Memories From My Teens: The Wrong Fart.

It was a regular weekday in secondary school. The bell signifying the end of first break had just been rung and students were rushing to their classrooms; to avoid the wrath of teachers who obviously weren't pleased with the idea of  waiting for their students.

Anyway it was, like we used to call it, English period. I had just returned from the Staff Common Room (part of my duties as Assistant Class Prefect was to search for teachers if they weren't in class ten minutes after their period had begun) with instructions that we were to read a text and work on an assignment since our teacher had to see to an emergency.

We were reading in groups when all of a sudden, my stomach began to growl, you know, that sound that's like a combination of the wind blowing and a tap flowing. At first I shrugged it off since, I hadn't eaten anything crazy that morning. Then the discomfort began to increase and the growls as well, and that's when I made that big mistake. I figured that it was gas and I felt a fart coming up. Silly me thought I could quickly release it and be free but no, I was in for an unpleasant surprise as I released the wrong fart. I just felt something warm in my undies.

"Shit!" (the irony). I had just crapped my pants!

I didn't know how to react. I just remember getting up slowly and asking one of my good friends to bring my books to the dorm if I didn't return before closing time. As I trudged to the dormitory, which was a quite far from the classrooms, I prayed that I wouldn't meet any one who would ask unnecessary questions or smell anything funny.

I got to the dormitory and ran straight to the "Tugbuntiafi" (what is known as pit latrine to many), took the soiled undies off and threw them straight into the latrine. Looking back, I shudder thinking of how I would have handled the situation if the dormitories had been locked on that day. So, I did my thing, went straight to take a bath, popped some anti-diarrhea pills and stayed in the dorm till closing.

That evening at prep my colleagues kept asking where I vanished to during that period. To this day I have learned never to "release" anything if I'm unsure of the games my bowels are playing. After all, s**t happens (pun intended).