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Sunday, April 17, 2005
A Good Day
April 6 was a patrol day for us, but since the Alpha Section of our platoon (Alpha is first and second squads) patrolled, we (Bravo Section – third and fourth squads) were down. We spent much of the day on the climbing wall just climbing, talking, and sort of lounging around.
After a while, we noticed quite a few more gunshots in the distance than usual, most of them automatic, and a lot of car horns. When Alpha came back from their patrol, they said the Iraqi assembly (the one voted into office while we were down south) had appointed an interim-President and that he was a Kurd. The city’s Kurdish population was in total celebration. The returning patrollers told us that every Kurd had taken to the streets, was firing off ‘celebratory fire’ from their AK-47’s (and yes, those rounds do come back down to earth eventually), shooting off fireworks, and generally going nuts.
Considering that within about four years they had gone from repressed minority that was being systematically killed off to having one of their own as President, celebration was definitely in order.
Just a few days before, I was over at the KRAB (Kirkuk Regional Air Base) where we had taken all of our interpreters from our patrol base to be paid and to get their monthly trip to the PX in. I struck up a conversation with ‘Frodo’ (all of our ‘terps are given Americanized names, like Sonny or Ben, that roughly equate to their real names to make it easier for us to remember their names). He told me how much the Kurds liked having the Americans here, "More than you even know," he told me. When I asked him what he meant, he said that many Kurds continuously pray for our safety, even to the point of asking Allah that if something was to happen, that it happen to them rather than an "American boy who has come so far over here to help them." Frodo then told me about Saddam’s attempt at "Arabificatioin" of Kirkuk, how he kicked families out of 6,000 homes in the city for Arabs to move into, tried to obliterate entire Kurd villages (in some cases succeeding and even using chemical weapons to do so) and how he killed more than 80,000 Kurds… in one month. Frodo said that no Kurd in Kirkuk had not felt the sting of this methodical program, everyone here having lost a brother, aunt, cousin, or friend, if not their father or a child. So, with a Kurd becoming their country’s first self-appointed leader, it was cause for jubilation.
We of course were happy to stay in our base and just know that the Kurds were so happy. But, just before dinner, our company commander decided that we all needed to roll out. Word came down that he allegedly said he was, "tired of all this gunfire," but the military is notorious for things getting distorted as they filter on down the many levels of the chain (in effect becoming huge games of ‘telephone’). Regardless, we geared up and rolled out, grumbling (as soldiers so often do) about the fact that we had to go patrol. I argued that we should be doing the exact opposite and pull in all our patrols to get out of the way of the celebration and to minimize our visibility during what should be an entirely Kurdish celebration. Others said that we should actually join in the celebrating with our Kurdish allies.
Regardless of our gripes, we rolled out into sector and soon found ourselves in the midst of a traffic jam of honking, flag-draped, Kurd-filled cars. The Kurdish flag, which is red, white, and green bars with a yellow sun in the center, was everywhere, and cars, people, and buildings were suddenly festooned with green banners, ribbons, flowers, sheets, headbands, any just about anything else they could find. (For some reason, the Kurds use that one color from their flag as ‘their’ color. The Turkoman’s color, by contrast, is a lighter blue.) We saw one moped that was so top heavy with green flags, paper flowers, streamers, and just about anything else green that the guy could find, we were surprised he didn’t just topple over. Everyone waved, smiled, cheered, and often offered us thanks in the Middle Eastern manner of putting their hands over their hearts and bowing their heads. And, for the first time since I’ve been here, the Iraqis were throwing candy at US, instead of th e other way around.
We stopped at the first traffic circle we could find (traffic lights being in short supply here, there are many circles all over the country) and dismounted when we heard the first (of MANY) close gunshots, a quick burst from an AK-47 that was nothing more than celebratory. By the time we dismounted, identified a general direction that the fire came from, and reached that point, the firer and/or the weapon were long gone. (As a general rule, we’re supposed to confiscate any such weapon, even if just shot off for celebration, or any weapon not kept in the home and only for home defense.)
