On My Time in Iraq

On my Time in Iraq

I was listening to CNN November 2, 2008, and they were reporting from Times Square on an event for veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. They talked with one fellow who was in the fight in Fallujah in Iraq, the major battle that ultimately resulted in the city being retaken by the marines. This particular veteran received the Silver Star and Bronze Star and has been nominated for the Congressional Medal of Honor for his actions in that battle. He said that veterans will never be the same as a result of the war simply for having been there. Even if they “never went outside the wire [left the confines of the secure area] of the FOB [Forward Operating Base]” they will be forever effected by the experience. I thought about what he had said and related it to what I had learned from my time in Iraq. I knew that what he said was true. I also knew that there is more to waging a war and helping secure the aftermath than most people realize or want to know. It is precisely this lack of full appreciation for what is involved, a naiveté of sorts, on the part of our recent leadership that caused us to become mired in an unfortunate and complex engagement in a part of the world we really know very little about. That is when I knew that I could now and indeed must, write about my experiences in Iraq. Not just the experiences with the dangerous situations, but the overall experience of a modern war, the costs and logistics, and attempts to reconstruct a society devastated by the carnage.

There are two things that permanently affected my outlook and my psyche. The first is the unwitting waste of phenomenal amounts of money on efforts which were guaranteed to fail or at best, not survive our occupation there. On this point I can only speak with authority about the undertaking in the Rule of Law area. The second thing that has affected me is what everyone asks about and is most concerned about; the danger of being there. This was pushed more to the back of my mind but was yanked to the forefront again by the vet I listened to on CNN. I will discuss this first.

I.

The required two weeks of courses in the greater Washington D.C. area were designed to give every person deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan the very minimal of information and skills necessary to adapt to what they would be seeing once in the theatre. There was a course on first aid to give basic information on how to react to injuries that may result from an attack. These included instruction on where we would find medical supplies in the various buildings and what to do if we were not in such a place. Basic trauma response. Tourniquets, when and how to use them, writing on the persons forehead with the date and time it was applied, etc. Methods to stop various types of bleeding. Who to treat first when there were multiple injuries, including making difficult decisions on priorities. And other more ordinary first aid responses.

There was a class in recognizing situations where we might be targeted. These were designed to increase our situational awareness. We were taught what things might be unusual and how to remain alert at all times for unusual things. We were told to alter times and routes of travel to regular venues. As part of this exercise we traveled in groups to and from a location while being stalked by several police instructors who were trying to plan an attack on our vehicles. What became clear to me as a result of this exercise was that it is nearly impossible to identify such dangers if the stalkers have enough intelligence and manpower. Finally we had a defensive driving course designed to teach basic emergency driving techniques in the unlikely event that we would ever be in such circumstances.

I understood the usefulness and the necessity of the courses while taking them. Kaz, because he was coming for a short time, was excepted out of the courses and it took him a long painful week to adjust to what was happening around him. It was not that he was afraid; to the contrary, he lacked the full appreciation of the circumstances to be cautious when he needed to be. Several trips to a duck and cover bunker had a way of creating a situational awareness where one was lacking. Kaz left a different person than when he came.

Chatting with a colleague on street in Green Zone
The first months were largely quiet with only a very few incoming rockets into the Green Zone. We traveled outside the Green Zone with either private PSD (Personal Security Detail) teams or military PSD teams. They always did what we were told they would do: advise us of the route to be taken, instruct on the equipment in the vehicle, either an up-armored (armored) Suburban or an up-armored Humvee, instruct on what to do if we came under attack, etc. The units consisted of twelve armed soldiers or private PSD forces, and four armed and armored vehicles. The private PSD teams used an additional two or more scout cars which were manned by masked Iraqis often Kurds, who were armed but in soft (unarmored) vehicles. Together with all other personnel we wore helmet and flak jacket – body armor, often called hard gear or battle rattle. The flak jackets were equipped with Kevlar or metal plates in front and back and weighed around thirty or forty pounds.

Preparing for a trip to a court.

Man in uniform is an Air Force Lawyer
The trips were always intense by the very nature of the exercise. The scout cars’ job was to clear traffic. The military PSDs often used helicopters to give advice on traffic patterns etc. to the military PSDs. The scout car occupants would often exit their cars and, weapons in hand, walk through traffic moving vehicles aside so the PSD team could get through. Stopping was a critical incident. No one wanted to be sitting in traffic in such circumstances. Moving targets are more difficult to hit than stationary ones. The goal always was to keep moving. If going on the opposite side of the street, even across a median, would keep us moving, that is what they did. All in all it was a very tense and, from an Iraqi civilian’s point of view, offensive undertaking. The objective was to get us safely to our destination.

There was one place in particular that was always a concern to me as well as the PSD teams. On the street leading to Rusafa, FOB Shield and the Ministry of Interior, it was necessary to pass under an overpass where two streets intersected. It was tunnel-like and constricted. Above the entrance and exit to this underpass, the crossing street passed and was flanked by sidewalks which overlooked the street below; the one we traveled. Sometimes the PSD teams would wait outside for traffic to clear and then speed through. There was always a danger during the time that the team was waiting. It was possible to wait at a traffic circle on the trip back which had the advantage of an Iraqi policeman to stop all traffic while we waited. It also was situated in a way that allowed the vehicle with principles – us – to move even if slightly to make targeting more difficult. In those instances (and similarly in other parts of the city), the other PSD vehicles would pull alongside and protect the principles’ vehicle from the most obvious source of a threat. Nothing was perfect, but the teams were extremely well trained and cautious. They were supported by TOCs (tactical operations centers) at the Embassy or elsewhere who advised of anticipated dangers and were in radio and other contact, such as GPS, with the teams. Some teams would simple move through the underpass as fast as they could after clearing as much traffic as possible, but without stopping.

Walking to a court
We entered buildings the same way. We never got out of the vehicles ourselves. Strict instructions were that we waited for the PSD team member to open the doors. There was a procedure. The team members would get out of their vehicles and do a quick check of the area. Two would post themselves on either side of our vehicle and wait for the others to give an all clear. Only then would they open the doors for us to exit. Then they would always lead as we walked into the building. Our preference was to take our body armor off before entering buildings so as to present a more normal demeanor to our counterparts. Sometimes the PSD Team Leader would require us to remain in body armor until we reached our destination within the building. They would also enter any room we were scheduled to have a meeting and check it before allowing us to enter. Even then, there was an incident where a bomb went off and killed an international who was meeting with a judge.

There was one occasion when our interpreter Aubakr and I were meeting with some Iraqi court officials; the IT Director and one of her assistants. We had a discussion in one of the courts in a part of the city which was secure but dangerous. This area I suppose could be contrasted from neighborhoods like Sadr City where we did not go at all, although we had gone to the edge of Sadr City to visit the Judicial Training Center. But this court was in an area where conflict among the local factions often occurred as well as attacks on American military.

I had traveled with some of the PSD team before, in particular the team leader and medic, a tall black man with a distinct British accent. He wore a bandana covering what may well have been dredlocks. A British flag adorned his vest. He gave us the usual run down. "If we are incapacitated press the red button... If we have to break out of the vehicle, these are the tools.... If I am out of the vehicle and there are injuries throw out my bag .... " and so on.

In orchestrated form the vehicles moved out from our Green Zone pick-up point in a line, all of them, led by two scout vehicles - soft cars driven by masked people who speak the local tongue. The unit weaved and wound, each vehicle covering for the next with particular attention to ours. We were the principals. Sirens blared and men hung out of the chase cars with orange flags waving. Police stopped traffic and cleared paths in traffic jams. The team was tense when we had to wait in traffic congestion. A scout car passenger exited and urged cars to pull over to make a path through the stalled traffic. It was a scene right out of a plottless violent B movie.

We arrived at the court. Abu and I took our gear off before exiting. We wanted to appear to our hosts as normal as possible. Our small private army escorted us, weapons at the ready. The hallway was politely cleared by our armed companions. We met the judge, but he was not who we were there to see. After exchanging pleasantries, we proceeded to a computer room where we were joined by the IT manager for the Iraqi courts and one of her assistants. She is a woman who I came to know and fully respect for her direct firmness and pleasant smile. We had come to view a software system installed with US dollars a few years earlier. The meeting went well in certain respects and not so well in others, but we were always pleasant and always making progress. The guards stood sentry at the door.

