Mood:  happy
Topic: The Places
I finally got out of my compound today. My teammates and I left to have a short lunch at the al Rashid Hotel. (For those you not keeping track of the war, this is the nice hotel that the insurgents attacked when Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz visited the International Zone (IZ) in October 2003. He walked away from the attack unscratched. Unfortunately, one soldier died, and 15 others were wounded.) To get out of the lovely concrete-walled prison that I call home, I had to put on my "battle rattle," which consists of my Second Chance ? battle amour and matching black helmet. Thanks to the insurgents we can't go walking around the IZ these days, so we had to call over to the motor pool and request a ride over to the hotel. Our friendly Iraqi driver drove us swiftly through the IZ in a nice government van. The IZ (formerly known as the Green Zone) isn't a pretty place, and it definitely isn't green. Large, concrete, blast-resistant walls line almost every street. Mounds of trash and rubble are everywhere. The military has also erected a number of check points to help prevent any bad guys from zipping around the IZ undetected. Once upon a time, I am sure the IZ and the al Rashid were some of the nicest places in the whole country, and al Rashid still might be the nicest hotel. All the same, it really feel hollow now. The only people in the hotel were Americans, British, various contractors, and Iraqi hotel workers who didn't have many customers to serve. We ate lunch in one of the two restaurants, which was completely empty except for us. The kitchen had run out of propane, so we only has a few items to choose between - burgers, kabobs, club sandwiches, and one or two other things. They did have a small wine selection. We ended up drinking a Lebanese wine. It didn't taste very good and cost $30. I kept telling myself that beggars can't be choosers in Iraq. That didn't make me feel any better. After lunch, we wandered around the roughly ten "stores" inside the hotel. Most were selling knock-off Rolex watches, paintings, Persian rugs, and bootleg DVDs. I almost bought a rug, but I wanted to do some research first. I would hate to be the stupid American who paid $300 for a rug that I thought was worth $1,000 only to find out that it was only worth $50.