Out of Iraq

I flew out of Baghdad this afternoon and landed in Amman a couple of hours ago. I'm excited to spend a couple of days here going to Petra and the Dead Sea, getting a massage at the luxurious Four Seasons and doing a bit of shopping.

That said, I'm really sad about leaving Baghdad. Our crazy frat house had become my home, and the guys had become my brothers. And as war-torn as the city itself may be, I feel like it's my war-torn city. Saying goodbye was really hard -- everybody came outside to wave me off, and I wanted to cry. J, my American coworker, is one of my favorite people in the world, and I hate that I won't get to see him every day anymore. I think it's going to be very strange to go back to living alone.

Fortunately, A is in Amman at the moment as well, so I don't have to totally divorce myself from Baghdad quite yet. We're going out on the town tonight and to Petra tomorrow, so hopefully it'll take my mind off of being sad.

The quest for alcohol

We're throwing a party tonight because I'm leaving tomorrow, which led to a hilarious quest to buy beverages. It was sort of a ridiculous proposition in the first place -- buying alcohol in an Islamic country, on a Friday, during Ramadan. Poor planning led to the Friday part of that equation; the rest was fairly unavoidable.

There are a few remaining liquor stores in Baghdad, and a few of our guys -- a Christian and a couple of lapsed Muslims -- know exactly where to find them. We asked G, the Christian, to go to the liquor store where he usually buys Amstel and Corona, but it's closed for the entirety of Ramadan (which raises a question about how its proprietor supports himself, no?). We knew the location of two other stores, but they were closed too. At this point, we began to panic a little bit, because we had invited 25 people over and we figured they would be expecting alcohol. Somebody told us that there was a liquor store near the PX in the Green Zone, but we soon learned it had been shut down because soldiers were buying alcohol, which they're not allowed to drink.

And then a British security consultant next door told us about the "tactical shop," which reportedly sold beer out of a sketchy little trailer in a remote part of the Green Zone (U.S. officials call it the International Zone, or IZ). We got step-by-step directions and set out. Getting there requires a complicated series of turns at intersections marked only by small yellow signs proclaiming "tactical shop." We drove off a paved road, essentially into a dump, and saw a series of battered trailers. Sure enough, one of them had two signs: "Tactical Shop" in yellow and "IZ Liquor Store" in green. The trailer couldn't have been more than eight feet wide, and the passageway was even narrower than that because of the cases of beer stacked high on both sides. We got two cases of Corona, one case of Amstel, four bottles of wine and a bottle of Absolut (for mixing with pomegranate juice).

The party is on.

Shopping, redux

I got to go shopping with two of my coworkers yesterday, which was a rare chance at true freedom -- no work, just looking for pretty things to bring home. S wanted to buy a painting for his mother's house in Baghdad, A wanted art to decorate his family's new home in Amman, and I went along for the ride.

With the exception of the bodyguard lurking outside, it felt fairly normal. We walked around a series of adjacent galleries, compared our favorite paintings, chatted with the owner and generally had a good time. I bought an absolutely amazing painting -- it's hard to describe, but it's an abstract painting of a couple of "Baghdadi doors," a minaret of a mosque, etc. It's royal blue with other bright colors (lots of gold) and some raised texturing. It's going in my bedroom when I get back.

The gallery owner was clearly pretty desperate to make a sale -- when my coworker asked about the price of the painting I was looking at, he said "Oh, whatever you think." We eventually settled on $20 American for something that was similar to pieces that people were charging $150 for in American military compounds. These guys can't make a single sale most days, so having three people walk in with money to spend was pretty exciting. All told, we gave him the equivalent about $100 American (for five paintings, one of them framed), and he couldn't stop thanking us.

Iftar

It becomes a bit difficult to think through complex assignments at about 6 p.m. after a full day of fasting, so the break-fast at about 7:15 p.m. is eagerly anticipated at our office. For the past two days, every single person in the house has gathered for Iftar together as soon as the sun sets -- the first time since I've been here that we've all eaten together. We all gather around a television where the government-controlled station counts down to official sundown, an occasion marked by a clip art depiction of a firing cannon. Then all 20 (or so) of us gather around the dining room table, where food is abundant.