As I stood near the rear of one Humvee, people came up to me, thanked me, said in pidgin English that it was "a great day, a very great day" and took our picture, usually with cheap disposable cameras or camera cell phones (another new technology that, like the Internet and satellite phones, is only about three years old to these people). One young guy pressed a big green flag into my hand and took my picture. Another one kept asking me to fire my SAW off into the air in celebration. I think he asked in jest, knowing that we couldn’t do such a thing. Regardless, I smiled and laughed but let him know I’d do no such thing.
As we remounted the vehicles and drove off to another sector of the city, our opinions of having to roll out reversed. We all spoke about the fact that we were happy to have been called out, happy to see this celebration of such a once-downtrodden people.
We drove on to another traffic circle, this one just across the river. It was another logjam of vehicles, people standing around, and just another general massive celebration. However, I quickly spotted a man moving toward the lead Humvee with a pistol in his hand and called out, just as others in our truck did the same. We dismounted and the lead element quickly restrained the man. We soon found out that he was an off-duty Iraqi cop though so we let him go, with his pistol.
Sgt Stewart and I were on the far side of our Humvee when we saw a wonderful thing: beer. Now, unlike most Islamic countries, alcohol is legal here. Our base is surrounded by several small liquor stores, all advertising Efes or Tuborg beer, and we pass them routinely, which adds to our depression. You see, we aren’t allowed any kind of beer, or other alcohol, at any time, in any way. And the guys drinking this beer offered us some. We could have said yes. No one else was around. It would just be a sip, a sip of cold, refreshing, tasty beer. But that part of the day was so sad as Stew and I, reluctantly, sadly, with broken hearts and tears in our eyes, said no. We’re still second-guessing that decision, one that many other in the platoon had to make at various points during the night.
As I stood guard over the Humvee, lamenting our lack of beer, I made eye contact with a pretty Iraqi girl who was several feet back into the crowd. I smiled and nodded, and she did the same back. Normally, the women here are very coquettish and quickly look away. It’s testament to the Kurds’ joy and exuberance that she not only didn’t look away but soon thereafter, as I was handing out more candy to more kids, she quickly came up to me and, in the midst of hundreds of people, asked me my name and then told me hers. She smiled, I smiled and then she retreated back into the crowd. [Right about now, Sally is reading this going, "What the hell?" but I mention it only to show that these people were SO happy that some of the women even broke long-standing cultural lines to speak to us, some even kissing a few of the guys in the platoon later on.]
Soon we were back into the trucks, driving onto another sector, and the change couldn’t have been more extreme. This being a Turkoman neighborhood, it was almost totally quite, just another Wednesday evening, perhaps even quieter. The people here were still just working, finishing up a day’s labor, and slowly starting to head home for the evening. There was no celebration here, just business as usual, perhaps slightly quieter even, their neighborhood banners of blue crescent moons on a white background just hung solemnly above our Humvees as we drove along. (On, yet another, aside: when I see these neighborhoods, all with their own colors, flags, and traditions, I can’t help but wonder how they equate to Irish, Italian, or Jewish neighborhoods in turn-of-the-century Boston or New York.)
A few blocks later though, it was another rollicking street party. Much of the night was like this, a stark contrast between almost silent neighborhoods and full-blown street parties with gunfire, kissing girls, beaming kids, more Iraqi candy thrown our way, fireworks, green everywhere, and just general near-euphoria. Then we’d drive six or ten blocks down the road and it would be utterly silent.
We enter another Kurdish neighborhood, one running along a main road that parallels the river. We stop several times in futile attempts to track down more celebratory gunfire. We stop one time near a family who is sitting out on their taxi, watching the slow, honking, yelling procession up and down the divided ‘highway’. I reach into my backpack, now carefully set up with ammo and water in the big pocket, small toys in the medium pocket, and the smaller pocket full of candy. I return with five pieces of candy, handing one each to each kid and the father says several times, "Thank you mistah. Vetty good, thank you." I go back to guarding the Humvee, trying to discern between fireworks and gunfire, red tracers streaming into the night and roman candles doing the same. I look back at the kids, reach back into the backpack and approach them again with five toys, small fire trucks, some small stuffed animals for the girls, a Burger King toy from The Incredibles movie, etc. Their father again spits out thank you’s and "Vetty good," as the kids beam with excitement.
