Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes

My, how things have changed, and a great portion of our casual conversation has centered around this. "Back in the day,… When we were here the last time,… It used to be that,…" start many of our conversations.

It’s reminiscence, in part, mixed with a desire to keep our newest team member (hither fore uninitiated to the Mideast) up to speed, and a need to establish our credibility with those who are here already. This last part will probably be the most vital as we delve into the work, but for now, it lets others know that we were here first, and that the program that they are still trying to manage is the one that we set up at the start. [“What ever have you done with our reconstruction program? Morons!”]

Lots has changed, though. It hits first on the incoming flight where a commercial airliner brings you to BIAP with minimal hassle. Once there, we processed through Iraqi immigration, adjacent to immigrating Iraqis. Limited taxi service was available just outside the terminal. When we left in March 2003, there was no commercial air service. However, once air service was established, it must have allowed even more of the wealthier Iraqis to skip town, so there’s no one left to support the small restaurants and shops that were just starting to populate the terminal back in the day. As a result, there’re no shops.

Back in the day, once you were on the airport with suitable kit and papers, it was relatively simple to access the various military camps and facilities that extended for thousands of hectares around the tarmac. Today, I get the feeling that the military here has compressed and hardened their position. There’s less open space, more of the giant concrete T-walls, and a more intense security posture. It wasn’t the inviting place that it was in the beforetimes, when we would regularly cruise out to BIAP at a hundred miles per hour for trunkloads of booze from the duty free shop.

The IZ is even more so, with the T-walls running down both sides of most streets. Subdividing. Isolating. There’s no access to the former presidential palace, the grounds, hallways and closets of which I used to call home. It’s now the U.S. embassy, and no one gets in unless they’re super special.

There’s no Haji Mart either, which used to be a place to go just to go to some place. There’s no Chinese Restaurant or local pizza place, and very few Iraqis. There was a time not long ago when I could stroll in relative safety through the streets of this quarter and explore. We could get vehicles and drive to the airport or to the Al Rashid for a round of tennis or a few drinks.

Right! There was a time we could drink.

But no more. The look and feel of the Coalition is one subjected to the long term effects of fear, paranoia, and imperialism. It feels closed and terribly isolated.