Kosmo Posted January 30, 2012 Report Share Posted January 30, 2012 I never heard of Borborophoba before reading about her on a Foreign Policy blog about afghan customs aptly titled Of Alexander, Gods and Bathrooms. "...he was being faced (in the toilet customs of the ANA) with what Alexander's Macedonian Greeks would have called "borborygmus," a word that Plato and Aristophanes and Homer used to describe the filthy, excremental sewage of the underworld of Hades. For was he not in a kind of underworld (Hades or hell) on deployment in an Afghanistan he barely understood? Borborygmus not only means "shit." It also connotes "shit fearing." Borborophoba was known as the Goddess of the realm of death. She had the power to keep shit from flowing, but she also possessed the power to make it flow in the face of mortal fear and threat of death. Every combat soldier has been struck by her bowel- and bladder-releasing powers at least once in his life." http://ricks.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/01/19/of_alexander_gods_and_bathrooms_why_the_afghans_can_t_get_their_shit_together?wpisrc=obnetwork Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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