In between all this, my photo is taken again, this time by a street vendor selling Kurdish flags, ones on a plastic rod with a clip at the end, just like the kind they sell with New England Patriots (your world champion New England Patriots by the way) flags to attach to your car window. He presses one into my hand saying, "This for you. Very good day, today is very good day. George Bush good, very good!" He says he is also in the Iraqi Army, that he was Peshmerga (a paramilitary force of Kurds that used to fight Saddam and is now sort of a Kurdish ‘Special Forces,’ or more like a Kurdish retribution force.)
A family squeezed into the cab of a semi throws me more candy as a young lawyer and ex-interpreter named "Jeff" (who I’d met once before on our base and who echoed the sentiment we often hear about how much he’d rather work with the National Guardsmen rather than active duty – but that’s another story) beamed with pride, exclaiming, "This is a historic day, a very good day. We have gone in three years from being no one here, in this country, to being in charge!" Although they really aren’t in charge, you can imagine at least the symbolic importance of having as a "President" one of their own people.
But soon thereafter, we spot several streams of tracers from the opposite river bank. We rush over, fighting through all the traffic (we always have the right of way here, both because the cops always let us through, we demand it for a variety of safety and tactical reasons, and because we drive six-ton armored Humvees with battering-ram bumpers and heavy machine guns mounted on them), over to where we saw the tracers. The tracers are gone, now replaced by more back on the other side of the river, from where we just came. Hey, they aren’t dummies. ‘The Americans are here, trying to take away our guns for using them to celebrate? Okay, hide the guns. [Whistle, look around nonchalantly, whistle some more.] They’re gone? Free fire party!’ And yes, those bullets do come down, sometime, somewhere. (One of our ‘terps, "Ram," was late for work the next day as a round came down through his car windshield while it was parked outside his house.)
Frustrated (or ambivalent as most of us don’t want to have to confiscate anyone’s AK-47 or stop their party), we stop for a "Class One Download". "Class One’ is water (and food) so when we’re downloading it… that’s right, we’re going to the bathroom. Hey, it was a long night. I stood there, watering the Humvee tires, watching surprisingly slow, beautifully streaming lines of red AK-47 tracers trailing off from the far river bank into the night, just enjoying the view.
(Okay so this is a long blog entry, but hold on. We’re almost done.)
We drive past some of the first traffic circles we started at and the party is definitely dying down. There are far fewer cars out now so we can drive pretty freely throughout the city, until we come to one more Kurdish neighborhood, where most of the party apparently moved to. Several blocks of city are just slammed, almost wall-to-wall with people still celebrating, mostly men (it’s always mostly men as the women are so often relegated to just staying at home). It looks like Mardi Gras. Through a gap in the armor behind my head, I stick out my Kurdish flag and there is a surge of yells and cheers from the hordes of people around us. I pull it in and they get quieter… stick it out and hear another roar… pull it in and it gets quiet… out again for another roar. It’s like something from a Bugs Bunny cartoon. In the Humvee ahead of us, SPC Flemming (former-Marine embassy guard, Gulf War vet, postal worker, father of three) is sitting in the gunners turret, waving, smiling, blo wing kisses back at the girls. I say to everyone in my Humvee, "Tonight the roll of conquering hero will be played by… Specialist Flemming."
Finally, we can’t drive much further as the crowds are too thick. We stop and dismount and we’re swarmed with friendly faces. Again more photos, again I raise my Kurdish flag and get a roar and more photos, then a Kurd approaches me with a big green flag, rips off a strip, and offers it to me. I try to wrap it around my helmet (while the helmet is still on off course, as I’m not about to do something like take it off – ever – while in sector) and sort of succeed, momentarily. There’s another roar from the crowd, then more photos (always with the very touchy Iraqi men who are never afraid to throw an arm around your shoulders). Then we push some of the crowd back and the Humvees creep up a little, until coming to a stop (often as a child ran out right in front of the lead vehicle). I wrap the strip of green around my SAW stock and the crowd erupts, from the back of the Humvee this time. Apparently Sgt. Dmitrov, our squad leader, did the same with a strip of green material but then also started dancing with some of the men there, the dance being nothing more than raising your arms and sort of stepping side to side. There’s another roar from just in front of me as Sgt. Stewart does the same. Everyone settles down, we push back the crowd, the Humvees creep, we stop and dance or get another photo taken, move the vehicles a bit, stop, and then eventually emerge from the end of the street party, popping out of the crowds like six-ton, armored Humvee corks.