Perhaps it's just nostalgia now that I'm in my final week in Iraq, but Iftar has been really meaningful for me. After 10 weeks of working and living with these people in very close quarters, I do feel like they are family, so it's been pretty great to celebrate the holiday with them. Our Iftar parties have been similar to an American Thanksgiving -- a somewhat dysfunctional family, all crowded around a big table, laughing and stuffing ourselves. It makes me glad I'm fasting so I can be a part of it all.

Ramadan

Ramadan begins today. Living in an Islamic country during holy days is fascinating. Restaurants close altogether, since there's nobody to buy food during the day -- everyone fasts. Among my coworkers are a large number of people who don't practice Islam (no prayers, no visits to the mosque, in several cases no belief whatsoever), but they all celebrate Ramadan. Celebrating only high holy days is obviously not limited to Muslims, but when it's such a huge commitment -- no food or drink during the day for an entire month! -- it seems particularly striking.

Because everyone at home is fasting, I am too. We'll eat two meals a day: a break-fast/dinner at 8 or so, then something light before we all fall into bed at 2:30 (or 3, or 4...). I don't really eat during the morning anyway, and if I'm running back and forth to different meetings I occasionally miss lunch, so I don't think this will be a huge problem. And no, it's not the first step to my conversion.

There is one definite problem, however. I'm leaving tomorrow night to go on a trip with the military for three days. Since I'm only fasting because everyone else is fasting, presumably I wouldn't do it around soldiers (it would be a bit awkward to say in the dining hall that I'm not Muslim but I am fasting for Ramadan). Additionally, soldiers work incredibly hard in still-brutal heat, so I think maybe I should not pass up opportunities for fuel -- and the idea of working outside all day without water sounds unappealing. On the other hand, plenty of Iraqis do the same thing...

So much testosterone

On an average night, there are three women (one of whom speaks no Arabic, one of whom speaks no English) and roughly 13 men sleeping at our house. This automatically connotes a frat house environment, a stereotype that our particular men seem to embrace. Last night we started coming up with the list of "You know you live in an Iraqi frat house when..."

10. Despite having a cook who prepares full meals, the majority of the population ate meatballs for dinner last night. Meatballs and beer.
9. You fall asleep most nights at 4 a.m. to the sound of pool balls crashing together.
8. American movies worth watching are sorted into two categories: lots of violence or slapstick humor. Major bonus points for attractive women in either category.
7. Our 400 news channels from all over the world are ranked by how attractive the young female newscasters are. Al-Arabiya currently maintains a significant lead.
6. Serious discussions ensue fairly regularly about the possibility of inviting Moqtada al-Sadr to play pool.
5. You can't convince a soul that french fries are not a vegetable.
4. People regularly wonder aloud when they last showered.
3. The general consensus determines that it's acceptable for Iraqi women to wear hijab, but never Lebanese women because they're so much hotter.
2. Running upstairs for two minutes to wash your hands before taking a cookie from a platter of about 100 of them means no cookie for you.
1. At least three people are crowded around the Playstation in their boxers at all hours between 9 a.m. and 4 a.m.

Finals week

Students at Baghdad University are taking end-of-term exams this week, which brings a whole host of problems unique to students in war zones. Many of them haven't been to class in weeks, so they are essentially taking exams based on independent study. Yesterday my colleague's 23-year-old daughter, S, came to our office, and I talked to her a bit about her experience in school.

S's father (my coworker) moved his whole family -- S, her mom, and her brother and two sisters -- to Jordan last year because he feared for their safety in Baghdad (he stayed behind because he earns a good salary here). They became illegal residents in Amman, doing everything they could to get their residency permits but essentially running from the law. Making it worse for S, who was a second-year college student at the time, she couldn't attend a university in Jordan because she was not a citizen (additionally, Jordanian universities refuse to accept Iraqi college credits, meaning she would have had to start over). She and her family decided that she would study on her own in Jordan and fly back to Baghdad for exams.