Just as we neared an end point to the meeting our PSD team leader, head wrapped in a black scarf, entered the room holding our hard gear (PPE, personal protection equipment, helmet and vest). As unobtrusively as he could not then be, he whispered that a bomb had gone off two hundred meters away and we were leaving. The cardinal rule is that the PSD team leader is in charge - always. If he says it is time to go, then it is time to go. No arguments or last few words. We put our gear on and thanked our hosts.

This was the first time that I have been in a situation where the intensity of everyone, the PSD team in particular, was elevated several notches. As we walked down the hallway, a man tried to pass a paper to another man, possibly his lawyer, by reaching in front of us as we approached. Our armed escort pushed the man's arm back and said, "excuse us please." Always professional, but direct and authoritative we were led to the car. No stopping, no wasted motion. Once inside the cars, in practiced form, we sped from the court compound and down the streets. Within minutes we were a safe distance and the team leader briefed us as best he could. An explosion had occurred very close to the court. We had not heard it but the US military was on the scene and we needed to be quickly evacuated. After all was done and we were safely back in the Green Zone and walking back to the Embassy, carrying hard gear, as so many do in that area, it quickly became business as usual

On another occasion, we visited the Rusafa Court. Inside the building there was an open area extending up to the second floor. The staircase was located in this area. There was a balcony around above the vestibule below. As we entered, I looked up to see two members of our PSD team already stationed on the balcony. It was as though we had occupied the building. There, with long guns at the ready, bodies draped in extra clips and various other types of smaller hand held weapons, helmet secured, stood part of our team. It appeared that we had our own army of mercenaries, and in fact we did.

Tee Walls along a Baghdad Street
In order to make travel safer, nearly all streets in the Green Zone are bordered by tee walls. Tee walls are concrete wall sections with a “T” base. They are assembled like inverted “Ts” They are usually twelve feet high, about one foot thick, eight feet wide and interlock to form a solid impenetrable wall of concrete. Tee walls are even used outside the Green Zone to protect heavily traveled routes. Route Irish from the airport is tee walled for several kilometers. Much of that section is being transformed into murals by local artists. Sadr City has been divided by a long tee wall to keep insurgents confined. It is hard to get

Baghdad Street in the Red Zone the flavor of the city when so much of it is obscured behind tee walls. What is visible is not unlike any large city, with storefronts and markets. People move about in cars; a few in other modes of transport such as motor cycles. The dress is everything from western to typical Arab dress. Some women are covered in black burkes others wear western dress. Nothing looks prosperous. The results of war are everywhere.

*******

But that was when we moved (traveled to outside the Green Zone). When we worked in the Embassy daily and walked from our hooches to the Palace it was very tranquil for several months. Ninety percent of my time was spent in the Embassy. There may have been a few incidents of rocket attacks but very infrequently and none ever hit in the area of the Palace. The Palace itself was an imposing structure. Easily two city blocks long and two stories high. It falls somewhere between beautiful, ostentatious and garish. The ornate hand painted ceilings and door trim were works of art. The plastic crystal looking chandeliers everywhere were overkill. The building was obviously used for a combination of official business, with hallways of offices, and for official ceremonial events, with one huge ballroom and several smaller ones. All entrances were manned by the Peruvian forces hired by the contractor. The doors were all air-lock doors; that is you enter one door and get cleared by a guard before a second door is unlocked to let you pass through.

Back of Palace
All functions will move to a new purpose built Embassy down the street from the Palace, but until then the Palace serves as the American Embassy. The old American Embassy is next door to the Palace and is now a bombed out shell. The North end of the Palace is where the Ambassador’s office was located and where the military and other secure offices were located. The North end was once a huge ballroom but was divided into offices with eight foot walls for use by mostly military personnel. The ceiling is over twenty feet up. Statues line the walls about half way up the perimeter walls and everything is
ornate, except of course the temporary walls built to give office space for the Americans. Great care was taken to insure that all the alterations made by the Americans during this several year temporary occupation of the building can be undone with minimal damage to the original structure. It will be for the Iraqis to decide what to do with the building after that. My bosses were in the North end of the Palace under the section with the private boxes that overlooked the ballroom. A couple of small offices were carved out of the grand entrance area for my supervisors. Every inch of space was used.

An airlock door separated this section of the Palace from the Middle section where several conference rooms were located and where the rotunda under the big green dome of the Palace is located. Marines check people into the North end and let people move back into the rest of the Palace. There was one long hallway down the front of the Palace from the middle section to the far South end. During sandstorms, a haze could be seen if looking from one end of the hallway to the other; a reminder that the air inside was only marginally more clear than the brown fog of the outside. It was in this hallway when, during the rocket attacks of late March and April of 2008, my boss and I were walking as the “duck and cover” alarm went off advising everyone to: “duck and cover, stay away from the windows.” We had been walking and talking and simply continued until we came to a place where we would be passing windows. The rocketing of the Green Zone had been going on for several days or weeks at that time. The “all clear” had not been announced over the loud speakers yet, so we stopped and continued our discussion. Several other people were also stopped waiting for the” all clear.” A woman standing next to T. suddenly broke into tears and literally slid down the wall into a crumpled pile, sobbing on the floor. We turned and watched; there was nothing we could do. Some people came to her assistance, helped her up and escorted her away. The all clear sounded and we proceeded on.

Hooch
This was during the time when, because of the incessant and random rocket attacks, the Ambassador had ordered all personnel to remain under hard cover at all times. That meant that the housing units were abandoned and everyone was sleeping on cots in the Palace. In the daytime, people could go shower in their hooches, wearing hard gear to and from, but had to sleep and work inside the cover of the Palace. A great amount stress was created by these circumstances; living in cramped conditions on cots together with fellow employees, wearing body armor to go to meals or to shower, and rockets falling without warning.

My office was located at the far south end of the Palace, immediately south of a large room used for the Internet café for the troops and others, the library, and the Green Bean coffee shop. This is where the Ambassador and dignitaries like Condoleezza Rice would address the staff. The room from which my office was cut was once Saddam’s decision room. A large room which under American use, contained offices for perhaps as many as one hundred people. On the domed ceiling were painted horses in a large circle against a background of clouds and blue sky. These represented the Arab tribes. On the east wall was a mural of a mosque, on the west wall the famous scud missiles with flames shooting from them, flying toward Iran. We worked in a room about twenty feet by twenty five feet; ten of us, plus a conference table. Well, usually only seven or eight of us, but when the guys who were out taking a one hundred percent inventory of one of the larger contractors were in Baghdad, we had ten. It was a crowded place to be, but we were under hard cover never worrying about the rocket attacks. We had no windows, so when the duck and cover alarm went off we just kept working. Even when the rocket hit the Embassy near the entrance we normally used, maybe two hundred feet from our office, we did comment that it sounded like a direct hit, but we kept working. Within seconds K. came rushing into the office to tell us it hit right where they were standing smoking. They came in, of course, when the C-RAM (Counter Rocket, Artillery, and Mortar) went off, but it was at that location.

I should explain the systems we had for warnings. One was a simple announcement over the intercom system which extended to many parts of the Green Zone where US personnel would be residing or working. This system reacted to rockets that had already landed. You may hear an explosion and then the announcement would come across the loud speaker; “duck and cover, get away from the windows….” The C-RAM system actually would pick up the rockets on radar and give a five second warning of its impact. “Incoming, incoming. Take cover;” followed by a boom.

The rule for the dining facility (DFAC) was to drop down and get under the tables. Our particular facility had a special hard cover. Sometimes we did get down, but usually, about half of us just kept eating. I do remember a time when my two bosses and I were having dinner and a large boom was heard out the window near us. The rocket hit half a block away. We all looked at each other and, without speaking, moved in unison, albeit slowly, to get under the table.

It started Easter Sunday. There were, I think, twelve or so separate attacks with several rockets in each. I wondered if it was just the type of reminder they had been giving us on holidays such as they did on Thanksgiving. Monday there were no attacks. I reasoned that my thinking was correct. Then came Tuesday and beyond. The attacks actually coincided with al-Maliki’s assaults on Basra and Sadr City, both at that time controlled by the Madhi Army of Shiite Muslim cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. Regardless, the attacks continued daily, dawn until dark. Ten, twelve or more a day. Three, four or more rockets in each attack. The Iranian rockets were launched from people’s backyards, school yards and other innocuous places where it would be difficult for the Americans to find and retaliate against the perpetrators. In addition, they used timed detonators so that the persons setting the rockets were long gone by the time they launched. Guidance was better than random, but not precise by any measure. The LZ (Landing Zone) Washington helicopter landing site three hundred yards from the south end of the Embassy where I worked, was hit several times, leading us to believe that it was being targeted.

