Shit Soup (No, Kraig, this isn’t another culinary experiment)

We have a lot of narrow streets around here. I don’t understand this, because the Iraqis drive the same sized vehicles as we do in the States, and they seem to have even more large trucks on the road than we do! So I was walking down a one-way street and there was one of these big (I mean really big – it practically takes a ladder to climb into the cab) trucks broken down and two guys were trying to push it out of the way. It was one of those tank trucks with a built-in pump – we call them shit suckers because they are used to suck all of the effluence out of the porta-potties that dot the various bases.

Well, these guys were really getting nowhere, but believe it or not, after considerable straining, the three of us were actually able to move the truck and park it on the dirt so that it was not an obstruction to traffic. And just as we were edging it into place, one of the guys slips and his hand hits a lever. Out from this fire-hose sized spigot gushes a veritable flood of liquid shit – it got everywhere!! The other guy managed to shut it off real quick, but not before the first guy had slipped and fallen into the mess. God, did it stink – and it was one of those nasty, internal-smelling, liquid fart stinks I don’t know how else to describe it). I suppose I was lucky to have gotten away with brown-covered boots and poop splashes on my trousers.

So I walked back to the hootch, undressed to my tidy-whiteys in the walkway, and went in to grab a towel and some new clothes before showering. It’s a good thing I live in an all male section. The boots and trousers were later ceremoniously wrapped in plastic and delivered as an offering to the Dumpster God. Phew!!