S said that it's incredibly isolating to attempt to replicate a college experience on her own. She doesn't know anyone in Amman and rarely goes out, studying all day in the room she shares with her sister and helping her mother around the house. As exam time came near this summer, she wasn't even sure that her hard work would pay off -- she still hadn't gotten a residency permit in Jordan, and if she traveled back to Baghdad she might not be able to reenter Amman. With just a week to go before the exams began, she finally got a permit. She flew back to Baghdad, worrying her father terribly, and is sitting for exams this weekend. Then she'll go back to Amman, continue her studies on her own, and make plans to come back at the end of the next term.

S was nearly crying as she told me what her college experience used to be: sitting with friends at coffee shops helping each other review for tests, staying out too late, developing crushes on classmates. Now she steps on campus for exams only, then beelines back to Jordan. Many of her classmates' families cannot afford to move them out of the country, so they still have a community here, and S is crazy with jealousy. She's begged her father to allow her to move back to Baghdad, but he says absolutely not. As much as he loves having S here, my coworker is counting down the hours until she is safely out of Iraq again. We're at 48 and counting...

Time marches on

I don't think I was under any delusion that life in the U.S. would stop altogether while I was gone. I accepted early on that people would keep going to work, eating and sleeping and ::sigh:: even having fun without me. But I don't remember giving people permission to keep having all these life events while I'm thousands of miles away. And yet, my small circle of loved ones seems to be having a tremendously eventful summer. In the past few weeks:

• A friend got engaged
• A family friend got married
• OFH started his senior year of college
• So did my baby sister -- yikes!
• A close friend moved to DC
• A friend left my company and moved back to NYC
• Another moved to a new apartment in NYC
• At least three friends got their first grown-up jobs
  
• One good friend had a painful breakup
• A friend was officially cured of cancer, six years after I sat in her hospital room
  
• THREE favorite people, including the best friend who was already too far away, moved from NYC to Boston so two of them can get Ph.Ds or some ridiculous thing
• I lost one intolerable coworker from my very small office and gained a wonderful one
  
• One good friend moved to NYC to start law school

Maybe that's the normal rate of life, but it sure feels like the world is on fast-forward back there, and it makes me feel left out! Gchat and phone calls are wonderful, but I would give anything to have been there for any one of these events or these people. Last night one of the new Boston residents was describing a hilarious scene involving four of them hauling stuff into a fourth-floor walkup because the movers weren't going to get it all done, and it actually made my heart ache. I've got all these people describing their new lives -- new homes, jobs, relationship statuses, etc. -- and I just want to be there to lug boxes or hang pictures or buy beers. I want to feel like I'm being a good friend to people who should have good friends around, and it's hard to do that from here. I'm having flashbacks to freshman year, when I had a huge fear of being left out by my older, cooler friends.

So I have a request: can you all start having more boring lives for a couple of weeks? I'll be back soon, and hopefully you'll all be willing to help me play catch-up in person. But honestly: no more moves, no more weddings/engagement/breakups, no more new anything. Just for three weeks, okay?

Love,
Briony

Shopping

After eight weeks in Baghdad, I finally was able to wheedle our security guys enough to convince them to let me go out on a food shopping trip for the house. We basically have one man whose entire job is to shop for everyone's food, and he stays busy -- it's a huge job. At any given point, there are between 12 and 20 people here, so shopping is done on a large scale. I had been wanting to go for a while now, but it took a while to convince M, our security chief.

I expected to come back today and write a post about how inspiring it was to see the bustle of the market; life going on even as a war is going on, blah blah blah. But honestly, the whole trip was a little depressing. The market, which was in the neighborhood once considered the single safest area in Baghdad, was relatively empty, with just a handful of people picking out vegetables and a few shop-keepers trying to get rid of some merchandise. But it was the look in people's eyes that really got me -- everyone was moving very quickly, glancing around nervously, looking for signs of trouble. I can't blame them, as this neighborhood has been bombed eight times in the past six weeks. I wasn't allowed to speak English, so I walked silently next to our house shopper, dressed in an abaya and hijab. Even so, I felt people's eyes boring into me, like they knew that I was an intruder. I'm sure it was my imagination -- DH told me as much -- but I was uneasy the whole time.

