RSSPiss off, you little wanker
Jul 04
Society culture, order, piss 2 Comments
RIGA – The shame of public urination has hit home. I can certainly understand a John Smith from Somewhereshire in the UK wanting to relieve himself at the Freedom Monument on his trip to the Latvian capital. I could even understand a guy from New Zealand who decided to turn up at the monument in the Borat bathing suit. But now, locals began flocking to take a leak at the monumental monument in the heart of our beloved capital. First, it was a subhuman non-citizen, Nikolai and then, a citizen of Latvia joined in the list of public “urinators,” earning a slap on, well, you get the idea.
Actually, aside from the Freedom Monument, public urination is part of Latvia’s culture, part of drunken peasant culture. I suppose when no one is looking, you could urinate at the building of the Cabinet of Ministers, or some ministry you don’t like – that of agriculture, perhaps, is the least popular at the moment. I’ve seen men walk out of temporary parked cars at the railroad crossing, cross the road, walk a few meters into the green, whip it out and piss like there’s no tomorrow. It tends to leave passing-by women with a deformed face. Near my humble house on the outskirts of Riga, a man facing the road was watering a huge tree.
Recently, an op-ed piece in Diena ironically called to fence off the Freedom Monument from any one wishing to exercise their natural needs at the beloved landmark. In Latvia, you see, people believe that freedom usually means setting up fences. But the problem is not in their disrespect of Milda, rather the chronic lack of toilets.
What should a drunk Latvian, Russian, Brit, etc. do when he found a certain pressure on the inner wall of his bladder – to paraphrase “Spies Like Us” – with no toilet in sight? Men tend to want to urinate on something. Male ego tends to urinate on something large. When you’re in Old Town, the Freedom Monument is the largest thing you see. Besides, it’s got the girl on top. So they urinate there.
Near the office where I occasionally find myself, I saw two men pissing inside a tunnel near the Akmens Tilts. Good for them as there’s no public restroom on this side of the river either. The town’s sleeping areas – Agenskalns, Sarkandaugava, Torņakalns, Borderaja are the worst in the number of public restrooms. Certainly, a smart man might buy a coffee at a coffee-shop to be able to use their facilities, but as the interior minister Mareks Segliņš reminded us recently, even Čiekurkanls doesn’t have a nice place to eat and, therefore, to pee.
If our city fathers – once they stop fighting over the next local government coalition – wanted to deter Johns Smiths from using the Freedom Monument as their personal john, they’d create a citywide stop ‘n’ pee natural relief system for pleasure of local and tourists alike.
