For a ridiculously western-centric view of Chrissie – hardly surprising, since that’s where it tends to take hold – check out these this hilarious vid on the 12 days of Xmas done Indian style. No doubt nosy in-laws are universal though….and hey, butter chicken and Bollywood go down well everywhere, right? Not such a fan of teleworkers and 11-syllable names though. Speaking for myself.

This was not our only gumby tourist moment in the soul-destroying labyrinth that is Rome: I am not, by any means, one to point the finger of shameful blonde moments. Together we could start a collection form this trip alone: Kylz asking who Keats was and which way it is to Stonehenge from Picadilly Circus; me asking what the blue flag with the circle of yellow stars is (answer: the European Union, which I studied for five years, two degrees and $37 000 worth of uni debt).

To cap it all off, Kylz has not quite yet mastered the art of the vertical photograph, meaning that I could traipse the world over and have nothing to show for it but photographs of me standing before a backdrop of random steps that could be anything: ‘Hmm, this is me at Bucko Palace, me at the Eiffel Tower, me at the Trevi Fountain - note the different shades of limestone?’

Speaking of the Trevi Fountain, coffees here start at a whopping €5, so we quickly moved on for a random detour to the Jewish Quarter, to appease my inexplicable and slightly weird fascination with all people of Hebraic ancestry.

This was the old ghetto into which hundreds of thousands of Jews were packed during WWII; light refreshments are cheaper here but we’re still ripped off by a couple of euros when we pause for an on-the-spot chocolate hit. (Due to our associated-guilt complex from that whole extermination thing, though, we let the vendor get away with it. How’s that for mending fences?)

Taking a leak – or, worse still, a number two – in porcelain that’s not your own can be a traumatic experience and even the most cultivated of us have rested our cheeks on a feral lid at some point, albeit generally with a protective layer of dunny roll in between. I’ve taken the liberty of compiling some shockers, both from personal experience and snitched from that of other people’s. And yes, China, you do get a rather disproportionate mention.

10. Somewhere, Scotland

It’s hardly surprising that Scotland was going to figure in here somewhere. Why? Haggis, that’s why. What goes in looking and tasting suspiciously like fecal matter is hardly likely to come out pretty. Behold: the worst toilet in Scotland.

This is from the aptly named No Shitting in the Toilet by Peter Moore:

No Shitting in the Toilet is named after a sign I saw on the door of the toilet at Jack’s Café in Dali, Yunnan Province, in China. It was a crude, handpainted representation of one of those ubiquitous ‘forbidding signs’ – you know, the circle with a slash through it and a picture of the forbidden action or item in the middle. But instead of a camera or a dog or an icecream, this sign featured a little man squatting. Although you couldn’t see the strain on his face, you could see the product of his labours. Just in case you didn’t understand the sign, Jack had placed a grate over the top of the toilet seat as well.

8. Pantanol Hostel, Brazil

Ants, beetles, mosquitos, fleas, spiders: got to get your money’s worth. If you don’t leave with a chronic bout of constipation there’s got to be something wrong with you.

7. Squat loos, Chinese trains. Especially in the country.

Moore’s not the only one who’s got a bone to pick with China’s crappers. Alas, I’ve not got a photo to prove it, but roaring through the southern Chinese countryside on a train this summer I stumbled across a gem. It was a squatter, naturally, and nothing more than a rough-edged hole through which you could see the tracks whizzing by. A sign on the door read “Beware of Nipping Hand.” Now, one could hypothesise that this likely referred to the sliding door which tended to crash shut with a vicious bang, but nonetheless it’s not something you want on your mind as you lower your privates over an open hole at 200km an hour…

6. Anywhere that there are guns and Americans.

Of course, many of us don’t ever want to be anyplace where there’s guns – or Americans, for that matter – but peeing is one of those private moments we should all enjoy in comfort and safety. Of course, if you urinate in the petrol tank of some hobo’s ute, then you’ll likely have to answer to a redneck with a shotgun…

5. China revisited.

As the genteel host of this little trip down lavatory lane enlightens us, all a man wants is a shit a day. Preferably one watched over by a potentially rabid guard dog.