Also, as someone still longing for the produce at Monterey Market in Berkeley, I found the selection in Baghdad even worse than in D.C. (which is saying something...). I see why we don't get served a lot of vegetables -- the choices were basically limited to tomatoes, cucumbers, onions and potatoes (not a vegetable). There were some bruised apples and sickly oranges, but that was the extent of it. I cannot even articulate how happy I will be to spend four days eating in California.

Sleep

I've been thinking recently about the war's effect on the simplest parts of life. Outdoor markets are frequent targets of car bombs, so shopping is very difficult. As I mentioned earlier, walking through the street -- a luxury that most people take for granted -- is dangerous, especially for a woman alone. But the biggest effect of the war on people's daily life might be the problems sleeping.

There are a few problems with sleeping in Baghdad. The first, and most common, is that it's often too hot to sleep at all without electricity. Even at night, the temperature in the summer hovers at or above 100 degrees. Making it worse, Baghdad residents are only getting about an hour of city-provided electricity a day, and for the vast majority of people who cannot afford to run generators (even an average-sized generator can only run for a few hours a day -- our house has three massive ones), the heat is unbearable at night.

Consequently, people flock to their roofs, hoping for some slightly cooler open air for long enough to get a few hours of sleep. But sleeping on the roof is a scary thing -- especially in some of the more dangerous neighborhoods, mortar rounds fly through the air regularly. Sleep can be difficult because of a more general fear of violence as well. Most Baghdad residents
have adapted to living with some degree of fear -- if you can't delude yourself that your bedroom is safe, you've got nothing left. But with helicopters flying low and loud every night and fairly regular sounds of gunshots and explosions in the distance, sleep doesn't always come easily.

This morning I mentioned in the newsroom that I was staring at my ceiling at about 4:30 in the morning, unable to sleep. "Me too," my American colleague said. "Me too," A added. "And me," D said. We realized that all four of us had been lying in adjacent rooms, wide awake in the pre-dawn hours. There was a pause, then all four of us laughed, slightly uneasily.

Questioning my cynicism

Some small part of me has always thought about doing something to make the world better instead of just writing about the people who do. A friend that I deeply admire is starting law school this week after teaching in an innovative school for low-income boys for a year and then working as a paralegal for a homeless services organization for another year. Unlike many of the people who are going to his top-five law school, he isn't interested in the whopping $200,000 many first-year associates are now earning -- he wants to continue work for disadvantaged people and/or to teach. Being in Iraq, where literally everybody is suffering, makes me feel somewhat guilty that I'm not also making the world better, whether in New York or in Baghdad.

I know that storytellers have an important role in the world too, but to some extent it's that of a middleman -- get the information to the people who will actually do something about it. Supervisors have praised me for my critical eye toward happenings both in DC and Iraq, but there's a fine line between criticism and cynicism -- a line I find myself crossing fairly regularly. It sometimes scares me that I'm jaded at 23, that my mind ascribes political or self-aggrandizing motives to anyone who claims to be making progress in Iraq.

It's probably healthy that there's still part of me that wants to run away and join the Peace Corps or something, but I find it difficult to balance the two sides of my personality. I realize that dedicating my life to community service wouldn't put me in a position to solve the big problems of the world, but very often I feel powerless to fix even the small stuff. In the last three days, two close friends -- one in Iraq and one at home -- have, in different ways, lost people close to them, and it drives me crazy that I can't do anything about it. I realize that joining the Peace Corps wouldn't put me in a position to fix my friends' broken hearts, but wouldn't doing something for someone be a step in the right direction?