Ba'ath Party Headquarters from camp
Blackhawk camp, where I lived in a small compound operated by my employing agency, was literally in the parking lot of the Ba’ath Party Headquarters, now a bombed out shell. Saddam had been in the bunker under that structure during much of the initial campaign into Baghdad. A Tee wall separated our camp from the Iraqi special operations unit that used a salvaged portion of the former Ba’ath building. We learned that during the rocket attacks, an Iraqi was found on the roof of the headquarters building with antenna and radio equipment, ostensibly calling in coordinates. Targets other than the Embassy and the heliport included some Iraqi government officials’ homes along the Tigris River to the north of our camp, maybe a kilometer or so from us. I don’t know that the CSH (Combat Support Hospital) was a target, but it had several rockets fall in its parking lot or nearby. The CSH was two hundred yards from our camp. Phoenix base was also hit several times, once resulting in several military personnel being killed as they worked out in the gym.

I recall most of this time as a series of anecdotes, and perhaps my experience is best shared that way. On the Tuesday after Easter we walked to breakfast to the sight of a huge plume of billowing black smoke from behind the Embassy where the DFAC was located. The DFAC was unharmed but a warehouse behind the DFAC was hit by one of the early morning rockets we had heard from our beds. The next day one hit housing units behind the Embassy, one of which belonged to a friend of mine. He was not in it at the time. It was in these early days that one of the Embassy employees whose office was across the hall from mine, was killed in his hooch. Within a week or so there was a directive that all Mission Employees (those working in the Embassy under the greater umbrella of the Ambassador) were required to wear hard gear at all times while outside the Embassy compound and had to use the buddy system – no one walking alone. This directive also closed the Palace pool and outside MWR (morale, welfare and recreation) events. Employees were given the option to sleep in the Palace.

Gary and I had gone from the Embassy back to the camp one morning using the buddy system. He needed something and I did as well. There had been no rockets that morning. Before we could get back to the Embassy the attack started. We retreated to the duck and cover bunker in our camp. Better than most, our duck and cover bunker was equipped with benches along the sides and a light and fan. The benches were covered with dust, a testament to the lack of use of the bunker. It would be some time before the dust would settle there again. Made of concrete six inches thick and shaped like an upside-down “U” the bunkers provided cover from the blasts and flying shrapnel. Most, including ours, had short tee walls at the open ends so that all sides were fairly well covered.

We sat in rows along the sides of the bunker, facing each other, knees nearly touching, waiting for the all clear. We heard several blasts then silence. Finally the all clear sounded over the loud speakers positioned around us. Gary said he was not going back to the Embassy; without a “buddy” I could not go either. I went back to my hooch. Gary and Randy were playing Tiger Woods Golf in the MWR room on the TV there. Agnes went about her cleaning, others their own business. It was not long before another attack came; we followed the same routine scrambling to the bunker. We waited, the all clear sounded, and then another attack came. Although they had started late in the morning, there were more attacks that day than nearly any other.

We could hear them exploding around us, some near some farther away. At one point, Randy and I were sitting outside. I was smoking a cigar and drinking an aperitif in the late afternoon. The day had been a series of jaunts to the duck and cover bunker. I had my helmet near and my vest on. It was eerie when we heard the whistle of the rocket over our heads. It was as clear as if blown directly into our ears. We jumped simultaneously and ran to the bunker. Had we looked up, I am convinced we could have seen the rocket. As we entered the bunker we heard the blast. It was very close, perhaps at the CSH.

There was really no time nor reason to reflect on the happenings around us; simply react. It was not until I was sitting in Chester’s Cigar Bar at the Hotel Le Royal smoking a cigar and enjoying the last of a draft beer I had with my Caesar salad that I allowed my mind to reflect on what we had been through. Although it was then May, it was too cool to sit outside on the tenth floor veranda, but the glass could not mask the night lights of Amman as they rolled over the hills into the distance. A typical low rise sprawling Middle-eastern city of a couple million. Everything is the color of sand except those buildings painted white. The high desert of Amman reminds me a lot of Reno, Nevada.

Soft American Jazz was playing; the decor distinctively British, although the hotel post-dates that era. It was designed to make Westerners feel comfortable. Other than a man and a woman in traditional Arab dress, the man in his Dishdashah with shumagg on his head, she wore an abayah, hejab on her head with her face exposed, the rest of the patrons could as easily have been in London, New York or Chicago.

I took a long draw; I blew the smoke toward the high heavily wooded ceiling. Nibbling on a nut from the dish in front of me I reflected on the recent events back in Baghdad. The reality began to sink in. The realization of the true essence of the danger we were in crept timidly and with great hesitation to the forefront of my mind. It finally occurred to me that the difference between us and those who had been killed or injured by the incessant attacks was a matter of luck. The rockets had fallen where they were instead of where we were. We heard them, they felt them. The rockets shook the ground near us, the ragged steel shrapnel tore through their bodies. All because they were hit and we were not. They were neither more nor less a specific target than we were. I quickly decided that these were things I would not want to dwell on for long, nor in any great depth. I swept the thoughts back to where they had been safely kept until then. I crushed the last inch of cigar into the ash tray. I drained the glass of the remaining beer. The waiter came rushing to my side, obsequious in his offer to fulfill my further needs. I asked for the check, signed it, and returned to my room.

After the employee was killed in his hooch and other housing units were hit by rockets, a directive was issued requiring employees to wear hard gear at all times while outside and all employees would be required to sleep under hard cover, i.e. the Palace, and no one could drive in or ride in anything other than a hard (armored) car. All movements outside the Green Zone were indefinitely cancelled. The only people allowed into the Green Zone from BIAP were essential employees. Work became whatever could be done inside the Embassy and over the computer.

Compound villa
Cots were issued to all employees and people began finding places in their offices, in the hallways anywhere they could to sleep at night. I slept one night in my office with my suite mates. The cot gave me a terrible back ache, the women in another office found it desirable or necessary to stay awake and talk and laugh half the night; all in all it was a miserable night. Gary had closed our camp in light of the Ambassador’s orders. Most of the residents of our little camp were not Embassy employees but contractors who guarded another compound we had south of the Embassy. This compound was three former homes with walled yards. These homes were the typical concrete homes of well to do Iraqis. They were in fact hard cover. We had encircled them with Tee walls and secured them with a combination of American and South African guards, all of whom lived in the Blackhawk compound. An additional contingent of Iraqi guards supplemented the efforts of the professional guards; they manned the watch towers. The problem with this compound was that it was located immediately next to a group of twelve-story apartment buildings. The compound was an easy target for potential insurgents in the apartments. As a result, we could not use it for our offices, nor could anyone from the Embassy stay overnight there. Nonetheless, Gary moved our camp to that compound and procured hard cars in which to drive back and forth. In light of the circumstances and because the employees were not Embassy employees, the Embassy security people allowed Gary to use the compound instead of our camp.

The morning following my first horrible night in the office, I prevailed on Gary to prevail on my bosses to allow me to stay at the compound. Without going into detail, an exception was made and I spent the next weeks until the restrictions were lifted, at the compound. At least there was a bed and quiet at night.

The worst time for all who worked in the Embassy was this particular time. Outside rockets were dropping randomly and without warning; inside people were living in close quarters, working and sleeping in virtually the same space. Non essential people were not allowed into the Green Zone, all travel was suspended. Nerves were raw.

******

The reaction of the various people was interesting and instructive. There were many who could not take the rocket attacks at all. K. was one. He stumbled several times, injuring himself, running from his hooch to duck and cover bunkers. Although he gave an outwardly calm expression his actions and talk made it clear that he was not doing well. He did not go outside unless he had to. He somehow got the idea that there might be an invasion of the Green Zone. He openly worried about that and looked for places in the Palace where he might hide if we were overrun. For the sake of those who are not familiar with the Green Zone, it is a secure area about two miles square. Inside there were several major US military camps, not to mention the various other coalition partner forces in other embassies. But the mind does funny things in stressful circumstances.

I began to watch carefully to note how my colleagues were reacting. I was the link between our staff in the south end and my supervisors in the north end. I recommended that K. be sent to Camp Klecker at BIAP (Baghdad International Air Port) until he left for leave or the rocket attacks stopped. I approached him with that option and he gave it some consideration but decided in the end to wait until he left on R&R.

On one of the days we were stuck in the camp going in and out of the duck and cover bunker, and when several hooches behind the Embassy were hit, without injury, Alex showed up at our camp with a back pack. Alex was a Romanian-American and a friend of Randy’s. He wanted a place to stay, he did not want to stay behind the Embassy in his own hooch. I suppose he thought he was better off with us. Gary was not happy, but Randy obliged Alex.

