I've Been Workin' on the Railroad...

Photo by Chris L. (Click photo to enlarge)

I was stunned to see this train rolling down the tracks while looking at a train station on the Nasiriyah to Basrah line. I'd been told the trains weren't running. Look carefully and you can see two engineers waving as they pass (real engineers). Then we saw the train again today at the Nasiriyah Station. Click the photo to enlarge.

The Captain 'n Tallil

CPT "Josh" is the construction manager in charge of transportation. He wanted his picture taken with this engine that rolled in from Turkey. Trains aren't running passengers or freight yet in southern Iraq.

Nasiriyah Train Station is the Iraqi Railroad's flagship terminal. The Brits with the rifles are with us. 

"Play Ball"

Spring training has started at Tallil.

The softball season is starting up and since it will be 130 degrees in the shade during the daytime in a few months, most of the games are at night under the lights. Went for a walk this evening out around the running track and a soldier was walking around to each of the one dozen generator light sets around this field to light it up. In addition to these facilities, there are indoor and outdoor basketball courts, a world class gym, and an indoor size soccer field that looks like a little hockey rink without the ice. Our office has two trailers out back with a tread mill and some free weights if we can't make it to the gym. Unfortunately, the gym is at least a 20 minute walk from here, and if we can't get a car... it's not the extra exercise, it's the time, we just don't get a lot of daylight hours to work out. Four days a week, we are given an hour to work out and most of us take advantage of that. Otherwise, the mess hall food takes a heavy toll.

Three Pied Kingfishers played, hovered and sang over the running track pond this evening. The first I've seen on base in two months. I was thrilled to see so many of them yesterday in the car, but it's much better to hear them overhead. They put out quite a racket when they fly, and at home I hear them long before they fly by.

Smile

Say "Cheese" photo by Roy B.

I spend a lot of time taking pictures here with my 3.0 mega pixel camera. It's setup to take photos in 2.0 mega pixel mode and the size is dropped further to fit into the blog with software named "Hello". Hello picks the photo out of a file folder and automatically loads it. Most of the time, it's a pretty quick process. I tried to edit the html to update my web pages and send them to an ftp site for a while, but doing this on the blog is a much cleaner process, with no limit on the file size like my homepage provider requires. While out staying at a contractor base camp at one of the new Iraqi Army Bases, the upload speed was too slow to update my ftp, so blogging turned out to be the way to go. This little Sony camera and a two 258K memory cards have done a great job for me. Usually I keep the camera on a lanyard hung off my flack jacket or under my DCU shirt on my belt. I have a micro cassette recorder with me that I've dragged around everyday waiting for another shot at mosque prayers broadcast over their PA systems or the lunch crew singing in harmony on breaks. Usually that only happens when I don't have the recorder with me. Plenty of pockets left to bring individual milk cartons back from the dining hall for breakfast, baby wipes, sunglasses, notepad, cell phone, palm pilot and keys to my double-wide castle.

Southern Iraq Used to Look Like This

Marsh in southern Iraq southeast of Nasiriyah.
Click photo to enlarge

Mike P. wrote from back in Concord that he'd read a book about the Marsh People in southern Iraq written by an anthropologist in the 50's or 60's. At that time, this was the only place on the planet where people lived on floating villages made of woven reed mats. There is talk about restoring the marshes here, but the scope of that project is staggering. This is the first "intact" marsh I've seen of any size since my arrival in Iraq almost two months ago. I am literally at the end of the road that dead-ends at the edge of this place. Saddam's marsh draining projects have made a moonscape of the lands in this region, crisscrossed by drainage canals. His goal apparently was to displace the marsh people and in that he was thoroughly successful. Only salt tolerant species can survive in the salty soil. Once drained, salt precipitates on the surface like snow.

The boat in the foreground is poled while standing like a gondola, or paddled with a spoon-shaped paddle. The fishermen we saw have small seine nets, but I didn't see what they were catching. I know there are lots of small fish here because of all the Pied Kingfishers.