Gun lessons

M, our security chief, informs me that every young woman needs to know how to use a gun. The perplexing part of this is that he realizes I will never own a gun, but just in case... just in case what? Just in case I find one on the street just as I'm being attacked? Just in case my nonexistent martial arts skills are enough to grab my attacker's weapon? It's unclear. But I figured it never hurts to learn, and now I'll be able to tell people I learned how to use a gun from a hard-core retured Iraqi Army captain. For some reason M is convinced that a 9 mm is more practical than an AK (in Iraq, it sure doesn't seem like it!)

Lesson one was all about safety (a good place to start). I practiced taking the magazine out, checking the chamber and aiming. It's not the sexiest stuff, but M promises he'll take me to a range at some point. Right now I'm mostly just aiming an unloaded gun at the clock in his office.

I've got some cousins back in Kentucky who would be pretty proud of me. I have a very distinct memory of sitting in a much-older cousin's truck a few years ago and being horrified when he pulled his handgun out of his waistband to rest it in the cupholder. Turns out Kentucky has slightly less restrictive rules than, say, Berkeley.

Al-Qaeda in Iraq: a true story

One of my co-workers, M, used to be a captain in the Iraqi Army. He had enlisted as a young man, gone to officers' school, received highly specialized training and served loyally for more than 20 years (well, he tried to run away once -- he made it as far as Fort Bragg, N.C. -- but that's tangential to this particular story). He was commanding several hundred guys when the Americans invaded in 2003. M was thrilled -- he hated Saddam, as did most of the officers he worked with.

Then Paul Bremer announced the entire Iraqi Army was being disbanded for fears they would be loyal to Saddam. Two million soldiers and officers, most of whom were eager to fight against any Baath party loyalists and patrol the borders, suddenly found themselves out of a job. There was no chance to audition to get their jobs back; if they had served under Saddam, they could never serve again.

Since then, M has received several offers from al-Qaeda in Iraq (which may or may not be connected to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda, depending on who you listen to) to help train their fighters. Most recently, an old Army buddy proposed that he devote two hours a day to train insurgents how to fire mortars and RPGs in exchange for $500 a day. That's more than $180,000 a year. AQI has nearly unlimited financial resources, they know where to find the best people and they're willing to do what it takes to get those people on board. M said no; he had a good job already, and though it doesn't pay nearly that well he is making enough to feed his family. But dozens, maybe hundreds, of the guys he worked with in the Army took AQI up on the offer. Good jobs are very difficult to find in war-torn Iraq, and for many men the opportunity to make that kind of money was irresistible.

I say this because I believe that portraying this war as a purely ideological conflict (freedom vs. terrorism, democracy vs. tyranny, secularism vs. fundamentalism, etc.) is overly simplistic and historically inaccurate. I initially found M's story totally incredible, until I realized how common it is. I would wager that most of al-Qaeda in Iraq's members are people like M -- people whose steady wages from the Army were abruptly withdrawn in 2003 and who needed to replace them. Their old Army buddies came around presenting a new opportunity, and without even questioning the political or ideological platform they jumped at the chance. This is not to say that al-Qaeda's leaders do not have a fundamentalist ideology (driving out the U.S. military, establishing a caliphate, fighting Israel, etc.), but it's naive to think belief in that ideology is the only reason people join.

Walking

Tonight I walked over to the hotel across the street for a glass of wine with a bunch of other westerners. On the way over, one of our guards escorted me, brandishing his AK-47 the whole way. This hotel couldn't be more than 100 steps from our front door, but in order to go anywhere I need an escort.

Still, even our security guards aren't obsessive enough to sit and wait for me to come out, so I got to make the long walk home by myself. I didn't think anything of it when I set out, but while I was walking down the block I realized how nice it was to just walk at night by myself and look up at the sky. It was the most relaxing moment I've had since I've been here, and although it didn't last long it was fairly refreshing. Most people take for granted the ability to walk down a silent street late at night, but I think I had forgotten how wonderful those moments can be.

Hey what else can we do now
Except roll down the window
And let the wind blow back your hair
Well the night's busting open
These two lanes will take us anywhere
We got one last chance to make it real
To trade in these wings on some wheels
Climb in back
Heaven's waiting on down the tracks
Oh oh come take my hand
Riding out tonight to case the promised land
Oh oh Thunder Road, oh Thunder Road
oh Thunder Road

...