The game of choice on the Play Station or whatever other make of TV computer game player it may have been, was Tiger Woods Golf. Tiger Woods Golf was actually a pleasant distraction. I didn’t play, but Randy was expert and Gary was close, so was Piedt. It was entertaining to watch them play. Gary could not beat Randy and that frustrated his retired Marine “Gunny” Sergeant ego greatly. They played for hours at a time. They played in the MWR room. On one occasion, Gary and Piedt were playing while several of us watched. I was on the couch sitting on the end closest the door. Randy was on a chair at the opposite end of the couch and furthest from the door. The C-Ram went off and we all got up to move to the duck and cover bunker. Somehow, Randy made his way out the door before me even though I was closer. The story grew with each telling by Gary until it became something like; “The judge wasn’t moving fast enough so Randy knocked him down and ran right over top of him. The judge had footprints on his back.” It surfaced at every barbeque after the attacks stopped and Gary never tired of telling it – and embellishing it.

Alex brought another game to the camp when he arrived for his several days stay. It was some sort of G-I Joe game with guns and bombs going off. I said, “there isn’t enough of that outside?” I don’t like those games anyway and certainly not in the circumstances we found ourselves. I left Alex and Piedt to their play. Shortly after that conversation, a rocket blast was heard and we all headed for the duck and cover bunker. Within seconds, a couple of additional rounds hit. About that time, Piedt and Alex came running into the bunker. They were laughing. They said they were not sure the sounds were the game or from rockets outside.

John worked in the TOC. He was an extremely nice guy and conscientious. He had been in Iraq for two years with the military, first during the original invasion, then for a year at a later time. He saw a lot of action in the early years of the war. He had worked in his position in the TOC for a year or so, making his tenure in Iraq over three years. He was an example of how people can be in those environments too long. John jumped at every sound. If the truck dropped the dumpster (which it did often) he started for the duck and cover bunker. If a rocket landed no matter what time of night, he was in the bunker. Everybody in the camp knew he was too edgy and so did he. We often said, “John, why don’t you go home?” I surmise that when people have been in a dangerous situation for so long without injury, they begin to consciously or sub-consciously believe that their luck may be running out. It is hard for me to know what brings on this reaction after someone has endured for so long, but it is a real phenomenon. It is part of what the vet was talking about in Times Square in early November. Within a month or so John did make the decision to go home for good.

Agnes cleaned the camp and our hooches. She was Filipino. Kobis was a security guard and former South African Policeman. Agnes was noticeably frightened every time we huddled in the bunker. On one occasion, rockets had hit to the north of us. The prior attack had hit to the south. Kobis was sitting in the bunker with the rest of us and decided to analyze the attacks. “That hit to the north.” He said. “The other one hit to the south. They are triangulating us.” As he talked Agnes’ eyes grew larger and larger. Gary not so subtly asked Kobis to stop.

I was awakened by the solid, heavy, sharp and distinctive sound of a rocket exploding nearby. Then came another; it was 6:30 in the morning on my day off. As I lay in my warm bed, I debated whether to crawl under its somewhat secure metal plate form or just stay where I was and hope for the best. Within a few minutes I could hear the sirens and the all clear. I rolled over. Since my normal awakening time was 6:00. I wondered if I would be able to fall back asleep. I thought that I might just as well start the day. But I wanted to catch up a bit on sleep. I turned a few more times under the covers. Then the sirens came again, and the voice over the loud speaker somewhere outside, "duck and cover! Duck and cover!" Within a few moments another boom, and another, and another. I got up. No sense in delaying it any longer. I turned on my computer. "All clear. All clear." The muffled voice declared. I turned on the light by the coffee maker. Boom! Boom! A belated; "duck and cover! Duck and cover!" I started the coffee then sat at my computer. More booms, some close, some in the distant. For an hour maybe more it kept going. I decided that I may as well relax. If the unlikely event of a direct hit on my hooch happened, then it would surely be my time to go. A fatalistic attitude I suppose, but I never had the feeling that I would die in Iraq. I was pretty confident in that.

Belief in ultimate survival does little to quell the effects that the experience has on the psyche from being in such uncertain and therefore stressful circumstances. I was home on R&R in a Best Buy with Sharon and our son Patrick. The people in the audio section were trying out the speakers, and of course, as with all people of that age and inclination, they wanted to hear the base. The base speakers could be heard everywhere in the store as a boom, boom. Then it would stop until the next person listened. Boom, Boom. I asked Sharon if she noticed. She didn’t. My ears were tuned into those sounds. I knew they were not rockets, after all I was in the US at Best Buy, but my experience made it impossible to not notice all such sounds and identify them in an instant. We began to be able to recognize a rocket from the sound of the dumpster being dropped, but also a rocket from a car bomb; a rocket that hit outside the Green Zone or fell short. It just happens. And all of this is what the vet in Times Square was talking about and trying to get people to understand. Things that happen in war stay for a long time. I am fortunate to have only been working there a short time in a relatively secure setting. It has happened in all wars and is a reason we should avoid wars at all costs. The toll in human suffering is far too extensive and great.

Part II. must wait,
Until the Next Connection,
Dan

Along the Silk Road III

III

Earthquake; Green onions and the street vendor; It is getting cold but no heat; Staff illnesses, teeth; Critical report; Buttons; Clinics, Buildings, Steps, Doctors and Medicine; Snow

I felt it and looked and saw the wall in my apartment moving back and forth and the curtains sway. I was on the phone with Sharon at about nine-thirty at night here, when it happened. I said, “There was a tremor.” It was a bit disconcerting but I was aware that this is an earthquake prone area. I had not felt any before here or anywhere. It was the next day that I learned of the large 7.0 on the Richter scale quake south of here in the Osh area. That is on the south side of the mountains several hundred miles from Bishkek. Over seventy people died.

oo000oo

I was on my way to the ATM and I noticed a man on the corner selling apples and bunches of green onions. He had a cardboard box with apples and bunches of green onions spread across an overturned box. I had not found good green onions anywhere and his looked good. On my way back I stopped and picked out a nice bunch. He got a plastic bag and put the bunch in it. Then he put two more and said “three.” I was thinking they must have been three for something and I asked that. He, of course, could not speak English beyond a few numbers. Then he put another bunch in and said four. Again I asked, “four for what?” He then put a fifth bunch in the bag, far more than I would eat in a month. He said “five.” I said how much and he said “five.” I knew it was not five som, since five som is about – well at thirty-seven som to the dollar, not much. I pulled a five som note out of my pocket and showed it to him saying, “five.” He said “Net.” He then pulled out a fifty som note and showed it to me. I said, “That’s fifty; how much for one bunch?” He pulled out a ten som note and showed me. “Give me one bunch,” I said. He said “net.” Then he placed the ten som note over the fifty som note and as he pulled the ten som note away from the fifty som note, he said, “five.” I had to capitulate at this point and paid the man forty som (just over a dollar) for five bunches of green onions when I needed one. Best I could do back at the office was to convince Julia that she needed one bunch, I still had four.

oo000oo

Chui Street October 31

Nearly all buildings in Bishkek are heated by the central heating authority. Hot water and hot water heat are piped from the facility at the base of the large stack under the plume of smoke on the eastern edge of town. Hot water runs year around; well except for one month around April when it is down for servicing each year. Hot water heaters in apartments are therefore necessary if you want continuous hot water. I have one in my kitchen and one in my main bathroom. They are not turned on now, but will be when the government hot water stops.


The heat is another matter November 15 to April 15 whether it is needed before or after those dates or not. It is needed this year before November 15. Our weather has cooled considerably to the high fifties in the day time and forties at night, and damp. In our office we have several air conditioners in most offices which are the split unit variety so common in all parts of the world outside of the US, however we just installed one in our new cottage in Key West. These units can be reversed to provide heat in colder weather. The air conditioners and a few space heaters served us well for a couple of days at the office until we smelled something burning. Of course it was an electrical wire. I had already noticed that the electrical cabling here seems to me to be on the lighter side of safe and this was an example. We called the electricians who came relatively quickly. When they discovered that they could not get in to the basement to run a new wire, they left and we made arrangements with the landlady for the following day, Friday. As you can guess from my bothering to write this detail, there was miscommunication and the landlady did not come; the electricians did and sat around for a time then left. We re-scheduled for Monday. We spent another day in the cold. The landlady unlocked the basement door, but on Monday the electricians thought it was still locked because it was so tightly closed they could not open it or there was another door and they had the wrong one, I am still not clear. Tuesday they were busy most of the day but by Wednesday they had it fixed and we have had heat since. I am reminded how difficult things in these environments can be. Things we struggle with in the US, like getting mechanics to service problems, are magnified several times with results generally more adverse.

