Weeks 13 and 14

Weeks 13 and 14 were spent hanging out in Al Taqaddum, or TQ for short. I was the only one left out west due to people leaving for training and vacation time. I went to TQ because it is a large air base and it would be easier to get around from there than Ramadi in the event that something went wrong at one of the sites. I also heard good stories about the location being pretty nice compared to Ramadi. The stories were not wrong. The chow hall is the only one I have been to so far that uses real plates and silverware. They also have those fancy hands free faucets. The trip was sort of my in country vacation.

Entrance to the Bunker

I was picked up from the airfield in TQ by one of the Marines from the site. TQ is a very large base. When I go jogging around Ramadi it takes me about 20 minutes to run around the whole base. It took us over 20 mins to drive from the airfield back to the bunker where I would be staying. The vehicle I was picked up with is a neat old Russian Jeep. The Jeep was a convertible and the night breeze felt good. The bunker itself conjures up images from one of those apocalyptic movies where a meteor is about to smash into the earth. It would be a self sustaining facility if it only had a kitchen. The atmosphere there is very different from Ramadi. You are sort of forced into social interaction due to the arrangement of the facility. There are about ten rooms that open into a common area. One room is a work area and the rest are living quarters. The level of privacy you get is very minimal. The room I was staying in also had an X-Box 360 which had its own magnetic effect.

Parked on incline because starter was out. Needed gravity's help to jump start.

I played more video games in TQ in the short time I was there than I have in the last ten years. That fact was very apparent as I was constantly being slaughtered playing Halo 2. I forced myself to go jogging a few times to make sure I my muscles didn’t atrophy from sitting on my butt all day. It was definitely a lazy time. They had a basketball hoop, horseshoe pit, and two hole golf course on the compound where the bunker is. That got me outside every once in a while. There is a lot less equipment in TQ than in Ramadi and nothing broke the whole time I was there. This didn’t help the laziness.

Sunset over lake near Al Taqaddum

One of the Marines that lives in the bunker is Christian. It was nice to find someone who shares my spiritual beliefs. I attended the protestant services with him and had a good time. The service went well and I really liked the sermon. I also got to play dominos with him and some of the people from who attend gospel service. The people we played dominoes with were a lot of fun. The game we played was called Mexican Train dominoes, or something like that. It was very competitive and there was a fair amount of friendly trash talking. It was one of the best times I have had in a long time.

Three months down nine more to go.

Pics

Here are some more cool pictures. Most of these are taken on the way to and from the bat cave.

This is me all suited up for the convoy out to the bat cave.

Above is a picture of the mud after a heavy rain. I wish i had a boogie board.

From inside the Humvee a collapsed building in the background.


More scenery on the way.

Prime Ramadi Realestate.

More Scenery

A mosque.

Me working hard.

Convoy on the way home.

Saddam's Mosque.

Week 12

Week 12 was a very demanding one. We had a really bad storm roll through the area. The wind gusts were up to fifty miles an hour. Recovering from the effects of the storm kept me very busy. The long hours combined with the oceans of mud left me drained. I wasn’t able to get much else done, besides watching a few episodes of Alias. I bought all five seasons and am working on season four right now. Season one hooked me and so I thought that I would enjoy the rest of the seasons just as much. The law of diminishing returns seems inescapable though.

I made two trips out to the bat cave this week. The first was for monthly maintenance and the second was due to the above mentioned storm. The bat cave is very detached in several ways. There are no windows and the windows that used to be there are sealed and covered with sandbags and plywood. There is also very little incentive to leave the bat cave. There is not much to do on the base besides eat and go to the gym. Having this atmosphere of detachment, it is easy to forget that there is a world outside of the bat cave. A powerful storm could very well pass right over the bat cave and no one would no the difference. This would have happened if the powerful storm hadn’t blown over the satellite dish that provides the bat cave with its communications. This is what brought me back to the bat cave only two days after leaving it.