4. Yes, China. You again.

This cute little number from Virtual Tourist’s World’s Worst Toilets could pass itself off as a medieval torture chamber rather than a pissoir. It starts with the “curtain of cobwebs” and ends with the pair of pigs pottering about in the vicinity, snaffling around for a snack. Gross, really.

3. India. All over.

I’m never one to write off a country in one fell swoop – I did give China four bashes at it – but I’ve got it on good authority that the world’s most god-awful shocking shitters are in India. As not more than 70% of the country’s population of close to a billion has got a working sewerage system, that means – according to my admittedly often shoddy calculations – 30% has not. Which means, a hell of a bloody lot of people just can’t flush it away. Ever wondered just how much crap that is? I thought you had, so I’m a step ahead. It’s 900 million litres of urine, to be precise, and 135 million kgs of solid waste. That’ll teach you for asking.

2. Anywhere in Ancient Greece.

No plumbing is to blame for this one. Whenever young Leonidas or Aphrodite had to plant one, they just popped outside into the street. Good chance to get to know your neighbour, and all that. In Ancient Rome though, they didn’t even bother stepping outside – it’s not an uncommon claim by historians that the aristocracy had slaves bring in silver pots in which they could relieve themselves without having to step away from the theatre…

1. Well, hope I didn’t spoil the climax, but I had to throw in at least one Top Place to Relieve Yourself. (All good bits have a twist, you know.)

Anyway – do pee in Singapore. In 2003 the BBC ran an article reporting that “Singapore is to launch a “Happy Toilet” campaign that will rate public restrooms with a five-star system similar to the one used for hotels.”

High-ranking dunnies will qualify for the prestigious Singapore Loo of the Year award. Jack Sim, the president of the Singapore Restroom Association (yes, it’s true), is quoted as saying “Where toilets are clean, people are happy and healthy”. When asked what he thought makes a good loo, Mr Sim said “It has to have a very good ambience, probably with plants and pictures”. Fair enough.

Had we been in possession of any of these whizz-bang gadgets (Gifts for the directionally challenged) I daresay we would never have gotten lost. Yes, even us. I need them. All of them. Immediately.

The reason we so often had the time to ponder such existential matters as the nature of Italian traffic is that Kylz and I are obsessive itinerisers. It is imperative that we squeeze the most amount of café, gelato, apperitivi and wine o’clock (and here and there a few significant monuments also) into our day.

Of course, our plans rarely unfold along the predicted lines because inevitably we encounter certain unavoidable obstacles along the way, such as our acute inability to read maps. Now, this I’ve commented on before, but it’s worth revisiting if only to induce malicious laughter from people who revel in my pain.

Barely had we left our hostel this morning after having assured Kylie that I trusted implicitly her knowledge of the Italian language and ability to be a most excellent tour guide, when she started exhibiting all the signs of a hopelessly lost traveller: stopping dead in her tracks, staring up ahead quizzically then directly back from whence we had come, furrowing her brow worringly.

Eventually she approached a pair of old ladies and asked if we were anywhere in the vicinity of the Via Condotti, the main shopping street. At this, the women dropped their bags and started laughing uproariously, gesticulating to other passers by and generally revelling in the sheer idiocy of tourists.

We got distracted then by the policemen strutting by in their snappy little knee-high boots – white, at that. All the better for chasing crims with, and providing dashing assistance to useless tourists. Suddenly being lost and in Rome didn’t seem so bad after all.

More on the hilarity of Italian road rules. A sneak peak:

Sticking to your lane? –> What lanes? It’s a free for all.
Giving way? –> What the hell for? Just speed up and you’re bound to find a gap in the traffic.
Indicating? –> Oh, we thought that was just an optional extra.

Love it! Know exactly how you feel. Road rules as suggestions: the key to an early death-by-heart-attack if not by shocking road accident…

More famous Roman sights today: the forum, the Colosseum, the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore, the Vittoriana – or, more precisely, the bloody great wedding cake looking thing.

