Irritable Bowels of Dubai

Did you know that Dubai has one hell of a stinking poop problem? Consider this. The tallest building in the world, Burj Dubai, stands 822.8 meters tall and boasts the fastest elevators in the world, each one of these bad boys will zip you up and down at 64 kilometers per hour. The building holds the highest residential floor and highest observation deck in the world. We should not forget that they also have the worlds highest swimming pool.

I really appreciate the magnificent, beautiful things humans create when they put their mind to it. The only problem, is that when creating such spectacular things we must first think about some of the not so pretty things, like a proper sewer system. What is most amazing, is that building things like sky scrapers and artificial islands, a lot of planning is involved. Nobody ever said, "Golly, maybe we should first think about a proper sewer system before we start building?" That thought literally did not occur to anybody? Not a single human being in the city of Dubai thought that maybe it would be a good idea NOT to have poop truck carrying ten thousand pounds of shit out of Dubai every single day?

Here are the details. If you do not believe me, go to the video featured at the end of this blog. Drivers rent poop trucks. That's right, I said poop trucks. They make their money by each visit to the worlds tallest building, and other large buildings. The more buildings they cyphen poop from, the more money the driver makes. Each truck carries up to ten thousand (10,000) gallons of human shit.

They are required by law to empty their tanks at a designation sanitation station. The problem is that with the population boom, and the amount people poop every day the drivers end up waiting in poop truck lines for days. These poor drivers have to camp in their poop trucks before reaching the sanitation facility. They resort to dumping the contents into man holes or on the side of the road. The excrement goes into the earth, ground water, and onto the beaches. After dumping the excrement, they race back to Dubai and fill up the tanks with another ten thousand pounds of poop. It is a vicious cycle, I mean...this shit never ends.(pun intended)

You know why these brilliant billionaires build all of these super tall buildings, hotels, and luxury condominiums without a decent sewer? There are no awards for having the fastest, coolest, most efficient sanitary system. People do not "ooh" and "ahh" over a great sewer, but they will go "ohh" and "ahh" because the Prince genetically engineered his pet sharks to glow in the dark.

Victorian Pumping Station

Lets contrast Dubai with the Great Stink of Victorian London. Nineteenth century London reflected the age of the Industrial Revolution and large population increase.  This notable increase in the population was reflected by the city’s increased sanitation needs.  The people faced some pretty gross problems such as overflowing drains, defective pipes, decaying human excrement and the lovely scent of sewage seeping up the pipes. Lets just imagine it for a moment. Close your eyes, clear your mind, and let the scent of decomposing movements fill your nostrils. Lovely, isn't it? The river Thames was an open sewer, with disastrous health consequences for the people. Such destitute sanitation conditions, as well as the employment of coal-fired stoves, produced heavy and foul-smelling air in and around the city.  Wastes and other fecal matter plagued the environment and its inhabitants due to the unavailability of proper disposal means.  Tons of raw sewage, both from the city itself and by the neighboring valleys, was dumped straight into the Thames River and eventually carried up the river by the tide.  Sanitation conditions were abhorrent during Victorian London.

The Victorians did not have the technology that modern Dubai have. But as Queen Elizabeth the first once said,"Common sense, it is a most English virtue." In 1858, the Victorians constructed pump houses, main sewers and concrete pipes. The excavated 2.7 million cubic meters of earth before laying down the pipes. It was a lot of work but the Victorians managed to clean up the city, and create the worlds largest sewer system. 

Perhaps the Victorians could teach Dubai a thing or two about underground plumbing. It is magnificent thing. Underground plumbing means that no one has to see it or smell it.  It means that the poop is funneled in a series of underground tubes. While the Romans used only gravity, the Victorians used actual pumps. Goddamit those Victorians were muth-fuken-genius! The prince of Dubai either has a penis complex, or he is a half-wit. He can conceive artificial islands in the shape of palm trees, but they cannot grasp the basic necessity of underground plumbing. 

Who am I to judge him. He clearly has much bigger things to worry about, like having the tallest building, fastest cars, and the world's highest LED lighted swimming pool in the middle of the freaking desert.