The municipal heat is on now. It did not come on in my apartment for a week after everyone else ad it. I had Jyldyz call my landlady. The landlady told Jyldyz that a tenant on the sixth floor was remodeling his apartment and had the heat cut somehow for some reason. In any event, the heat in the entire building was cut off and all tenants were waiting for the remodeling to get to a point where he heat could be turned on. That has finally happened.

oo000oo

And so this was another experience in the developing world. Of course we then had several staff persons out with a variety of illnesses. Olga had some sort of kidney problem, Meergul had pneumonia, Jamilya had an infected tooth extraction, Denis’ wife was hospitalized with an unknown something or other and I began having dizzy spells. Not all can be attributed to a cold office, but it does not help when people are struggling to maintain an appropriate body temperature. Most are also having their electricity cut for several hours a day at their homes which can only contribute to maintaining conditions which stress the immune systems.

Everyone began having dental problems and one by one they were taking half days off to have teeth fixed or extracted. It started with Julia. She had a toothache and went to the dentist. She had to make several trips before she was finished resulting in several half days off work. Then Jyldyz A. had the same issues starting the day that Julia finished her last dental appointment. Jyldyz’ issues took two days of her work. Denis then left with a toothache after begging a dentist to take him immediately. He had his tooth yanked and came back the following day. Jamilya then had her teeth fixed. She had a tooth extracted and came to work with a sore and swollen jaw. Next day she did not come in and took three days to control that infection. And I have not even mentioned Ermek’s periodic hospital trips for his asthma; he smokes as well.

Two things are clear from these experiences; first, we have excellent health care for those who can still access it in the US. Second, the value of preventative measures is readily apparent. I have never understood insurance companies’ reluctance to fund preventative health programs and activities. I think their actuaries should spend some time in my office as I struggle to move work forward with half of my staff out sick and filling in where possible with expensive replacement temporary staff. Productivity is crippled here as a result of a combination of bad health care and a lack of preventative medicine.

oo000oo

Blind man playing at the Osh Bizaar
All of these issues; the cold office, the beginnings of staff illnesses and dental problems, came when were finalizing one of our most important reports. This report has been talked about since I arrived in country. It really marks the beginning of our work but to listen to those waiting for it, it sounded like it marked the end. Regardless, it was much anticipated and was due October 21. We had scheduled a meeting to review a final draft of the document on Friday the 24th of October. The date had been agreed to by USAID and the Millennium Challenge Corporation people as well as the local Kyrgyz counterparts. The report was an assessment of the entire Kyrgyzstan judiciary and included a number of recommendations for improvement. It was a major piece of work and necessitated our staff and consultants doing a large amount of research. The research and data collection had been going on since July. It continued until Friday morning before our afternoon presentation. We had already done closed and pending case surveys, interviews with counterparts and review of legislation; we were now waiting on the questionnaires that were still drifting in from courts. Erkinbek was assessing those results and writing a report to give to Dick who had come to assemble the entire document and help with certain of the recommendations. Dick and I had worked together in Bangladesh and Kosovo and keep in touch through e-mail. He was the perfect person for this monumental job. Joe was finalizing the piece on commercial courts and enforcement of judgment issues.

Just when everything was set, and the translators were working on the last of the document – English to Russian and Russian to English so that we have one complete document in each language – Erkinbek said to me. “I think it should all be under the Supreme Court.” A dramatic departure from our recommendation. He then proceeded to articulate his opinion, through a translator of course. If his comment had not referenced the one recommendation we had made which could be most controversial I would not have cared, but it went to the core of what we had done on judicial governance in the report which was ready to be printed. I immediately called a staff meeting in the conference room. We rehashed things we had been discussing for months and I drew diagrams on the white board. We discussed more, heard arguments and reasoning, and after about a half hour or so we had actually better articulated our original position and gotten the agreement of all staff members and consultants.

We met with our counterparts in the judiciary together with USAID overseers and presented our work. The final pages of Joe’s work were delivered by the translators mid-way through his presentation and in time to distribute before the discussion took place.

The Judicial counterparts were satisfied with our report and we had only to make minor revisions before a final presentation to the public generally the following Wednesday. I bought Champagne and called a late afternoon staff meeting. We all deserved it.

The following week started slowly with Dick, Erkinbek and others refining the document for the Wednesday presentation. The international consultants had been called to the Embassy to meet with the USAID country director. When we arrived, the meeting took a turn for the worse when the country director expressed dissatisfaction with the part of the document Joe had done. This was the beginning of a nightmarish two days. We returned to the office by late afternoon and Joe began a re-write of five or six pages of findings and recommendations. The translators were working on revisions but the several people doing them were working on separate documents and they were having fits trying to integrate all revisions into the same document, same two documents, one English and one Russian. Meantime, Joe did not finish his revision until Tuesday morning. Tuesday was not better. I got called to a lunch and following meetings with the Department of Justice advisor who was working with prosecutors. I didn’t get back until late afternoon and found that the staff had just finished working as a group to reconcile all the versions to get one each of an English and Russian version. We had originally planned to deliver the document, some ninety pages, to the printer on Tuesday morning or afternoon at latest. The revised Wednesday plan was to deliver it to two printers by noon. The presentation was at two in the afternoon. We had already decided to produce a black and white photo copy of what we had produced in house to save time at the printers. By noon the plan was again revised to use three printers each producing twenty copies of the document. The English version had been copied by noon.

At the site of the presentation, I got a call from Jyldz A. who told me that the copies would be ready by three. I needed to stall. Guests were arriving including the high ranking judges. The media was present and was delighting in interviewing several of the people there including me and my staff. The interviews took several minutes. By two-fifteen no additional people were arriving and we had to start. I introduced the report and presenters and told the participants that we would distribute copies of the report after the power point presentation. The presentation went fine; Dick took his time explaining things. Joe presented last, starting at about three. As he started, the copies arrived and were passed out to the participants. It looked like we were totally organized.

Vendor at the Osh Bizaar
We had a meeting on Thursday to discuss why things got chaotic and how to avoid that situation in the future. I had to confess to the staff that in spite of all the chaos, no one cried (close for a couple of our staff), no one yelled at each other, everyone worked together, alternatives were identified when original plans failed, and the whole event came off looking like a professional operation, which it was. There were no weak links in the chain. I am blessed with a first rate professional group of people.

Finally, for those of you who have asked what it is I do, I think this is an indication, but I will summarize: I deal with strange landladies, I make sure the cleaning lady has a stick on the end of her broom (her husband ended up putting one on it) so she doesn’t have to stoop so far with the typical stick-less straw brooms they use here, I have meetings with the Chairperson (Chief Justice) of the Supreme Court and Chairperson of the Judicial Council, I make sure the electricians fix the burned wire so we can have heat, I deal with the USAID people who oversee the project, I deal with the home office bosses, I listen to all the problems our staff members encounter at work and in life, I write reports, I make sure we have translators when we need them, I make sure things get copied, I speak publicly for the project. I make sure the consultants get picked up at the airport and have a hotel to go to, and lastly, I take blame for all that goes wrong. Thankfully, so far, with this group of people that has happened very infrequently, and they deserve the credit for that.

oo000oo

It has been so cold lately that I dragged out my leather overcoat that I bought in Athens a few years ago. It is a beautiful coat and keeps me warm but two of the four buttons were missing. They are just simple black medium sized buttons with small backer buttons. Julia said she knew of a place to buy buttons. I went with her and Vladimir to the bank and Julia and I went around the corner to a store. We walked in and there were bolts of cloth everywhere, standing on end, laying on shelves. There were glass shelves showing all manner of buckle, ring and other metal clasps, there was thread of all colors and ribbons and rolls and rolls of frilly fringe and there were buttons. In the far back corner, a woman stood behind a counter in the button section. There were trays of buttons on the wall behind her, there were stacks of small plastic drawers standing about five feet tall and lined in a row of five or so; hundreds of little drawers. There were buttons displayed on the wall to the right. There were maybe a trillion buttons in all or if not that many, then for sure something more than I could count.

