The Trench Chronicles

I'm back if any of you are still wondering, but never mind if you haven't realised the absence. It's been nearly a 3 week abstinence of partying, I am alot richer from it and my hair is alot shorter. And as of last Saturday, I am officially a trained assassin and a proficient trench digger.

After 36 hours of kicking at shovels and filling sandbags, I have a renewed respect for grave diggers. They are somewhere between rickshaw pullers and bodybuilders. They were great to have around, until Toyota and steriods came along and screwed their lives.

But Butterfly, how horrible can trench digging be you ask? I asked that same question myself. I was afterall, surrounded by men who were well advanced in years, if they could do it, now surely it can't be that bad. I was afterall, younger and well capable of holding an erection longer than them. Surely this had to be a breeze.

Apparently no. Not if you are me and have 5 years of physical inactivity and had at least 100 litres of alcohol passed through my liver and out my pee hole into several priviledged urinals at Zouk and MoS. I knew I was going to be the whore of fatigue and it was going to ass fuck me for the next four days.

10.15am : I start my survey of the site, hoping to find somewhere with soft soil.
10.30am : Everyone else has started digging. I pull on my gloves and decide I will find a spot near the trees with shade. I give myself a pat on the back for being intelligent beyond men. I start to dig.
10.45am : The guy to my right is muttering vulgarities. I am disappointed with his lack of fitness, but do not show my disapproval.
10.55am : My back aches and my hands are tired.
11.00am : I stop to have a chat with God,

"God, please give me strength. And a Bangladeshi worker to do this for me.."

11.05am : Strangely my prayers remain unanswered. And I begin to start cussing with several references to the human anatomy.
11.10am : I look up to see the guy to my left digging relentlessly. This is a guy who looks lke he is well into his 30's and digging so rabbidly that I wonder if he knows there really isn't any buried treasure under there. If he wrapped himself in aluminium, he would have qualified as an excavator.

I was tired, and needed to distract myself. So the only logical thing was for me to start a conversation.

Me: "Wah, that's damn fast."
He: "Technique.."
Me: "Heh, so what do you do? Work at a construction site? Hahaha.."
He: [looks straight at me] "Ya.."

Very.Awkward.Situation.

I am no longer funny. I decided to shut up, and continue digging.

11.20am : I start digging into small roots, which makes digging even more labourious. Is that why no one is digging near the tree? I am an idiot.
11.25am : The lower soil is soft, which makes digging a breeze. God loves me.
11. 35am : I decide that instead of digging deeper, I will pile the sides with soil to make my trench appear to be deeper. This will firstly, save energy on my part and secondly, not destroy potential earthworm habitat.
11.50am : I am done, but I piled on so much at the sides, it looks like I dug on a ramp.
12.00am : I join the rest of the men over their lunch time conversation of where is the best place to have their ass licked.

If it's one thing I realised about men, it is that there are two social adhesives in life that are geographically defiant; Cigarettes and Sammyboy.

God bless their wives.