The Iraqi foreman next to me thought it was pretty funny that he was almost my height standing on that berm. He just told me he'd worked out the deal to pay for the palm trees, houses and telephone poles the road would take out and had the Ministry of Electricity's stamp to ok his plan to relocate the power lines. 

A Day Out of the Office

On the road again and stuck behind a convoy. Clicking on these
pictures makes them bigger by the way, (just figured that out).

It's always nice to get on the road away from the computers, telephones and email. We set out to inspect a road project in a town southeast of here today and saw some of the prettiest scenery I've seen yet in Iraq. Date palms lining sleepy canals with footbridges and small houses dotting the banks. Looked like a picturesque place to live compared to the city slums I've become accustomed to seeing here. Drove past and over many canals here today and lots of marshes full of egrets, herons, plovers, black winged stilts, and saw dozens of Pied Kingfishers. They were on every power line and the silty banks of the canals would make a perfect place for these bank nesters to burrow. Most of the places I saw today are living remnants of a way of life that goes back centuries. This was a Wayback Machine trip. I saw a donkey walking in circles powering an ancient irrigation pump, long-houses of reed mats that must have been in style for a thousand years, and mud-brick houses that look like doubles for pueblos in our southwest. I saw kids walking to school farther than my Dad used to tell me he did. Backpacks from some aid agency or other, all matching. Hundreds of kids just appear, seemingly out of nowhere, near these schools.

This is a traditional Iraqi meeting house made of woven reed mats. It reminds me of the Native American long houses I've read about in New England. This one is huge. 

Helping Mom with the laundry. 

This road outside of Suq Al Shuquhk is 7KM long and will end up an asphalt paved, two lane road. 

I passed out Tootsie Pops, bubble gum and pencils to the kids who came to watch the big yellow equipment. One of the young men gave me a palm heart to chew on in return.  

Make way for the water tanker! The grader, dozer, loader and sheep's foot compacter got out of the way for this rig. He delivers water up and down this road to big canisters in front of each home. 

Bob and Rick on an Iraqi Police Station assessment last week. Article published in our Gulf Region Division newsletter today. 

Changes Sweep Across Local Iraqi Police Stations

February 22, 2005 By Denise Calabria Gulf Region Southern DistrictU.S. Army Corps of Engineers
Baghdad , Iraq – The winds of change are sweeping across Iraq and affecting everything in their path. Local Iraqi police forces and police stations are no exception; they are undergoing both procedural and physical adjustments through the combined guidance of coalition members from Italy and the United States .
The Italian Army and Italian Carabinieri (Federal Police) are responsible for performing patrols, providing security, training local Iraqi police officers, and equipping them with weapons and law enforcement systems in the local southern province of Dhi Qar .
The U. S. Army Corps of Engineers has responsibility for overseeing part of the physical reconstruction of Iraq , and the Corps’ Gulf Region South is responsible for part of the reconstruction efforts in the Basrah, Tallil, and Hillah areas of operation.
Part of GRS’s mission is to provide quality facilities for basic security services, to include local police stations. In order to complete required renovations in the region, USACE assesses the sites under security provided by the Carabinieri, develops courses of action, and initiates construction contracts. The contractors always use local Iraqi laborers to perform the required construction work.
To date, GRS has been tasked with approximately 275 stations for renovations – 181 of which have been assessed. The Multinational Security Transition Command-Iraq identified the requirements from input from maneuver commands, e.g., Multinational Division-Southeast. In the region, 135 contracts have been awarded and over 100 sites have begun construction.
Members of a local police force are anxious to share their opinions and have an encouraging reaction to the changes taking place around them. For example, 1st Lt. Haider, of the Nasiriyah Police Department Serious Crimes Unit, has served on the police force for 12 years.
“The situation has changed now to be better than in the past,” said Haider. “Our salaries have increased. The Iraqi people are more cooperative now. Even though there is still some danger, we are more ready to work in a good way.”
One of the changes Haider’s unit experienced is the result of training provided by the Italian Carabinieri.
“The Italians are very cooperative. They provided us with police training and a new way to register criminals with a new computer system and equipment,” said Haider.
“There is now a cooperation and respect from the two sides. People now think the police work for their sake due to a thorough change in the way the police perform. They are working closer with the people,” said Haider.
Haider said he hopes to see many improvements to his workplace. “We would like to see the station totally refurbished with towers, an internal garage, and outside guard rooms,” he said.
Mark Bennett, a Corps Construction Manager, said Haider and his police unit will eventually see those improvements and more. Bennett said, in order to ensure the protection and safety of each police force staff, police station requirements include security walls, guard towers, generator installation, exterior lighting, bullet-proof glass, bars on exterior windows, steel exterior doors, and an antenna. In order to make the stations habitable for employees, toilets, plumbing and electricity will also be included in all Corps total renovations of facilities.
In some cases, said Bennett, renovations instead of rebuilding will ensure that existing police stations – some 50, 60, or 70 years old and lacking healthy maintenance over the years – are brought to an acceptable standard. That standard includes the required security features.
Whether the issue is renovating existing stations, or identifying those locations that warrant newly built stations, substantial efforts are in place to help Iraq prepare more capable and formidable security forces. It is through these carefully coordinated efforts that the Iraqi people will be able to assume responsibility for their own security.

