Greetings from Iraq

Emails from Iraq

Photography by Jayel Aheram.

Greetings from the Cradle of Civilization!

At the moment, the place I will be in the next seven months does not even come close to the word “civ­i­liza­tion.” More like “a-giant-ate-a-tent-factory-and-had-diarrhea-right-here.” Ooh! Ooh! There are some places in here where the “sand” is not even sand. It is just giant mounds of dust. You step into it and you sink and it goes POOF all over the place. Just DUST. It is crazy. It is just pow­der all over the place.

They have show­ers in here and I am using it at least two times a day. It is one lux­ury I intend to abuse. They have no chow hall here, but have some sort of build­ing with tables in it. The food is pre­pared by a staff sergeant and two cor­po­rals. Sometimes we get this AWESOME steak. We are not eat­ing “t-rations” but some­thing a bit better.

Speaking of chow halls, SWEET MOTHER OF GOD. The chow halls in Kuwait and Al-Asad are just FANTASTIC. And get this, the ARMY base in Kuwait is WAY bet­ter than the one back home! SO much food and so much choices! SO MUCH. It was noth­ing I have ever seen.

The chow hall in Al-Asad is guarded by Somalian mer­ce­nar­ies. A pri­vate con­trac­tor went to Somalia and hired these guys as guards. Their weapons are in con­di­tion 1 (round in cham­ber, mag­a­zine inserted, ready to shoot) and they will shoot any­one who tries to enter the chow hall or the PX or the MWR areas with­out an ID. I almost wit­nessed an inci­dent. Freaking trigger-happy Somalians!

Anyway, I am fine and every­thing. More later!

PS: Someone spread this rumor I had a “thick Coca-Cola can sized penis, 6 inches but very thick!” And now every­one believes it. WHAT THE FU—?!

PPS: The PX only comes here once every 3 months.