The sounds of silence
by Sylvano Lucchetti - 2009-06-17 00:00:00
I was sitting on a camp site pit toilet listening to a currawong warbling to its mates in neighbouring trees. It was a very classy pit toilet: a rust-free corrugated iron shell, held in place by an attractive timber frame, which was recently constructed and clean.
I sat and waited.
As my focus shifted away from the external world to shepherd my internal processes through the first contraction and release of excreta, my ears tuned in for the expected splash that signals a successful delivery of payload.
I sat and waited.
But the splash never came. It took me a few seconds to realise that the distant, muffled slap I heard in place of a splash was the signal that my contribution had joined the pile of communal human waste far below.
I sat and listened.
With the welcomed relief came a new silence and contentment. No rush, no need to push and no other thing to do except to sit and listen while my organs did their job. After a while, my body began the ready itself for re-entry into the world and my arm reflexively reached for the flush button.
But there was none.
In a pit toilet, one isn't provided that middle class sensation of dispensation; that jettisoning beyond one's home of the unwanted muck. Instead, the pit toilet experience is a return to a simple, low key and unbroken flow of existence.
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Did You Know?
Sydney is religious - more or less...
As well as amenities, proximity to shops and transport, you may also want to check the level of religious affiliation in the Sydney suburb you are next considering to live.
I could tell you that 75.5% of people in Sydney align to a religion, with 14.1% saying they have no religion and the balance uncompelled to respond to that 2006 census question (10.4%).
Move around Sydney though and you begin to appreciate what a heterogeneous city it is on the religion front.
For example, 25.6% of people in Surry Hills said they had no religion and 29.2% didn't give any answer to the religion question in the 2006 census. That's 54.8% of people who don't have no religion or didn't feel compelled to answer the question.
Only 18.3% of people in Liverpool stated no religion (5.7%) or didn't respond (12.6%).
While Gymea has also has a strong, overall commitment to religion similar to Liverpool, the mix of the unaligned was the other way around, with 13.7% with no religion and 6.6% who didn't respond to the question.
Balmain has a tad more explicit 'no religion' individuals (28.3%) than you find in Surry Hills, but fewer left the question unanswered (13.0%), giving an overall level of 41.3% of people who don't explicity align with any religion.
Mosmon sits in the middle of the range, with 30.6% of people having no recorded alignment to religion, made up of 19.2% with no religion and 11.4% who left the answer blank.
Refer: ABS, Cat. No. 2068.0 - 2006 Census Tables