Finally we return back to our patrol base. We’re physically wiped because the simple act of mounting and dismounting into and out of the vehicles so often, with all our gear on (35 lbs of body armor, six lb Kevlar helmet, 17 lb SAW, 21 lbs of SAW ammo (and that’s about 1/3 a combat load since I can carry the rest in the truck), night vision monocle and mount, various pouches, a knife, flashlight, first aid pouch and bandage, etc.), not to mention occasionally running toward AK-47 fire, pushing back crowds, trying to be gregarious and nice while also scanning four-, five-, ten-deep into a crowd and/or along rooftops, cringing when fireworks are blown too close to the Humvee and for a split second you’re not quite sure what it was, trying to fight through hordes of aggressive boys to get a piece of candy or a toy into the hands of a little girl at the back of the mob, and just generally having your senses wired on level ten for several hours, takes its toll.
But we’re also happy, even though we didn’t confiscate a single weapon, didn’t stop anyone from shooting into the air, and generally didn’t do too much. Because we didn’t care about that stuff. We were happy to have seen a people, once who wondered how they could even survive or if their children would even reach adulthood, much less have a good, peaceful life, infused with so much pride, honor, dignity, validation, and absolute joy all in one night.
While I definitely do not agree with the way that we, as a nation, were brought into this conflict (Saddam had no connection to the 9/11 terrorists and were where those WMD’s again?), I am overjoyed to see something so good come of it. Let us all hope that I, and my daughter, and those daughters of that taxi driver that I gave some simple little toys to, see a lot more good come of this over the months and decades to come.
After a while, we noticed quite a few more gunshots in the distance than usual, most of them automatic, and a lot of car horns. When Alpha came back from their patrol, they said the Iraqi assembly (the one voted into office while we were down south) had appointed an interim-President and that he was a Kurd. The city’s Kurdish population was in total celebration. The returning patrollers told us that every Kurd had taken to the streets, was firing off ‘celebratory fire’ from their AK-47’s (and yes, those rounds do come back down to earth eventually), shooting off fireworks, and generally going nuts.
Considering that within about four years they had gone from repressed minority that was being systematically killed off to having one of their own as President, celebration was definitely in order.
Just a few days before, I was over at the KRAB (Kirkuk Regional Air Base) where we had taken all of our interpreters from our patrol base to be paid and to get their monthly trip to the PX in. I struck up a conversation with ‘Frodo’ (all of our ‘terps are given Americanized names, like Sonny or Ben, that roughly equate to their real names to make it easier for us to remember their names). He told me how much the Kurds liked having the Americans here, "More than you even know," he told me. When I asked him what he meant, he said that many Kurds continuously pray for our safety, even to the point of asking Allah that if something was to happen, that it happen to them rather than an "American boy who has come so far over here to help them." Frodo then told me about Saddam’s attempt at "Arabificatioin" of Kirkuk, how he kicked families out of 6,000 homes in the city for Arabs to move into, tried to obliterate entire Kurd villages (in some cases succeeding and even using chemical weapons to do so) and how he killed more than 80,000 Kurds… in one month. Frodo said that no Kurd in Kirkuk had not felt the sting of this methodical program, everyone here having lost a brother, aunt, cousin, or friend, if not their father or a child. So, with a Kurd becoming their country’s first self-appointed leader, it was cause for jubilation.
