Forget the poop knife, that requires a poop spatula.
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It could be worse. When I first saw this kind of toilet I was so shocked that I couldn’t use it. It took a lot of time how to figure out how to properly use it.
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Deschutes brewing taproom in Portland has the most elegant urinals I’ve ever seen.
This is the same style, but pictured elsewhere
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FYI, Romania and Moldova have a few of these, too. Typically public toilets. 
I have to say, the thing they get right is separation of the toilet room from the bathing room, so one doesn’t get caught without a place to poop while someone else is using the bath.
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As a beginner, my biggest fear was slipping while crouching and falling into that mysterious hole in the ground.
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I know! NO HAND-HOLDS!
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I found myself watching a documentary called The Wonderful World of Dung, hosted by Tony Robinson. It was explained that English villages and towns had very open, um, public conveniences, consisting of two walls outside town. One for the women, one for the men. Every morning, folks would go to their respective walls, and find a place to sit and chat with their neighbors whilst relieving themselves.
A rather new male friend walked in on me when I was using his bathroom, and he was extremely embarrassed. I eased his pain by telling him that bathrooms weren’t always the privacy palaces enjoyed (is that the right word?) today, once I’d emerged. I then very straight-facedly launched into telling him about Ye Olde Englishe Walls. He and his roommate (a longtime friend of mine) were amused, his embarrassment and resulting anxiety were gone, and I’d once again blown his mind by sharing - and possessing in the first place - a strange and profound bit of information. 
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Appalling. Imagine having one of those “obstructed view” seats, then seeing that in the pisser. Great…
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When I was young worked for a guy who did high end home renos… one customer had us install “his 'n her” toilets in the master bath. After feeling a little grossed out by this for the last forty years, it just now occurs to me it may well have been his wife didn’t want to share facilities with him. Although when we asked “what kind of divider” he wanted he said that would defeat the purpose. Jus’ trolling? Maybe 
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Sticks are still used in “shallow trench” latrines, which you might have to create out of necessity in an emergency. You dig a shovel-wide trench in the dirt about a half shovel deep, piling the loose dirt along the edges of the trench, then stand a stick in the dirt at one end. To use, you remove the stick from its current location, straddle the trench at that point to do your business, use the stick to cover it with dirt, then stand the stick back in the dirt marking the last used position in the trench.
Despite common usage, the phrase often used to describe an unlucky person is not “he grabbed the the short end of the stick.”
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I think most of the world has. They used to be common in France when I was a kid, they still are nearly everywhere on the African continent (at least to the best of my knowledge and experience), and from what I hear from China, they are pretty common there, too.
That said: what where you doing in Moldova, of all places? Except going to the loo, that is.
And: have you been to Transnistria as well? How’s the toilet situation there?
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Man - I used to LOVE those old style ones. But yes, they probably aren’t the best actual design… needs a deeper bowl.
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Extended vacation, hanging out with Moldovan friends (including a week’s trip to the Black Sea coastline near Odessa, Ukraine).
I haven’t done the Transnistria trip. I was advised that it really wasn’t all that exciting, unless you count the border guards seeking bribes to let you pass.
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I encountered similar to these (I don’t remember the wall-mounted tanks) all around Turkey and Tunisia in the early oughts. I really liked them. It’s better ergonomics for bowel health, too, if your knees can handle the squatting. 
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