Well I got this guitar
And I learned how to make it talk
And my car's out back
If you're ready to take that long walk
From your front porch to my front seat
The door's open but the ride it ain't free
And I know you're lonely
For words that I ain't spoken
But tonight we'll be free
All the promises'll be broken

Halfway there

It's hard to believe, but my time in Iraq is slightly more than halfway over (I return to the States on Sept. 11). The frustrating part of that, of course, is that I feel like it's taken me this long to get comfortable here. It's not just that I know the difference between Mansour and Saydiya or that I can recite the entire family history of Moqtada al-Sadr, it's that I have Iraqi friends, that I have finally gotten used to the food at home, that I have a username and password for the internal al-Qaeda in Iraq web site. Although I don't plan to call Iraq home any time soon, I feel nearly as comfortable here as I do in Washington.

Of course, the biggest thing I miss about the U.S. is the people. The worst part of this experience is that it can feel a bit isolating at times because the people I'm closest to aren't here. And as much as I've tried to communicate the experience through this blog, I'm not nearly a good enough writer to express Iraq. It doesn't mean I'll stop trying, though.

Iraqi media

Here's the thing about Iraqi television stations: they make things up. Some of you more cynical types might think that the U.S. media does the same, but you're wrong.

Today a member of our Iraqi staff saw on a breaking news ticker at the bottom of the newscast that there was a massive protest against the government downtown. We thought this was a bit strange, especially since it was after curfew. A friend of A's lives in that neighborhood, so we called him. He was in the middle of enjoying a nice, quiet dinner with his wife. There was no protest outside, he assured us.

Okay, but maybe it was on the next street over and he just couldn't hear it. We decided to call the police station in that neighborhood, which is centrally located. The desk clerk laughed when he heard the question. "You know it's past curfew, right?" he asked A. "Well, yes, but it was on al-Shariqiya, so we figured we should check," A replied.

The officer laughed. Loudly.

"You get your news from Shariqiya?" he said. "You know they make it all up, right?"

The trouble with love

In Iraq it can be the simplest things that cause all the trouble. I just spent an hour consoling D, who was in tears because of her boyfriend. The man in question lives next door, but they rarely see each other because another man in his office has connections to the Mahdi Army and has made threats toward them. They talk on the phone almost every day, but he regularly tells her that he is moving out of the country soon and won't take her with him. Today, she asked him to write down her parents' contact info in case something happens to her, and he didn't want the commitment (although he tells her all the time how much he loves her). D's parents live in Basra, a few hundred miles away, and most of her close friends from college have moved out of the country, so she's very lonely--and this boyfriend doesn't seem to be helping matters.

Dating and love are incredibly complicated matters around here. It makes me grateful for what I've got, even if it is 7,000 miles away. If you're in the same place as someone you love today, give them a hug, okay? For D and me.

Fun

Several friends and family members seem to think I'm working too hard and not having enough fun. Others have asked some variation of the question "What in the world do you do for fun in Baghdad?" The answer is not much, at least outside our tiny little neighborhood. But that's not to say we don't have any fun at all!

I've mentioned the swimming pool in the back yard, which feels pretty great when it's 115 degrees. Although everyone in our house is very liberal when it comes to social customs (I wear jeans and a t-shirt, not an abaya, in the house, which I wouldn't normally be able to do in a house full of Muslim men not related to me), a bathing suit would still be pushing the comfort limit for some of them. Consequently, I wear shorts and a t-shirt in the pool, which makes it difficult to swim laps but is fine for floating around. My friend and co-worker D had never been in a swimming pool before she started working here, so she asked me to teach her to swim. She's perfectly comfortable getting in the water, but the idea of actually swimming scares her a bit. I taught a few swim lessons back in my lifeguarding days, so I have some idea of how to do this, but D is going to be a challenge. I started by having her hold on to the side and kick her legs, but as soon as I let go, she stopped kicking. We've got some work to do.

