04/09/07

A couple of days ago, in the wee hours of the night, I had my head down working on some papers. I heard a soldier asking one of the Turks the procedure for getting on a computer here in our tent, saying it was his first time here. I glanced up and much to my amazement it was 2 soldiers that used to be on my camp in Tikrit in '04.

I jumped up and before I could a "Hi" out of my mouth, they screamed back, "HEY THOMAS!!". They ran over and shook hands and gave me a big hug and said how weird it was to see me, and I said the same.

They had stopped at our camp to stay overnight before they continued back to theirs.

We sat for awhile and caught up alittle, with family, and other things and exchanged email addresses. Then they went off to call and email their loved ones.

It was strange to see them here. It was like none of us had ever left this country yet. And after all these years for them to remember me, touched my heart.

We had a great Easter here in the "Cradle of Civilization", even being on "High Alert" all day with everyone figuring we would be attacked because it was a holiday.

Only one explosion was heard though, a VBIED, some 1000 meters off the FOB.

The day started out with a sunrise service at Elijah's Monastery, one I mentioned in an earlier entry. Founded somewhere around 595 A.D.

What a great place to hold the service, so much history there. Even though it sprinkled sporatically on the several hundred worshippers, I don't think there was one person there that minded.

Later that night, after going to my hooch and getting a few hours of sleep we had our Easter Party. (Thanks to Mary and Operation Pinecone, Patty from Beaumont, and of course Mom and Dad. Without your generous donations we would have had nothing. Thank you for allowing me to be the tool of your generosity.)

We had an Egg Hunt, (plastic eggs with numbers on them that would correspond to the number of a prize). I know it sounds like a little kid thing, but we had several hundred soldiers here tearing apart everything looking for these eggs. I really didn't know what to expect, however, as soon as I announce the rules and told everyone to start looking, it seemed like everyone stopped what they were doing and started looking for these eggs.

We had tons of candy and Girl Scout cookies laying out, and even some individual wrapped packages of several different candies to give to the soldiers. Even some Happy Easter cards and a sign from some school kids and adults. To say all these things brightened everyones day would be an understatement.

Also, it seems everyone here loves musical chairs, only this time since it was Easter, I made everyone grab one leg and hop around the chairs like bunnies for the prizes.
Unfortunately 4 chairs were broken with the various scuffles that broke out during the different rounds, and one soldier got elbowed in the face pretty hard at one point too...I don't ever remember this game being a full contact sport...everyone that wasn't playing, just watched and laughed and laughed at the antics going on over a box of Girl Scout cookies!

I understand that the DFAC had a good Easter dinner too although lately, for the last month or so they have been rationing everything there. Don't know why that is but everyone tells me they have been doing that.

I haven't ate in the DFAC for well over a month now, as I have been eating with the Turks, and their dishes during this time. Some of their stuff I have no idea what it is, but it is pretty tasty for the most part.

Last night at dinner they kept calling one of the guys "Dau-shon", but I knew it wasn't his name. So finally I asked them what "Dau-shon" meant, and they told me it roughly translated to Easter Bunny...I just started laughing...

So it was a pretty good Easter, all things considered...it was very, very busy. In fact last night a convoy from another camp way south of here, (11 hours to get to us I was told), arrived just towards the end of the party and joined in with us.

Around 0300 or so I went outside to the porta-potties and saw some of them just sitting in their trucks, I walked over to their humvees and asked them what they were doing.

They told me they had to sleep in their trucks 'cause all the hooches were already filled. (That tourist brochure I put out is really workin'!! ha!)

I told them they were more than welcome to sleep in our movie room on the beanbag chairs or on our crappy couches, but it's still better than sleeping in a humvee. Especially after being in it for 11 hours!!

So they told the guys in the other vehicles,and they all came inside the tent.

We dimmed the lights for them, and told everyone else to keep it down as much as possible, but I really didn't need to, they all have been there before, dead tired and just looking for somewhere safe and quiet to catch a few winks.

Off to sleep they went and back to my paperwork and reports I went thinking about all the laughs, fun and memories that were made... ...and thinking today...at least for a few hours...this wasn't such a bad place to be...