Turkish Toilet Tea Talk (+ Tattoos!)

Most evenings, we have a "tea talk" (although so far, there hasn't been any tea at any of these). The topics cover things that we're interested in learning but which aren't part of the regular curriculum - superstitions, the fine art of haggling, and...The Turkish Toilet. Aka the squat toilet. I'm not ashamed to admit that I've been kinda dreading this one. But our fabulous teachers handled this with the same cheer and grace with which they've handled everything else we've thrown at them. Not only did they explain what we'd need to bring (soap, hand towel, shoes) and the relevant vocabulary (stl, the bucket for the washing-up water; robini, the tap; hashak, dirty, which you need to mutter whenever you mention the bathroom--bit l'ma--to say that you are well aware you're talking about something dirty), but they even made a contest out of the ability to hold a squat and sit straight down. (I didn't enter.) Oh, and to clarify - this was all done in the common room, not an actual bit l'ma (hashak).

About halfway through, when no one was volunteering to practice squatting, M** (our utterly fabulous homestay liason) looked me in the eye and asked me to try. I had to admit, "I don't want you guys to see my tattoo." It's covered during every normal activity, but squatting while hunched over is guaranteed to reveal that strip of skin on my lower back. M** and the others assured me that they wouldn't care, so I went ahead and squatted. (I fell over. Twice. I'm reeeally not looking forward to doing this for real...) While I was down there, though, M** exclaimed, "Is it script?" It took me a second to realize that she was referring to my tattoo--which is indeed in Arabic script. I stood up and acknowledged that she was right. She then asked to take a better look at it. I hesitated for a second...and then realized that I'd only been hiding it out of respect for the Muslim proscription on changing the body Allah gave you. If they didn't care, I certainly didn't. (More accurately - it's not that they don't care, it's that they don't expect a Westerner non-Muslim to follow the same rules that apply to them. Also, tattoos are much more common among Berbers than Arabs, so the situation is not as shocking as it might be elsewhere.) So I gave them a better look at it, and M** read it aloud. (It sounded so awesome!) Someone asked for a translation, which I gave and M** confirmed.

Long story short: thanks to our awesome Moroccan staff, I'm less nervous about Turkish toilets *and* visiting the hammam (public bathhouse, where my entire back will be fully visible.). I love these guys!