I was able to get everything back up and working fairly quickly. I even got my first ‘at a boy’ from the folks in Baghdad. I felt good and accomplished. I am finally starting to fall into a rhythm and am feeling more confident about my job. I hope this will only help to make my time here go by quicker.

Week 11

This week’s weird dream: I dreamt that I was in a feudal Chinese fort that was under attack. I was an archer and I was steadily taking down the attackers. I eventually ran out of arrows and was forced to defend myself with a sword. My sword fighting technique was not up to par and so I was easily defeated. I woke up from this dream determined to become a better sword fighter. Then it dawned on me that I was crazy.

This week was not exceptionally exciting. I did however learn my first ASL ‘story’. It goes like this:
HI I [spell your first and last name].
NICE-MEET-YOU.
I HEARING. I SIGN SLOW.
I STUDENT [spell the name of your school].
I LEARN LEARN SIGN.
TEACHER NAME [spell the name of your teacher first and last name].
HE/SHE DEAF.
HE/SHE TEACH GOOD.
I UNDERSTAND HE/SHE.
I LIKE HE/SHE.

Since I am teaching myself sign, I kind of improvised the last parts. It is a very straight forward introduction, but took me forever to get down smooth. It was very exciting to learn. ASL is so much more intuitive then learning a spoken language not to mention being very mnemonic.

This week there was a large explosion in Ramadi. Here is the link to the news report. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070406/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq
The explosion was a few miles away from the base, but it was large enough that it shook my room door. I went out side, probably not the smartest thing to do, and saw this huge dust mushroom cloud out in the distance. It didn’t cause much of a reaction in me. Just a ‘wow that was big’, and carry on with my life type of deal. I feel like there should be more than that. In my own selfish way I want to know what it is like to have to live with the fear of something like that happening to me with out actually being in danger of it. I feel like I will never be able to identify with those whose suffer when I am always in a place of safety. I think if I were here doing humanitarian work or something more benevolent in nature, I could partake of the experiences of the people more legitimately. Maybe one day I may get that chance somewhere else.

Week 10

I found out that the reason my skate board has not arrived is that they haven’t shipped it yet. It is so state of the art that they seem to be having a hard time getting all the parts together. Oh well, at least my ASL Curriculum has made it. I am both excited and nervous about learning Sign Language. It is a big step but one I look forward to taking. So far it has been a little tough teaching my self ASL. I can’t ask the teacher to clarify since all I have is pictures to look at. I am determined to learn though and will do what ever it takes to do so.

This week was nice. I got to play host to a couple of my fellow contractors who came to town for a few days to do an upgrade on our system. It was cool having people to hang out with and to show around. Most times I will go to lunch or dinner by myself and be in and out in about 15 minutes. With these two we just kind of sat around after we were done eating and chatted. It was a little uncomfortable at first, due to being a break from my normal routine, but I started to enjoy and even look forward to it.

I pulled my first all nighter at work this week. We had a routine upgrade to the equipment that should have taken about an hour. We ran into some complications and I didn’t get to bed till 6am. After 24 hours of not having any sleep I tend to get really cranky. Luckily this only kept me up for 22. The next day I just relaxed and watched lots of DVD’s and drank lots of coffee, my reward to myself for working hard. I watched a lot of ‘My Name is Earl’, my new favorite sitcom. It is a really funny but semi-wholesome show, a rarity these days. Despite some philosophical and theological issues, it is a really great show.

I have had a lot of strange dreams since I came to Iraq . A lot of them have aspects of the war or other things having to do with my work in them. Last night I dreamt that I saw a soldier walking on base doing sign language. It is very interesting and at the same time very weird. Being here can feel very surreal at times. I feel like when I get back it won’t even seem like I was in Iraq . I wonder if people will see any difference in me. I wonder if being here will have a positive or negative effect on who I am. I hope whatever happens I am able to use this opportunity as a chance to grow.