We approached and Julia asked in Russian if she had a button like the one on my coat, she pointed. “Net.” The woman said without hesitation. I was awestruck. How could this woman know that she did not have a button like the one on my coat or even anything that would be a suitable substitute? Julia and the woman had a few more words and the woman turned and walked to the back of the area and pulled a drawer out and retrieved some buttons. They, as she already knew, were not suitable, wrong design, wrong color, or wrong size. None would work. Julia and I went to the wall to the right and looked at the various buttons on display. None were what we were looking for. In another shop we found a button which worked fine. We bought four with four backer buttons and some thread. I could not, however, get the woman at the first store out of my mind. She was not just a clerk in the button section of the store, she was the button woman and she knew every button in the hundreds of trays, drawers and displays in her charge. She knew her job well, I respect and appreciate that.

oo000oo

It occurred to me while I was suffering with dizziness particularly while I lay in bed, that it may be an ear infection. I had Jyldyz A. contact a clinic and Ermek and I went to see an ear, nose and throat doctor.

All Soviet era buildings are the same. They were the same in Kosovo and they are the same here. There are entrances at each end and in the middle. Inside there is a long hallway that runs the length of the building. On each side are doors to various rooms and offices. They are all the same. The courthouses are like that. The courthouses in Kosovo were like that. The courthouses here that were converted from schools are also like that. And the clinic was like that. We stopped in a room that Ermek must have known (or perhaps he read the Cyrillic Russian on the door) was a reception or check-in room. We paid a fee of 300 som and were told to go to third floor room 9. We climbed the uneven stairs to the third floor and walked down the hallway until we came to room 9.

Old Soviet Building, American University

As standard and predictable as the building designs are, so are the stairways. This was something I found in Kosovo and in Bangladesh. The steps of the stairways are not uniform in height. Some will be the same but then there will be one higher or one shorter. Westerners stumble a lot on these types of stairways, anticipating uniformity as we walk. I do not know why this is. I have offered to share the formula used in the West for stairs, but have not found an architect interested. In the meantime, I know that the steps of stairways are not uniform.

Another example is my apartment building. I live on the third floor. I go up two flights to the second floor. One flight is ten steps, the second nine. Go figure. Then I go up to the third floor using two flights of stairs. The first is ten steps and the second ten, but the final step on the second flight is about three inches high. It simply does not make sense, but is as common as the uniform building design.

Inside room nine Ermek gave the woman the slip we obtained from paying on the first floor. She directed us into the adjoining room. There sat a doctor (by his white coat) and a nurse (by her tall cylindrical white hat) each on a stool. They directed me to sit as well. The room was stark. There was a sink hung on the wall, a cart on which the freshly sterilized instruments of the doctor were neatly laid on the top rack. Underneath were the used instruments in a pan for washing later. There was a cupboard and another cart, but not much else. The walls may have had a notice or chart of some sort but otherwise were clean and painted.

The doctor asked appropriate questions and checked my ears, nose and throat. Ermek translated. He scheduled an appointment for us to go to a specialist of some sort; I am generally calling her an audiologist. He also ordered blood tests. We arranged that appointment before we left. The tests were fasting tests, so I would come the following morning, a Saturday.

Vladimir had driven us and was waiting outside. We drove to the second doctor’s office and, after paying another 300 som or so, were seen by the doctor. Again, she asked appropriate questions and looked into my ears. Then she gave me a hearing test. I already know that I have a certain amount of hearing loss. I also have ringing in my ears. After the test, the doctor said I had hearing loss – high tones – and that the loss and ringing were the result of nerve damage. She said it was due to inadequate blood flow. It could not be cured but could be contained. She then proceeded to describe a regimen of intravenous drips she said I should have twice a year. These are mostly B vitamins. I needed to couple these with regular exercise for the muscles in my upper back, and with massages. She spent an abnormal amount of time with me based on the several knocks on her door, but I attributed it to the fact that I was an American and she wanted to make sure I was satisfied with the treatment.

I had the blood tests, they were fine. Again, the cost was around 300 som. I have not had the therapy she prescribed. I talked to my doctor in Key West. He seems to think the dizziness is something that will pass eventually. It is always difficult to get medical treatment in these places. I do have a certain amount of confidence in the Russian doctors, but I am uncertain whether these doctors are Russian trained. I believe so but am not sure. It is also readily apparent that doctors outside the US practice medicine differently than US doctors. Knowing when to rely on alternate medical treatment is difficult. The total cost – less than thirty US dollars, two doctors’ visits and lab work.

I should also mention drugs. Prescription drugs here are bought at pharmacies but generally without a prescription. My blood pressure medicine is purchased that way. I purchased twenty tablets of my blood pressure medicine made by Russian companies for, 15 som for twenty of the 10 mg tablets, and 12 som for twenty of the 5 mg. tablets. At 37 som to the dollar, this was pennies. I did pay 90 som for Slovenian made tablets from the same company who made the tablets I bought in Kosovo. These Slovenian blood pressure tablets were .50 Euros in Kosovo. At the best sale of the generic version of this medicine I cannot come close to these prices, especially the Russian made tablets. We need a time for serious reflection and discussion regarding health care in the US.

Out my Apartment window

oo000oo

It snowed November 9, 2008. I think winter will
be long.









Until Next Connection,

Dan

Along the Silk Road II

II.
Arrival; The Project; Randy; Bishkek; The People; Osh; Jalalabad; My Permanent Apartment; Picnic in the Mountains; Jamiyla’s sister dies

Vladimir, our driver, met me at the airport. I recognized my name on the sign he was holding. He knew where we were going and speaks no English, I, no Russian. I knew a small apartment had been arranged as temporary quarters for me but that is all. Vladimir stopped at a grocery store so I could get a few things. It was Sunday evening the third of August. The flight had been delayed in Moscow and the trip long. I left Paris at half past midnight on Sunday morning, and, travelling east, gained time as the real time hours ticked by. Sleep was scarce among the Aeroflot economy class passengers, me included. And the plane for the second leg, from Moscow to Bishkek was a more domestic example of the Areoflot fleet allowing for even less comfort.
I borrowed 500 som (about fifteen dollars) from Vladimir to pay for my things and in a few more minutes I was in my temporary apartment. It is a one bedroom small but neat apartment suitable for temporary lodging and better than a hotel room for extended stay. The bedroom window and balcony open onto the mall that surrounds the Symphony building. Bishkek is filled with parks, monuments and statues. The sprawling mall surrounding the Symphony leads from Chui Street in front of the Mayor’s office past the Symphony to Frunze Street, about three blocks from the office. The search for a permanent apartment would begin nearly immediately the following week. Vladimir indicated to me that he would pick me up at 8:45 the next morning. I settled in and very soon was asleep.

Next morning, true to his word, Vladimir was waiting for me at 8:45. In five minutes we were at the office. Inside I met several of the local staff and two international consultants with whom I had worked previously. Kate had presented for our Kosovo project at a seminar we conducted at Lake Ohrid. A second consultant had come to fill a gap from the departure of the Interim Chief of Party on July 9 and my arrival on August 4. Mitch had worked for me in Kosovo and is not only a quality consultant, but a friend with whom I keep contact. I knew he would be there and we had e-mail and telephone contact before my arrival. Nonetheless, it was good to see him again. I couldn’t help but reflect that I had just departed a rule of law effort with over a hundred lawyers, none of whom I had ever heard of before, largely because none had ever done rule of law development work either at home or abroad, and, likewise, none had ever heard of me. Now I came to a little project tucked away along an ancient trade route somewhere north of India and the only other internationals there were people I not only knew of but had worked with. Another indication of the failure of the Iraq effort.

The local professional staff are all former government officials or judges or both. Young enough to be vital, but old and seasoned enough to not only hold the attention of our counterparts, but to receive respect from them. This is perhaps – no – it is the best local staff I have had the opportunity to work with in any project. It will be challenging to keep up with them.

As is normal for all of my international engagements, this project started before I arrived and due to lack of a permanent Chief of Party, is behind schedule. The demands are great, but the staff good and Mitch’s efforts when he arrived invaluable. The office itself is suitable. Two apartments have been converted to office space in an otherwise residential apartment building. I was shown my office, my desk and my computer and the work began. As difficult as it is to get up to speed when things are already moving, it is so much easier when the project has a design and direction from the start. The immediate task, other than Kate working on things we were required to do, was to complete the work plan. Work plans are a bane for USAID project, but having just come from a place where there was no such thing because there was no plan at all it was, in a weird sort of way, a relief to be working on it.

I had been in e-mail contact with Randy since before I arrived. Randy was the Operations and Maintenance person at our Blackhawk camp in Baghdad. Randy, like Big Gary, had been in Bishkek before. Big Gary was with the State Department and Randy with another contractor, both at different times. Randy had left a girlfriend in Bishkek who he maintained regular contact with. He left Iraq in May to return to Kyrgyzstan with a friend of his who had a contract with the U.S. Air Force base in Bishkek. The base manages tanker planes that refuel planes heading for Afghanistan. Randy’s company provides local maintenance staff for the base.