We of course were happy to stay in our base and just know that the Kurds were so happy. But, just before dinner, our company commander decided that we all needed to roll out. Word came down that he allegedly said he was, "tired of all this gunfire," but the military is notorious for things getting distorted as they filter on down the many levels of the chain (in effect becoming huge games of ‘telephone’). Regardless, we geared up and rolled out, grumbling (as soldiers so often do) about the fact that we had to go patrol. I argued that we should be doing the exact opposite and pull in all our patrols to get out of the way of the celebration and to minimize our visibility during what should be an entirely Kurdish celebration. Others said that we should actually join in the celebrating with our Kurdish allies.
Regardless of our gripes, we rolled out into sector and soon found ourselves in the midst of a traffic jam of honking, flag-draped, Kurd-filled cars. The Kurdish flag, which is red, white, and green bars with a yellow sun in the center, was everywhere, and cars, people, and buildings were suddenly festooned with green banners, ribbons, flowers, sheets, headbands, any just about anything else they could find. (For some reason, the Kurds use that one color from their flag as ‘their’ color. The Turkoman’s color, by contrast, is a lighter blue.) We saw one moped that was so top heavy with green flags, paper flowers, streamers, and just about anything else green that the guy could find, we were surprised he didn’t just topple over. Everyone waved, smiled, cheered, and often offered us thanks in the Middle Eastern manner of putting their hands over their hearts and bowing their heads. And, for the first time since I’ve been here, the Iraqis were throwing candy at US, instead of th e other way around.
We stopped at the first traffic circle we could find (traffic lights being in short supply here, there are many circles all over the country) and dismounted when we heard the first (of MANY) close gunshots, a quick burst from an AK-47 that was nothing more than celebratory. By the time we dismounted, identified a general direction that the fire came from, and reached that point, the firer and/or the weapon were long gone. (As a general rule, we’re supposed to confiscate any such weapon, even if just shot off for celebration, or any weapon not kept in the home and only for home defense.)
As I stood near the rear of one Humvee, people came up to me, thanked me, said in pidgin English that it was "a great day, a very great day" and took our picture, usually with cheap disposable cameras or camera cell phones (another new technology that, like the Internet and satellite phones, is only about three years old to these people). One young guy pressed a big green flag into my hand and took my picture. Another one kept asking me to fire my SAW off into the air in celebration. I think he asked in jest, knowing that we couldn’t do such a thing. Regardless, I smiled and laughed but let him know I’d do no such thing.
As we remounted the vehicles and drove off to another sector of the city, our opinions of having to roll out reversed. We all spoke about the fact that we were happy to have been called out, happy to see this celebration of such a once-downtrodden people.
We drove on to another traffic circle, this one just across the river. It was another logjam of vehicles, people standing around, and just another general massive celebration. However, I quickly spotted a man moving toward the lead Humvee with a pistol in his hand and called out, just as others in our truck did the same. We dismounted and the lead element quickly restrained the man. We soon found out that he was an off-duty Iraqi cop though so we let him go, with his pistol.
Sgt Stewart and I were on the far side of our Humvee when we saw a wonderful thing: beer. Now, unlike most Islamic countries, alcohol is legal here. Our base is surrounded by several small liquor stores, all advertising Efes or Tuborg beer, and we pass them routinely, which adds to our depression. You see, we aren’t allowed any kind of beer, or other alcohol, at any time, in any way. And the guys drinking this beer offered us some. We could have said yes. No one else was around. It would just be a sip, a sip of cold, refreshing, tasty beer. But that part of the day was so sad as Stew and I, reluctantly, sadly, with broken hearts and tears in our eyes, said no. We’re still second-guessing that decision, one that many other in the platoon had to make at various points during the night.
As I stood guard over the Humvee, lamenting our lack of beer, I made eye contact with a pretty Iraqi girl who was several feet back into the crowd. I smiled and nodded, and she did the same back. Normally, the women here are very coquettish and quickly look away. It’s testament to the Kurds’ joy and exuberance that she not only didn’t look away but soon thereafter, as I was handing out more candy to more kids, she quickly came up to me and, in the midst of hundreds of people, asked me my name and then told me hers. She smiled, I smiled and then she retreated back into the crowd. [Right about now, Sally is reading this going, "What the hell?" but I mention it only to show that these people were SO happy that some of the women even broke long-standing cultural lines to speak to us, some even kissing a few of the guys in the platoon later on.]
