Dubai,UAE

R&R

I know I have been horrible at keeping up the blog. I have been so swamped at work and then I got some r&r and have been digging out since I got back a little over a week ago. We had a change in leadership here in June - the guy I was working for as left and a new person has come in and I have been swamped. I did manage to get away from the 28th of June through 6 July. I went with my friend Kallee from here to Dubai, UAE for 3 days and then on to Jordan for a week and a day trip to Israel. It was an amazing vacation. I will post some pictures over the next few days. Here is our first stop Dubai. I think it is the most under construction city in the world. There are cranes everywhere and unfinished buildings all over the place. They are building the tallest building in the world and it is also the place where they have the indoor ski slope at a mall. Dubai is a Muslim country, that has become very westernized. They have alot of British and having lived in London for so long, it was nice to see some of my favorite stores like Marks and Spencers and Monsoon. I did some shopping there and we went on a hop on hop off bus. I also got my hair cut, so there is a picture of the stylist. It was only like $40 and I thought he did an ok job. There is still a bit of the old city that remains with the gold and spice souks and the boats that carry the exports to other countries thought the Gulf of Arabia.

Animal Love

So the other day I come home from a very long day at work and I am getting my pajamas on and I see something on my bed move. I thought I was imagining it and I wasn't even going to check it out, but then I thought - yes I did see something - so I went over to my bed and pulled back my covers and there was a little mouse right there in my bed - on my covers, on my pillow. Down he went under the bed. Hyperventilation of course and then I had to go find someone to help me get it. Two people came and helped me, we moved everything from under the bed and saw him two times, but yes...he got away. Now two other people have reported seeing him in their room. We went out to look for mousetraps yesterday, but all they have here is some glue that you put on a board or something and I guess the mouse happens across it and gets stuck on the glue and is trapped. My question then is then what do you do with it?? Of course you would have to kill it and that would just be too brutal. I know it sounds insane that a mouse trap is better, but at least if all goes well, it's instant death. So...I am not going to have any of the glue in my room, but I am curious to see if my friend Kallee catches one. I actually think it's the same mouse.

We also have some newborn kitties. They are actually older than newborn, but we just discovered them. We are trying to tame them so that they can live around the Villa and capture the mice.

We have three dogs on the compound. Kallee has named them Lincoln, Greg and Tina. The Peruvian guards have named them and the Philipino workers have named them also. So they answer to three different names. They are trilingual dogs!! Sadly Tina was very sick last week, so we had to take her into the vet and have her put down. We are just hoping that the other dogs don't get what she had. It is against policy to have dogs for pets, so we say they are guard dogs of the compound, but we still can't get the vet to come and treat them officially, although we have made some connections so hopefully they will stay healthy.

Well, that is all the animal reports for now.

One last thing is the pool is finally fixed here at the Villa. It was never clear, but they fixed it a couple days ago and it is beautiful. I will take a picture soon.

Commanding General (CG)

Once a month the CG, General Petraeus has the military camera crew set up in the middle of the Embassy ballroom where the coffee shop is and takes his picture with as many people as he can in 30 minutes. My friends Kallee and Clairissa and I went on Monday and got our picture with him. I have been in breifings with him on Fridays (well he was on the other side of the video camera) and I've seen him once at a change of command ceremony, but I've never met him in person. I don't know if I should really count this as meeting him in person, but I guess I will. It was very well choreographed. I received a 3x5 card to fill out my name and email address on and then once I got up near the stage (yes there was a stage), I handed the card to the guy and he wrote a number on the back, then I went up a couple of steps on to the stage where this Army guy said "step up to the tape" (marked on the stage floor) and then he put his hand on my shoulder and said "step forward when you hear the shutter". Then he pushed me over to the CG. The CG stuck out his hand, looked at the camera, the picture was taken, he said "keep up the good work your doing". And off I went. And that's how it happened. Amazingly my picture arrived in my inbox two days later, as did my friends! We compared our pictures and the CG looks the same in everyone. I'm thinking they could have got a cardboard man in his image, but of course then it wouldn't have counted for me to meet him in person.

Outside the Wire

I got to go on my first trip outside the Green Zone on Saturday. We had two investors interested in looking at a bus factory that is about 25 minutes by helo from Baghdad. My friend and workmate Stacy went with me. It was pretty fun riding in the helo, except for on the way there the Army Col who was with us was trying to impress the investor and asked the pilot to do some crazy maneuvers. It was 106 degrees out, I had all my personal protective equipment (PPE) - helmet and flack jacket that weighs like 15 lbs on, I had just eaten lunch and I was facing backward in the helo. I don't mind the rollercoaster like moves, but the side to side on top of it about put me over the top. I had a "car sick" headache the entire day after that. The way back was nice a smooth though. I attached some pictures of the landscape so you can see what it is like. If you didn't know any better, you'd think it was a peaceful place.

Sand Storm

Today the weather was horrible. There is a sand storm and I can hardly breath. Light orangeish sand is everywhere - all over everything. We got a thermometer that we put right outside our office area - funny thing is, it's American and it only goes to 120 degrees. Yesterday it was around 98-100 degrees. Today it got up to 88 and it felt cool. I don't like the sand at all - I hope it doesn't last long. The pictures are of the backyard of the Villa - the one on the bottom is during the sand storm.

I got my hair cut today - one of the little bases in the IZ has a salon - although it is a called Cleopatra's Saloon. I was expecting the worst and it came out not bad at all. I was pleasantly surprised. $35 plus an $8 tip and I used a $6 box of hair color that I brought with me. $49 sure beats the $200 bill I got last time I went to the hair dresser in DC.

Normal

These pictures are from Camp Victory, there is a building there called the Flintsone House. I 'm not sure what it used to be, but it reminds me of some of the buildings in Barcelona. Now it sits empty and people have put graffiti all over it. It seems to me like it would be a great place to have a party.

If you are following the news, you know that the cease fire is now back in effect. We had a rough week, but things are getting back to what - from my experience seems - normal. It was very quiet up until Easter for me, so my experience has been that it's normally quiet. People who have been here for a couple years say that is really not the norm, that last week, with all the blasts (maybe not sooo many), is more the norm and the quiet is abnormal. So....we will see - I like it better when it's quiet though.

On the mosquitoe front, I have made progress. I have procured some spray for my room and for my body, so the double effect seems to be working. I am back to sleeping through the night.

I have been very very busy with our senior manager here the past two weeks as well as planning for many investor trips this month. Things are still busy, but many of the trips have been moved to May, so that spaces our my workload at bit.

I have been neglecting the gym the past two weeks. While there was a lot of activity, we couldn't really get to the gym and also I have been working so much, that it's been hard to get away now that things have settled. I have no excuse though really because we have a treadmill and rowing machine in the villa now. We've had it for two weeks probably and I haven't tried it out yet. Unsat!!

During all the bombings, we had to wear our flack jackets and helmets when we left the villa - I was complaining about wearing it for 1/2 hour or so, but then I think of the soldiers out there who wear it everyday all day long. They really do sacrifice in so many ways for our country. I appreciate them so much.