to Buddhist frescoes, statues, butter lamps, water bowls, incense and offerings.   Although I am invited to use some kind of receptacle for nocturnal elimination, no such appliance is offered, and even if I had one, I wonder about the wisdom of dropping my drawers in a room normally reserved for prayers.

By early evening I stop drinking all manner of liquid---or eating anything wetter than soda crackers--- so I won’t have to go through the arduous expedition to empty my bladder in the middle of the night.  The steps include, but are not limited to:  awakening, denying, sleeping, re-awakening, getting mad, procrastinating, peeling my tongue from a dry, intimate embrace with the roof of my mouth, bargaining, pleading, reluctantly accepting, finding clothes, shivering, dressing under covers,  finding the flashlight, tiptoeing past five sleeping humans, going down the “stairs”with a flashlight bit firmly in my teeth, stopping to massage the muscle spasm in my jaw, remembering/being tempted by/refusing my hostess’s alternative suggestion that I might simply relieve myself where the cows do, tightening all orifices at the thought of an unanticipated cow-horn suppository, groping one baby step at a time to the courtyard gate, lifting the heavy wooden latch with both hands without dropping and breaking my only light, opening the rusty-hinged outhouse door without awakening three surly watchdogs who in broad daylight barked themselves hoarse when a lazy candy wrapper drifted past them, pulling down my pants far enough but not too far, avoiding dropping them into anything I’d regret, straddling the hole, relieving myself with Robin Hood aim despite the urgency brought on by stalling, turning my upper torso completely around without moving my feet so as to reach the toilet paper on a ledge behind me, thinking of the next person,  tearing off only one or two pieces, using them without dropping the other highly-valued squares, finding two pieces to be insufficient, cursing the next person, standing long enough to air-dry or until my teeth chatter--- whichever comes first, pulling up my pants, dipping a metal pitcher into a large blue bucket and rinsing down my own byproducts, then reversing the path back to bed.

I do not relish the idea.

Pulling the blanket over my head, I command my bladder to wait all night. Voices in my head argue.  Optimism argues with Experience.  No way, the latter says.  Miracles happen, the former replies.  Yep, says Experience, but not to full bladders.   I fall into a deep sleep within minutes.

I awaken many hours later, my eyelids registering sunlight.  Without opening my eyes, I high-five my Bladder, my Body, my Will.  I knew you could do it, Optimism says.

Experience, as it happens, has the last laugh.  When I open my eyes I discover that it is not at all the sunrise that has awakened me, but a gorgeous Himalayan full moon, staring down at me through the window like a single divine eye.

I want to stay to appreciate the lovely sight, but my bladder is bulging and bossy.

Not yet, I insist, beginning my trek to the outhouse with denial. 

Hob wins a prize from the Traveloscopy 'Treasure Chest' for this entertaing piece. Why not submit your own?