Soon we were back into the trucks, driving onto another sector, and the change couldn’t have been more extreme. This being a Turkoman neighborhood, it was almost totally quite, just another Wednesday evening, perhaps even quieter. The people here were still just working, finishing up a day’s labor, and slowly starting to head home for the evening. There was no celebration here, just business as usual, perhaps slightly quieter even, their neighborhood banners of blue crescent moons on a white background just hung solemnly above our Humvees as we drove along. (On, yet another, aside: when I see these neighborhoods, all with their own colors, flags, and traditions, I can’t help but wonder how they equate to Irish, Italian, or Jewish neighborhoods in turn-of-the-century Boston or New York.)
A few blocks later though, it was another rollicking street party. Much of the night was like this, a stark contrast between almost silent neighborhoods and full-blown street parties with gunfire, kissing girls, beaming kids, more Iraqi candy thrown our way, fireworks, green everywhere, and just general near-euphoria. Then we’d drive six or ten blocks down the road and it would be utterly silent.
We enter another Kurdish neighborhood, one running along a main road that parallels the river. We stop several times in futile attempts to track down more celebratory gunfire. We stop one time near a family who is sitting out on their taxi, watching the slow, honking, yelling procession up and down the divided ‘highway’. I reach into my backpack, now carefully set up with ammo and water in the big pocket, small toys in the medium pocket, and the smaller pocket full of candy. I return with five pieces of candy, handing one each to each kid and the father says several times, "Thank you mistah. Vetty good, thank you." I go back to guarding the Humvee, trying to discern between fireworks and gunfire, red tracers streaming into the night and roman candles doing the same. I look back at the kids, reach back into the backpack and approach them again with five toys, small fire trucks, some small stuffed animals for the girls, a Burger King toy from The Incredibles movie, etc. Their father again spits out thank you’s and "Vetty good," as the kids beam with excitement.
In between all this, my photo is taken again, this time by a street vendor selling Kurdish flags, ones on a plastic rod with a clip at the end, just like the kind they sell with New England Patriots (your world champion New England Patriots by the way) flags to attach to your car window. He presses one into my hand saying, "This for you. Very good day, today is very good day. George Bush good, very good!" He says he is also in the Iraqi Army, that he was Peshmerga (a paramilitary force of Kurds that used to fight Saddam and is now sort of a Kurdish ‘Special Forces,’ or more like a Kurdish retribution force.)
A family squeezed into the cab of a semi throws me more candy as a young lawyer and ex-interpreter named "Jeff" (who I’d met once before on our base and who echoed the sentiment we often hear about how much he’d rather work with the National Guardsmen rather than active duty – but that’s another story) beamed with pride, exclaiming, "This is a historic day, a very good day. We have gone in three years from being no one here, in this country, to being in charge!" Although they really aren’t in charge, you can imagine at least the symbolic importance of having as a "President" one of their own people.
But soon thereafter, we spot several streams of tracers from the opposite river bank. We rush over, fighting through all the traffic (we always have the right of way here, both because the cops always let us through, we demand it for a variety of safety and tactical reasons, and because we drive six-ton armored Humvees with battering-ram bumpers and heavy machine guns mounted on them), over to where we saw the tracers. The tracers are gone, now replaced by more back on the other side of the river, from where we just came. Hey, they aren’t dummies. ‘The Americans are here, trying to take away our guns for using them to celebrate? Okay, hide the guns. [Whistle, look around nonchalantly, whistle some more.] They’re gone? Free fire party!’ And yes, those bullets do come down, sometime, somewhere. (One of our ‘terps, "Ram," was late for work the next day as a round came down through his car windshield while it was parked outside his house.)
Frustrated (or ambivalent as most of us don’t want to have to confiscate anyone’s AK-47 or stop their party), we stop for a "Class One Download". "Class One’ is water (and food) so when we’re downloading it… that’s right, we’re going to the bathroom. Hey, it was a long night. I stood there, watering the Humvee tires, watching surprisingly slow, beautifully streaming lines of red AK-47 tracers trailing off from the far river bank into the night, just enjoying the view.
