The Beginning

Words to live by: if, in the retelling, some event will make a great story, treat it as adventure and start enjoying it now. And so far, one adventure after another. First was the dead battery on the car I was going to use to get to the airport.

No, no, no. First was that the Company sent me the wrong sized helmet. "But", she said, "all of them are the same size. Let me measure the other one." Off then, to the various surplus shops in the Cities until I found one with few scratches and large enough to fit my noggin.

Next the flax vest which was the right size, but was delivered without the all-important ceramic plates that would raise its effectiveness from 3A to 3. Sure, it's just a letter, but it means the difference between stopping a forty-four or a NATO 7.62, the cartridge of choice for the bad guys in the Middle East. The plates came special delivery with about 26 hours to spare until flight time. Anyway, I'm fine with the additional eight or ten pounds of packed and carried weight. All told, the gear weighs over 30 pounds. I just wish the whole thing wasn't black.

Then came the battery. Then came the "necessary and required" special screening by the assholes at the TSA. Once suitably degraded, I knew my adventure had begun.

I flew to Chicago and met up with two more adventurers who were with me the last time. There, we sat in the international terminal for the two hours required prior to international flights, and then for an additional hour until the end of the first travel day, and then four more hours before Royal Jordanian saw it fit let their flight leave the ground, bound for Amman.

Day two went both fast and slow. Fast, because we were flying east at 600 miles per hour, and an hour in the air was equivalent to nearly two hours on the ground. By the time we landed, we would be eight time zones east in just twelve hours and only slightly shagged, a fine way to finish day two. The slow part of course was the seemingly interminable flight with bad food and a worn out seat (note to self: avoid Royal Jordanian Airlines). In Amman, our local agent failed to appear where he was supposed to appear (although we did find another Companyman, Wes, standing in line with us), so we had to suffer without an interpreter (a.k.a. fixer) through a couple of visa and cambio lines, then the immigration line, then down to the baggage carousels where, like Mr. Samir upstairs, one of my bags failed to appear.

By the time I filled out the proper lost luggage forms and found a ride to the hotel, it was close to three. My wake-up call was for six and, wearing all the clothes I had left, I returned to the airport to get on my flight into Baghdad. Compared to three years ago, the Fokker F28-4000 flight was sedate, and got us into BIAP at noon, just in time for the first of about ninety meals at one of many DFAC's, still operated by KBR.

We spent the rest of the day in and about a day room at Camp Victory, awaiting our opportunity to ride a Rhino Bus into the IZ, or International Zone. Waiting at Camp Stryker for this bus marked the end of travel day three, as the busses only run during the wee portions of the night, quite the change from before.

Day Four starts at midnight, the third midnight in a row, and in three different time zones. At this point, I've been traveling for a long time with little sleep (sleep on a plane doesn't count for much). If it wasn't for the Red Bulls and monster cashews I yanked from the Marriott mini bar in Amman, I'd be worse off, but what really keeps me awake at this point is the fact that most of those hours have been spent sitting in uncomfortable chairs where sleep is impossible.

So. It's midnight. It's Iraq under a full moon. It's the middle of the largest coalition base in the Middle East. What does one do for a couple of hours while waiting for a bus? Back to the DFAC, I suppose for MIDRATs, or midnight rations. Sadly, "It's something to do", and sleep is out of the question just yet.

The man at the travel counter said that the busses would arrive to transport us into the city between one and three-thirty. In tune with the rest of this journey, they arrived at three-thirty. There were eight of these Rhino's - stout, tough, armored busses, similar to the one that Bill Murray and Harold Remus (with P.J. "Spatula Treatment" Soles) stole in the last half of "Stripes", but without all of the creature comforts.

Once 150 soldiers (Ugandans and Americans, mostly) and civilians (and a conex full of gear) were loaded, we made the fifteen mile trek into the International Zone (the zone formerly known as Green).

There, our contact did contact us, and I found myself in my new billet as six o'clock and a new sun approached. The executive summary is below.

00:00 01:00 Find a car that runs and drive to the airport
01:00 03:00 Security, wait
03:00 05:30 Fly
05:30 13:00 Security, wait
13:00 25:00 Fly
25:00 28:00 Visas, immigration, customs, and taxi rides
28:00 31:00 Sleep
31:00 32:00 Taxi rides, immigration, security
32:00 34:00 Wait
34:00 35:30 Fly
35:30 50:30 Immigration, security, wait
50:30 53:00 Transport, security, process
53:00 61:00 Sleep

Waiting 26.5 hours
Flying 15.0 hours
Sleeping 11.0 hours
Active 08.5 hours

One last note on this subject - by the time I woke up, it was about two in the afternoon locally, equating to about five in the morning in Minnesota, which is about the time I wake up at home.

Dealing with jet lag goes on tomorrows' agenda.