Tonight the people in the hotel next door (who all work in "the industry") are throwing a party, which will be a rare chance for me to socialize with people who don't live here. They're almost all Americans, and almost all of them have been here for several months, so I'll be the new kid in the group. I don't think this will be a huge rager, but it should be fun.

Still, even though I'm having fun I realize there are so many things I don't get to do. Yesterday afternoon the two women in our office, D and I, went out shopping in the downtown neighborhood of Karrada. They very kindly asked me if they could bring me anything (and D ended up bringing me a very cool light-reflecting Iraq paperweight), but I didn't have anything else to do and wanted to go out with them. Of course I couldn't; it's too dangerous for an American to walk around out in the open, but it made me fiercely jealous.

Friends!

In addition to a couple other Americans, I work with a fairly large Iraqi staff. Some of those people I only speak to on the phone, others work in my office every day. They're an interesting group of people. Although the majority of them are middle-aged, there are also a few 20-somethings. I haven't learned everyone's name yet, and I won't publish their names here, but I thought I'd share a little about the ones I do know.

S was a captain in Saddam's military. When we went to the Green Zone the other day, he pointed out a building he wanted me to notice. In halting English he told me "That's where I worked for Saddam. I was captain!" Although S is hardly pro-Saddam, he likes to remind people that he was a major military figure. His wife and 5-year-old daughter live a few hundred miles from here, and he misses them constantly. Although he has a college degree, he's still taking classes, this time to earn a degree in Hebrew. He doesn't think this will have any practical application, but he's always wanted to learn.

M was a pilot (though I'm not sure if he flew commercially or militarily). He loves his job now (which involves a lot of risk-assessment work), but he says he misses flying.

K was a driver for an Egyptian company before the war. His son is a security officer who patrols a Baghdad home with an AK-47. K speaks very little English, but he loves to try. He thinks American civilians are totally fascinating and likes news about sports stars.

D is the person here that I've become closest to. She's the only female in the house with solid English skills, which she earned studying English literature in college. Now she's 25 and living with her cousin, her cousin's husband and their four children. She hates it there because it's so crowded, but her parents (both artists) moved a few hundred miles away and she has nowhere else to live. She's very chatty, loves pretty things (the cursor on her laptop is a rose) and is crazy about YouTube. She loves talking about how beautiful I am, although she's strikingly gorgeous. She's whip-smart, too.

SA rules the roost. He's worked here since the war started, is clearly brilliant, and is so good at what he does. Although he was also an English major in college, he learned the bulk of his English (which he speaks flawlessly, slang and all) from American movies. For several years, his job was to translate Hollywood films from English to Arabic for Saddam--I kid you not, Saddam told SA what he wanted to see, SA made it happen. Consequently, he's seen everything, and he can recite a ridiculous number of movie quotes because he's translated it all. He's a frequent customer of Baghdad's market for bootleg films, and currently sitting on his desk are several movies currently being shown in theaters. He seems a tad uncomfortable talking to women, but once you get him engaged he'll go.

People

I have a tendency to underestimate how much I depend on the people closest to me. In this case, I'm only now (T-minus 2 days) realizing how difficult it will be to live in a war zone--an already challenging situation--without the people who mean the world to me. Obviously I will miss my family, but that's nothing new for someone living 3,000 miles from most of her relatives. Over the last five years, I've developed an East Coast family made up of my closest friends, and this is the longest period of time I've been away from them too. I've never gone two months without seeing MHG or IVK in the last five years, and I'm not really looking forward to the idea of it. Even since I've moved down south, I've had a relatively easy 4-hour drive to see most of my closest friends, and after a bad week I've been able to sprint straight into OFH's arms.

And as much as I complain about the new city, there are at least a few people I'll miss here too. KH, MC and AK have kept me sane for a whole year, and I'm still counting on MMS to help do it for the next year. I never thought I'd hear myself saying I'll miss this city, but there it is. There's a William James quote that says "Wherever you are, it is your friends who make your world," which sum up my feelings about my current locale exactly. By that logic, I suppose I can handle Baghdad too. I'll be putting uite a few minutes on that international cell phone, though.