(Okay so this is a long blog entry, but hold on. We’re almost done.)
We drive past some of the first traffic circles we started at and the party is definitely dying down. There are far fewer cars out now so we can drive pretty freely throughout the city, until we come to one more Kurdish neighborhood, where most of the party apparently moved to. Several blocks of city are just slammed, almost wall-to-wall with people still celebrating, mostly men (it’s always mostly men as the women are so often relegated to just staying at home). It looks like Mardi Gras. Through a gap in the armor behind my head, I stick out my Kurdish flag and there is a surge of yells and cheers from the hordes of people around us. I pull it in and they get quieter… stick it out and hear another roar… pull it in and it gets quiet… out again for another roar. It’s like something from a Bugs Bunny cartoon. In the Humvee ahead of us, SPC Flemming (former-Marine embassy guard, Gulf War vet, postal worker, father of three) is sitting in the gunners turret, waving, smiling, blo wing kisses back at the girls. I say to everyone in my Humvee, "Tonight the roll of conquering hero will be played by… Specialist Flemming."
Finally, we can’t drive much further as the crowds are too thick. We stop and dismount and we’re swarmed with friendly faces. Again more photos, again I raise my Kurdish flag and get a roar and more photos, then a Kurd approaches me with a big green flag, rips off a strip, and offers it to me. I try to wrap it around my helmet (while the helmet is still on off course, as I’m not about to do something like take it off – ever – while in sector) and sort of succeed, momentarily. There’s another roar from the crowd, then more photos (always with the very touchy Iraqi men who are never afraid to throw an arm around your shoulders). Then we push some of the crowd back and the Humvees creep up a little, until coming to a stop (often as a child ran out right in front of the lead vehicle). I wrap the strip of green around my SAW stock and the crowd erupts, from the back of the Humvee this time. Apparently Sgt. Dmitrov, our squad leader, did the same with a strip of green material but then also started dancing with some of the men there, the dance being nothing more than raising your arms and sort of stepping side to side. There’s another roar from just in front of me as Sgt. Stewart does the same. Everyone settles down, we push back the crowd, the Humvees creep, we stop and dance or get another photo taken, move the vehicles a bit, stop, and then eventually emerge from the end of the street party, popping out of the crowds like six-ton, armored Humvee corks.
Finally we return back to our patrol base. We’re physically wiped because the simple act of mounting and dismounting into and out of the vehicles so often, with all our gear on (35 lbs of body armor, six lb Kevlar helmet, 17 lb SAW, 21 lbs of SAW ammo (and that’s about 1/3 a combat load since I can carry the rest in the truck), night vision monocle and mount, various pouches, a knife, flashlight, first aid pouch and bandage, etc.), not to mention occasionally running toward AK-47 fire, pushing back crowds, trying to be gregarious and nice while also scanning four-, five-, ten-deep into a crowd and/or along rooftops, cringing when fireworks are blown too close to the Humvee and for a split second you’re not quite sure what it was, trying to fight through hordes of aggressive boys to get a piece of candy or a toy into the hands of a little girl at the back of the mob, and just generally having your senses wired on level ten for several hours, takes its toll.
But we’re also happy, even though we didn’t confiscate a single weapon, didn’t stop anyone from shooting into the air, and generally didn’t do too much. Because we didn’t care about that stuff. We were happy to have seen a people, once who wondered how they could even survive or if their children would even reach adulthood, much less have a good, peaceful life, infused with so much pride, honor, dignity, validation, and absolute joy all in one night.
While I definitely do not agree with the way that we, as a nation, were brought into this conflict (Saddam had no connection to the 9/11 terrorists and were where those WMD’s again?), I am overjoyed to see something so good come of it. Let us all hope that I, and my daughter, and those daughters of that taxi driver that I gave some simple little toys to, see a lot more good come of this over the months and decades to come.
Posted by: Unknown / 11:49 AM 