After giving Randy my new cell phone number I received a call. He and his wife picked me up from the office and we went for a drink. Randy’s wife owns apartments, although none of her’s were available, she agreed to show me several owned by other people. It was good to see Randy again and to know that when Kate and Mitch left, there would be someone in town who I knew.

Bishkek is a large city of approximately one million people. It is the largest city in this country of five million people. By all measurements, it is a fairly new city, having been built in the late nineteenth century. The Kyrgz people historically are nomadic herdsmen. It was the arrival of the Russians that spurred the creation of cities such as Bishkek. During that time one Russian botanist decided that a park stretching from north to south across the city and lined with oak trees would be a positive addition. The park still exists in its original form and likely with many of the original trees. It is about two blocks from my house. Across from my apartment building is an amusement park among a near forest of trees and diagonal across the street is another park. There are many many other parks in the city. More parks than I think I have seen in any city; and certainly more statues. Every park has numerous statues. Statues and monuments are everywhere. Lenin himself has not been deposed here. Although his statue was moved from the front of the National Museum to the rear, it still has a place of prominence across a square from the Parliament building. The locals joked that Lenin points with his hand showing the right way. He still points the right way, even though after having been moved from the front of the building to the back, he now points in the opposite direction.

As with many second world countries, such as we saw in Kosovo, Macedonia, and Montenegro, infrastructure is not well maintained. The parks, beautiful as they are with flowers planted and with numerous trees and shrubs, are largely overgrown. Maintenance crews work through them but there are so many parks and so few workers devoted to maintaining them that the parks become overgrown and their potential beauty is unrealized. The sidewalks, sewers and drains also show the effects of neglect. Broken or no concrete, missing manhole covers, broken tubes creating large dangerous holes in the walks everywhere. I quickly remembered habits learned in Kosovo; keep one eye on the sidewalk and one on where I am going.

One oddity in this city is the drains that run along every street and sidewalk. The drains are open and periodically carry water that runs from mountain streams through the city. The water is diverted to particular drains on some sort of schedule and then it is further diverted from the drains to water trees and shrubs. It reminded me a bit of the system the Romans used in places like Pompeii where water from the aqueduct systems was channeled through the city for a variety of purposes from sewage disposal to the provision of water.

All in all, Bishkek is quite a livable city. Stores seem to have everything one could need. Restaurants and bars serve a variety of cuisine for a variety of prices. The biggest problem confronting me is the language. In Bishkek, everyone speaks Russian. In the country Kyrgyz is sometimes the main language, but clearly Russian is the primary language and, unlike nearly all other places I have been, very few people speak any English. I have two translators on staff to assist primarily with communications between the staff, and me and other consultants who come and go through the project. In stores, I resort to pointing and getting prices from the calculator that every shopkeeper has handy.

The people are friendly. Most are willing to help and most, like everywhere, still like Americans as people. I was walking down a street when a man, an older man my age, well, perhaps actually younger, on a bicycle with basket full of newspapers hawked in my direction. He was in front of the Silk Road Lodge Hotel across from our office. He hawked in Russian of course. I spoke to him as I walked, not caring if he understood or not, “do you have any in English.” He responded immediately in what can only be described as the best English I have heard in Kyrgyzstan.

“Only the ‘Times of Central Asia,’” he responded. That is a weekly English language newspaper given away free at the major hotels. A bit startled in a pleasant sort of way, I said, “I already have that, sorry.” He proceeded to complain that all others were in Russian and that, “the Kyrgyz language is in a tomb. It is dead.” I nodded affirmation. “Pardon my mind, “he said apologetically.

“You’re entitled my friend,” I said as I continued along my way.

“Good luck with the traffic,” he yelled as he peddled off down the adjacent street. He was referring to the impatience of the Bishkek drivers with anyone, especially pedestrians. Drivers have a habit of watching the traffic lights of the crossing street as opposed to the one on which they are traveling. By so doing, they can get advance notice of when their light will change; the green lights here flash before turning red. By watching for the flashing green on the cross street they can start edging into the intersection and get that fraction of a second lead on everyone else, just as drivers all over the world try so hard to gain.

The man at the market around the corner from my apartment who sells fruits and vegetables always tries to give me the best fruit he has. He calls one of the boys, sons perhaps, who speak just a tad more English than I speak Russian. The man will take a melon, small honeydew type melons, and hold it to his nose sniffing for the aroma of a sweet melon. Then he will compare to another and go back and forth between them until he decides which is the ripest. He then holds it for me to try, sometimes he holds both for me to compare. On one occasion he asked the opinion of a woman customer. Once we mutually decide – always the one he picks – he hands it to one of the boys who weighs it and tells me in unintelligible English how much. After a few questioning looks, it is punched into the calculator, shown to me and I pay. A nice neighborly ritual I think and so I keep going to his little stand on the sidewalk rather than any of the others. Although he has them for sale, he never sells me bananas but sends me to the woman in the stand next to his.

Most people are Kyrgyz. They have a distinctly Oriental look about them, although Daniyar in our office could blend as well in Mexico. The second largest ethnic group is Uzbeks. I am sure I could not tell the difference from Kyrgyz. Jamilya is Kazak and I cannot distinguish her from the Kyrgyz. The third largest group is Russian. Julia is Russian. There are also many Ukrainians, the result of a migration of some sort at some point in history. Olga is Ukrainian and last week married another Ukrainian-Kyrgyz.

Uzbeks are mostly in the south near the border with Uzbekistan in the cities of Osh and Jalalabad. We are working in courts in both of those cities and when Erkinbek and the Interns were going to sort through files as part of a case survey we were conducting it was decided that it would be an opportunity for me to meet some of the judges and see some of the courts. The trip by road through the mountains is about eight hours; the flight over them about an hour. We purchased tickets for the flight. Since Ermek had lost his internal passport and could not fly without it, Olga went along to translate for me.

We left early and got to the airport, checked in and were bussed to a local Kyrgyz airline’s plane that sat at the far end of the runway near the U.S Airbase. Olga commented on the U.S. military jets sitting waiting for their next mission to re-fuel war planes heading for the war over Afghanistan to the far south. “The U.S. is everywhere,” she said. I did not know if it was an observation, a critical comment, or both.

The plane was a twin engine older prop driven plane. We climbed the stairs, boarded and settled in for the flight. This was Spartan travel by most standards, but not unexpected after my experiences in Bangladesh and other places. The engines whined as the plane finally lifted off the runway and started its climb. It had to reach an altitude sufficient to clear the peaks of the Tian Shan mountain range which themselves tower to over ten thousand feet. As the plane finally cruised and we were given something to drink and a candy, I looked out at the barren peaks below us. Rugged and a mixture of gray and brown, the peaks were stacked in rows one after another then another still. It wasn’t until we had crossed nearly all of the range that we began to see green valleys, then what appeared as small rivers, then roads, then towns. Finally we began the float to ground level over a flat plain and within minutes we were in Osh.

Erkinbek, with the help of Jyldz at the office, had arranged transportation and hotel accommodations for all of us. We were bused to a small hotel on the edge of the city of Osh. I found it quaint in a way, with two levels of rooms overlooking a courtyard with a fountain among fruit trees and outdoor seating for meals. Erkinbek did not like the lack of air conditioning, the lack of a generator and the lack of Internet access. He would find a new hotel for future visits. This was tourist season and the foreign trekkers and cyclists, and other visitors had most rooms in most of the hotels occupied.

Erkinbek is a former Deputy Minister of Justice and for a short time, acting Minister. All of the judges know him. Fortunately, they also respect him. Erkin called the judges with whom we would meet and learned that the meeting would occur at three in the afternoon. In the meantime, he got the interns working at the court and Olga and I went off exploring. We started with the most noted landmark in Osh. There is a rocky peak called Solomon’s Throne which has a museum overlooking the city and a mosque built for an early Muslim emperor and now is a Muslim holy place. We took a cab to the museum then walked up the peak to the small mosque. It was a steady uphill climb. We stopped to buy water from the old woman vending drinks outside the mosque, and then continued. Olga was still in her dress and high heels, but at twenty-three this did not seem to bother her. For me, it was, well, more difficult. The path took us up further then around and down the far side. There was a small tree or bush on which people had tied small pieces of cloth. The tradition is that if you tie a piece of cloth to the bush your wishes will come true. How trees or bushes are selected remains a mystery to me, but we saw one at the national park in the mountains later as well. The views of the city from the peak were magnificent but the site of a cab at the bottom was a relief. Within a few minutes we were sitting at an outdoor restaurant for lunch of local cuisine. Lagman and kabobs.