The fire department guys let Ken drive, he's in his glory. 

Ken found a fire truck at camp. He's Deputy Chief of a fire station back home so he really got a kick out of this. Ken is my go-to guy on fire station technical questions, like,"Where do they dry the hoses? I can't find it in the drawing." 

Typical grocery store in Nasiriyah 

Statue commemorating the glorious victory over the United States in Gulf War I in a traffic circle in Nasiriyah. 

The new firestation site also had plenty of birds, white tailed wags, feeding on the bare ground. The kids using this for a soccer field will have to find a new field. One of our guys from the security team stands guard in the foreground. 

Today we settled the location for a new fire station at this site. The item that took the most time at our design review meeting, the Iraqis want a fire pole, just like on TV. 

This is a concrete block making factory. The Iraqi here mixes the concrete, molds, presses and dries each block. No HomeDepots here. These little businesses dot the roadside. 

New police trucks sent in by the coalition are starting to show up on the streets. 

To the dump, to the dump, to the dump dump dump

The entrance to the perpetually burning dump at sunset last night

We don't have much for entertainment here, but a trip to the dump is always fun. Razor wire, gloves, used small appliances, camo netting for smoking areas, furniture... you name it, it ends up at the dump when people leave. "Where'd you find that?" is almost always answered with, "At the dump."

Usually the wind blows the smoke towards Iran, but today we had a weak front move up from the south and blew the smoke our way. It made me nostalgic for the way dumps used to smell when I was a kid. My Dad and I would make trips to the dump from his shop in town and I'd always come home with some treasures from the land of unwanted toys. It rained today and that means the dump is going to be one big muddy mess for a while.

The dump is the daytime place to go birding. Lately, the place has been over-run with starlings. Think Alfred Hitchcock's "The Birds". They sit along the roadside berm in a row, one after the other, by the thousands waiting for the next big load of goodies to come in. There are usually wagtails, collared doves and crested larks here too. I talked to a guy out here today with a PhD in reptiles of all things. I was hoping he'd tell me some neat stories about all the poisonous snakes they warned us about at Ft. Bliss. Nope. He said, "We'd have to go out to the desert to find poisonous snakes and we're not allowed (because we'll get shot at)." The irony was not lost on me. I've been out to the dump several times in the evening riding my bike circuit and have never seen a single bird. They must go somewhere else for dinner.

"Say Cheese!" Our public affairs folks featured our work with the Italians. PAO Denise on one knee is smitten with the Italians. Also on one knee is Major Alessandro, standing left to right - don't know that Italian driver's name, Air Force contracting officer Sharron, Rick, Lt. Roberto, Mark, Major P., and me. 

Kids living in tents greet us at the roadside Sunday. Young girls dress in colorful outfits. 

Children are always running to the roadside waving wildly as we drive past.