More importantly, we sat about with our gelato (yes, more gelato), while Kylz instructed me in careful detail on self-preservation amidst Italian traffic. Lesson one: just wave vaguely to indicate ‘Yes, I see you, and I’m going to cross directly in your path while you lean on the horn, shout obscenities and nudge my kneecaps with your bumper.’
Laws are clearly seen more as ’suggestions’ here; on the highways there are actual lanes and ‘unofficial lanes’. Where in Australia cars are valued as prize possessions, in Italy they are viewed purely as a mode of getting you where you want to be, and the state that your car arrives in matters not.

The trick to merging in Italy is said to be to pull out in front of a metrosexual with entirely too much hair gel in a particularly expensive Ferarri, because he will care about unsightly dents, whereas your average bozo in a battered mini will not mind rebounding off you in the slightest.

Touch parking is all the rage, and is haphazard at best. Kylz tells me she once saw a parked car being ticketed, and wandered over to see what the offence was (or rather, which of the many offences committed was deemed ‘most’ offensive.) According to her translation, the ticket read something along the lines of ‘Please perhaps maybe if it would be at all possible do you think maybe , I mean would you mind, if you could possibly park a little teensy eensy bit more neatly next time. Please. From your friendly neighbourhood parking officer.’

Loitering atop Rome’s Spanish steps – as we were trying to do – is a French cathedral, and, like every other monument in Rome, it is covered in scaffolding in a somewhat belated attempt at restoration.

It was inside this church that my travel buddy Kylie may or may not have been abused by a nun for dressing immorally when she gestured angrily at Kylz’s partially exposed midriff after we asked if photographs were permitted - there was some question as to whether she replied ‘No flash’ or ‘No flesh’.

What’s most kerfuffling in Rome is the fact that Italians are so concerned that tourists still get to see the ‘real deal’ that they string huge banners in front of the scaffolding with painted murals of what the buildings should actually look like. Yet – and this is what kills me – directly below these murals on the Spanish steps was plonked a monstrous billboard advertising a pacific cruise. It kind of stood out, given the 50 foot image of a cruiseliner blocked out the rest of the building.

You can find stuff like this all over Rome: there’s a McDonalds directly adjacent both the Trevi Fountain and the Pantheon, and in the Piazza Navona, the most famous and snazzy of all Rome’s piazzas, street performers pranced about dressed as Tutankhamen and the Statue of Liberty. Wrong continent, anyone?

At the Trevi Fountain we managed to force our way through the throngs of tourists - bloody tourists - and tossed a coin over our shoulders, which, according to our trusty Lonely Planet, should ensure our return to Rome someday.

Saturday, actually, since we’ll be popping through again then.

For a more detailed account of all 138 steps’ worth of the Spanish steps (and pics!) check out this post…looks like I’m not the only one who’s a sucker for tourist traps.

It appears I left a little something off my cool stuff list. Rome.

I arrived in the city with a mate by way of Tiburtina, one of its outer suburbs, which is possibly the most unsavoury place on earth. We hid from the gypsy beggars and other assorted riffraff in the relative safety of the bookshop until our train arrived.

The metro wasn’t much better: too scared to touch the handrails of the train for fear of contracting hepatitis, we felt that skidding and sliding all over the carriage was preferable. By the time we popped up at Spagna - the Spanish steps - we were bursting for a lungful of nice, clean, fresh…Roman smog.

But it was such a beautiful sunny day, and to add to the top-notchness of the place, everybody was pottering about with four-tiered gelato cones - schoolkids, on-duty police, businessmen. Indeed, Italians have a seemingly endless capacity to down gelato at any hour while loitering on the steps of famous and historically significant monuments. As a fond tribute to Audrey Hepburn in ‘Roman Holiday’, we bought peppermint gelatos but no sooner had we licked our first lick when we were promptly told by an Italian policeman there was to be no eating there, presumably to avoid getting random slivers of unidentified drool all over their beloved Spanish steps.

They do it all the time in the movies…