I am in Tallil with Eva before we go on leave. I’m doing a whole lot of nothing here and it’s spectacular. We had Thanksgiving dinner yesterday and it was very good. And very interesting. There were myriad decorations and gigantic food-ish sculptures. The piece de resistance however, was the living, human diorama. Picture this: one Laotian man dressed up and face-painted as a Native American. A Phillipino woman next to him adorned in Pilgrim attire. Bookending the Pilgrimesse is a Nigerian man festooned in Native American garb; his costume bested only by his Laotian brother’s but his of a similarly gaudy nature. In the foreground, a model helicopter emblazoned with a giant medical red cross turns in infinite circles over a small model of a poorly rendered depiction of what I can only imagine was a 1962 Vietnam jungle scene. There was a gigantic butter dolphin. There was a massive chocolate icing sculpture of a turkey as well as an enormous cake decorated with a turkey. The cake borne turkey was made of cheese, lunch meat, black and green olives, kiwi slices, croutons and more– it’s making me a tad sick to type it. There were hundreds and hundreds of Thanksgiving decorations splashed across every vertical face imaginable. It was great.
The picture today is of Eva at the Ziggurat near Tallil in Iraq; it was taken by one of her co-workers also on the field trip. There are 32 known Ziggurats, 28 in Iraq and 4 in Iran. Eva was at the Great Ziggurat of Ur, one of the more well known structures, and also the Wiki article linked above. Perhaps it’s more well known because people with cameras and Internet connections actually go there. Who knows.
Eva, Iraq
Yesterday at dinner I said “You know, the best thing about neck tattoos is that you never regret them.” I stand by that assessment. I’ll be looking into getting a neck tattoo when we redeploy. I think I’ll be going with the Chinese symbol for “Honor” or perhaps the name “Candi.” I’ll let you know what I decide on.
A quick Arabic lesson for everyone that hasn’t spent much time in the Arabic speaking world: Allahu Akbar! = Run and/or Hide
Read this article my co-worker Juan wrote. I’m quoted in it. Let me say that when I carefully crafted the quote, I was hoping to elicit one of two very specific responses from readers. For those that know me, I was hoping they’d read the quote and think, “Oh that Rick, he’s just so ridiculous. What a silly quote.” For those that don’t know me, I was hoping they’d read the qote and think “Seriously? What a gay.” What group do you fit into?
The shot today is one which Eva took of me at the White Sands Missile Museum in New Mexico. I think it came out really cool.
Rick, White Sands, NM
Some things just catch it. That’s why it’s my eye. The shot today is of a lone fence in the pasture lands of White Sands. I assume it breaks up two properties, but one can never be sure.
Eva and I go on leave soon. I can’t wait. This place is making me go stir crazy. I won’t tell you all when I’m going, and I won’t tell you all where I’m going, but believe me when I tell you that it will be awesome. “C’mon Rick, just tell us.” No thanks. When I get back you’ll hear plenty.
I am officially no longer and Armor Officer, however. I applied for and was selected to a new branch of the Army. My new branch is one that is not very well known. It’s FA24, or Functional Area 24. I will now be a Telecommunications Systems Engineer for the US Army. I’ll be going to Ft. Gordon, GA sometime when we rotate back to the colonies and I’ll be there for quite some time as I learn the specifics of both the Signal Corps as well as of my new job. I am extremely excited to see what it’s like. You will all learn more as I do.
White Sands, NM
They say that Iraq is in the cradle of civilization. That’s because civilization here is still in its infancy.
I can’t wait for R&R. I mean, don’t get me wrong, this place is really beautiful, but I think reliable electricity will be preferable. We’ll see.
Not much going on here right now. The day time temperatures are around 80 degrees and at night it gets down to 50 or 60 which seems really cold. It has also started to rain which is a nice change of pace to tell you the truth. Except when my office floods.
A few weeks ago, and NCO in the Plans Shop called me into his room to show me something. He said he’d been putting his boot on for 3 days or so, and every day it felt like his left sock was bunched up under his foot. Finally on the fourth day, when his sock once again felt bunched up, he decided to check his boot to see if instead of a bunched sock he in fact had some foreign object in his boot. He upended his boot. What fell out you ask? A snake. A dead, squished snake. What’s worse is that the first day he felt his sock bunched up the thing was alive. Yeesh. Needless to say, since then I have been religiously checking my boots and shoes for snakes and, of course, scorpions. Iraq is sweet.
No photo today because my connection is too slow. Sorry.
Iraq