The afternoon meeting was like most I have been to over the years with a tour of the facility included. The courthouses in the Kyrgyz Republic are overcrowded and otherwise inadequate. Most are buildings converted from other uses. The two we toured had two courtrooms each and as many as twenty judges. Most hearings are conducted in the judges’ chambers. Large cases or serious criminal cases are done in the courtrooms. In one courthouse, two judges shared an office and while we looked in, one had a hearing in progress while the other tried to pay attention to his own work.

The meeting with the second judge was later and in another building in another part of town. We met him at five and after the usual discussion and tour of the facility, we were invited to dinner. It was already six in the evening. I was treated to a situation I had not seen in Bangladesh, Kosovo or Iraq, judges working to the end of the day instead of two in the afternoon. The results are apparent. They are very close to meeting their too short two month time frames for completing civil and criminal cases.

The restaurant was not far from our hotel. They had a separate room for us. The table was covered with food; fruits, meat appetizers, salads, breads and the like. We visited, ate the food in front of us and drank toasts of vodka. The tradition, Russian, is that each person makes a toast then everyone drinks. As subsequent courses arrived we kept going around the table making toasts and drinking shots of vodka. I did not count the number of chilled half liter bottles that the waitress brought, but at the end of the night, I was able to retain my composure while matching my hosts … toast for toast. It was a fun evening and the expression of hospitality impressive.

The next day we were off to Jalalabad, a city to the north of Osh but which is accessed by driving around a horn of Uzbekistan that juts into Kyrgyzstan at that particular area. A twenty minute drive becomes an hour or more. There we followed a similar procedure, meeting with the Oblast judge then out to the Rayon court to meet the judges of that court; all followed by a lunch the same nature as the prior evening’s dinner with the exception of the vodka, which was not served.

Olga and I returned immediately to Bishkek on the evening flight. On the way back to Osh and the airport, we stopped at a small city midway where a particular variety of rice is grown and sold. This was a must-stop for my Kyrgyz friends who wanted to take the rice back to Bishkek. The market was typical although clearly in a poorer more rural setting. Burlap sacks of rice stood one after another along the stalls of the market. The vendors would take a few grains and roll them between their hands and show the quality after do doing. Unfamiliar with the process and being neither an agronomist nor a student of gastronomy, I was unable to discern whether the bags Olga bought were in fact of a high quality. The experience was worth the time spent.
In this town there is a tower similar to the one in the Bishkek area which is an ancient minaret used for call to prayer. The tower and the mausoleum nearby are open to visitors and we climbed the steep circular stairs to the top for the panoramic view of the area. It is the Turks who brought Islam to this region and they are still prominent in Kyrgyzstan with many schools in the Bishkek and surrounding area. Olga and Ermek are both products of Turkish schools. Ermek found the excessive indoctrination in Turkish culture objectionable. Suffice to say, the Turkish influence, at least in Central Asia, is more than historic.

The trip back was uneventful with the exception of a non functioning ventilation system in the plane, making the hour or so trip warm and uncomfortable.

It is always difficult arriving at a new posting. Getting acquainted with the project and staff are the first priority, but second is finding a place to live. I was put in an apartment on a temporary basis but needed to find permanent housing. The procedure for reimbursing temporary housing is structured so that you must find housing within a month or be penalized financially. And so the search was on-going. The project had a realtor who showed me several apartments which were either too far away, five floors up with no elevator, or beyond my allowance for an apartment. Johna, Randy’s wife, showed me several as well, but none struck me with the right mix of all variables. Finally I was shown an apartment about three blocks from the office on the same street, not too far from the Beta store (groceries), well within my allowance, on the third floor plus an elevator, and which appealed to me. Jyldz did not care for it as being too old. It did in fact date to the seventies with no intervening remodeling, but it felt warm to me and was large enough without being too large. The apartment is located in one of three buildings near the Parliament which were built and occupied by Communist Party officials in the Soviet era. They are well known buildings called oosh kaduk, or something like that, meaning “three wells” in Kyrgyz.

I am now settled in and life has become more normal. I can sit in the enclosed balcony and open a window or two, watch the leaves slowly float to the cool autumn ground below as I blow my cigar smoke out, sip an aperitif and read a book. My refrigerator is adequately stocked and my meals cooked from the menu I decide upon and to my personal specifications. Life is good.

The mountains overwhelm the southern skyline, encroaching on the city itself. They come whenever the shroud of haze is lifted off of them. Then, there they are in their ever changing splendor; dominating all that man has built below them. The weather is still good, so we decided that a picnic to the mountains would be fun. All those who could make it came, Julia and her sister, Daniyar and his son, Jamiyla and her daughter, Vladimir, myself and Phyllis who was here consulting. The staff arranged for the salads, meat, charcoal and grill. We drove to the National Park about forty minutes from town.

The Russians instilled some good habits here. Many streets and roads are lined with trees, sometimes multiple rows of trees. They are half century or more tall and make the drive pleasant. This seems to be a corollary to the parks in the city. Whatever the reason for their existence it adds to the tranquility of this place.

The park itself is well maintained if mostly rustic. Trails are marked for the more adventurous, a hotel for those wanting to stay but in more conventional surroundings, and between the rushing river and the road there are innumerable spots for picnickers. We found one of them and laid out our blankets, assembled the grill and fixed the kabobs. Vladimir appointed himself the official cook for the afternoon. We had taken a short hike of an hour or so along a paved trail that ran along the river. The children tied pieces of cloth to the tree along the trail that held the thousands of pieces of cloth tied by many hikers who came before us and made their own special wishes

We ate as much as we could and then rested and watched the water as it charged down the mountain over, and around the rocks and stones in the river bed. It was white as it surged in its main course and clear and slowing to a mere trickle in the pools along the fringes of the raging watercourse; it was there that we laid our water melon to chill in its glacial coolness. The sound and sight of the fast moving water, the sun, and the towering mountains capped with white frozen ice taken together had a mesmerizing effect. It was a pleasant afternoon in a beautiful place with good people to share with. In such settings the barriers that languages erect have a tendency to melt away.

Jamiyla’s sister died. She had been in the hospital for several days or perhaps weeks. I learned of the illness about a week before her ultimate death. Jamiyla is the youngest of three children and has two children of her own. She also has responsibility for her parents and now her sister’s twenty-one year old daughter. In the midst of entertaining oversight visitors from Washington and having meetings at the office daily, Jamiyla came rushing to me in tears that the hospital called and she needed a ride there. We arranged a ride for her and within an hour she called at five in the afternoon that her sister had died.

The incident was reminiscent of the loss of one of my local attorneys in Bangladesh. Some of you may recall that Murtayish died of a heart attack in Dhaka after being diagnosed in Khulna with heartburn the night before. He was in his mid forties. He was a good guy and well respected among his colleagues in a refreshing variety of disciplines in which he was involved. I think it was the burial that triggered my reminiscing. Jamiyla’s sister was buried, in the Muslim tradition, the next morning.

The week following, on Monday, Jamiyla called and invited the entire staff to lunch at a local restaurant. Earlier we had taken a collection in the office for her. This is a local tradition I was told. Like that tradition, the lunch is also a tradition. The table was set as I have seen already when dining with judges, completely covered with fruits, salads, breads, dried fruits and nuts and other appetizers. We ate several courses when Jamiyla announced that she had a lamb butchered especially for the lunch and the waiters brought out platters of meat and disbursed it among all the staff. Plastic bags were provided to carry the meat, and every other piece of food left on the table, home. When the meat did not have enough fat on it, the person was given a two inch by two inch cube of fat. Fat is an important part of meat dishes here. In spite of this habit, the people remain thin. I dined on lamb and lots of bread Monday evening at my apartment. Jamiyla’s spirits appeared to be improved we will welcome her return.

I have been impressed by the generosity and compassion the people here have for each other. Our staff have not been together that long, but they have bonded well. They collect money for birthdays, deaths, weddings, gifts for consultants who visit and nearly every other occasion they can conjure up; all with great enthusiasm. When our component leaders are given compliments, they immediately acknowledge the help and support of their other team members. They work together amicably and produce results that are excellent. I am not sure there is a lesson to draw since these are characteristics we have always admired. I just don’t know where, when, and how we stopped employing them ourselves.

Until Next Connection,

Dan