4 Days In Qatar

OK not in Qatar yet, still trying to get the best sunset picture. This is of right outside my CHU looking at commo hill. The sky on the horizon is never clear but the sunsets are lacking. I remember the vivid evening sky in Waxahachie, especially on nights with an Ozone alert from Dallas. The good old days.

Getting ready to begin my long journey to Qatar. You must check out with the CP (command post). I am not sure if this is unit pt or what. They are playing rock band I think. This picture doesn't capture the activity level, but they were jumping around and really getting into it.


Ahh, welcome to Qatar, the lap of luxury. Feel like I was back in Oz in a backpacker. We had 10 people per room. Lower enlisted had 20. You have to be an O6 or above to get your own room. Wasn't too bad, met a lot of nice guys, people to hang out with while there. Luckly I got there a little early and got a bottom bunk. I hate climbing up to the top.

We were not allowed to take pictures outside on base, so here is outside our room but still in the building. We were basically warehoused. This is the front of the building and those are the rooms lined up down the hall, 4 rows of them. Way in the back they have conex trailers stacked up like Lego land in Afghanistan for the O6 and above.

Downtown Doha. This is looking from the front of the Islam Museum. The city is growing like nothing I have ever seen before. We must have passed 300 cranes on building projects just from the base to here. The rumor has it that they are bidding for the 2020 Olympics and are building not like they already have it. They were holding some sort of Asian games while we were here, but never got to close to it. The structures are very modern and some quite beautiful.

I don't stick out as an American, do I?

This impressive building is the Islamic Museum.

Artifacts from as far back as the 6th century. Incredible to think that things can last that long. Someone had the forethought to protect them or we are just lucky.

Just inside the front entry. The center is open without displays. They were setting up for some sort of dinner this day though. It is multiple levels high with stunning views the entire place and of the city skyline.

A view of the levels and the cat walks. If you look through the window you can see some of the downtown skyline.

Close up of the same window.

The exhibits were amazing to see. In the US you just can't find things that were made there 2000 years ago. One thing they talked about is the way they take normal objects an beautify them to bring beauty into their lives.

Tile wall covering. Very impressive inlay and done with the most basic of tools

Jeweled daggers, I think from the 1200's

Hand written copies of the Koran from before the eighth century. The design and gold inlay is amazing.

Some of the jewelry on display. Must of taken quite a while to do all of the impressive inlay in the gold.

What do you think Rickie?

The I dream of Jeanie lamp.

An oil lamp. It is wonderful with it's design. I would have liked it if they had lite it from inside to really show off the colors. The combo of glass and metal is amazing.

One of the many examples of pottery. Many had vivid colors and detail. I saw some that almost looked like our dishes at home. Some things don't change that much.

Jeweled falcon

This was a center piece of a door. The entire thing was just a massive inlay project. These people didn't just survive, but must have really thrived to even think of projects with this kind of detail.

Another example of a simple dagger, yea simple.

Later on the same evening
31 flavors known around the world. They also supply or chow hall ice cream.

This is in downtown Doha in the old shops area. It had many restaurants and galleries as well. Very European feel to it, but still very middle eastern.

These guys were hand carving traditional wooden boats. Notice the hold down clamp the guy on the left is using. OSHA approved. The finished work was amazing. Real craftsmen.

Dinner time at a Lebanese restaurant in the down town area. The food was amazing! We all try ed the hookah. They used fruit flavoring in the tobacco. It was very smooth, still not a habit I'll take up anytime soon, but it was interesting to find out what everyone likes about it. Out table is on the roof top of the restaurant with amazing views of the city.

Our appetizers. I wish I had written down what everything was. It came with some pita bread and we made burritos with it. I could have just eaten this for the entire evening. Not a bit of meat in it either. I know the green things are stuffed grape leaves.

More views of the street area. The large building in the back ground is a mosque. The entire city was amazing to see. So modern, but still a lot of what I would call traditional middle eastern feel about it. Many people still in the traditional head gear and dress like outfit for the men.

Doha golf course. It is on the PGA tour. Had to play it. I am not the golfer my father in law is, or for that matter my son is, but it was nice to get out and beat a little whit ball to death. This place is really kept up as well. They had guys out front cleaning the curbs!

A view of the club house and grand stands from a distance.

The grand stands from a bit closer.

Even the bathrooms are amazing.

This might be the Olympic course in 2020. I can say I played it.

You can tell this is at the beginning of our play, I'm still smiling pretty big. The clubs were great, which gladly improved my game. I didn't loose a single ball, and even found one. That, to me is a great day golfing!

Well after all the travels, it was time to get back home to VBC. I packed like but still found a stow a way in my bag. Captain had quite a trip as well. Got some needed rest and met some very famous people too. Think he enjoyed the time away as well.

Americana, it's everywhere. Makes you wonder sometimes why people hate us so much?
Pretty dry in Kuwait had to get him a drink. He wanted a beer, but not allowed here.

This fog is pretty cool if you don't know what causes it. The C-17 had a leak in the back door seal and we couldn't pressurize the cabin. When you get high enough it is kind of like hitting the dew point. Pretty cool, but not good for a long flight. We turned around twice to get it fixed. Good thing it was pretty empty.

There I am, all rested and ready to get back to work. That's what I keep telling myself anyway.

Random shots of the inside of a C-17. Had some extra time with the turn arounds and stuff to get some shots.

It was a great trip. Qatar is a place I might return to at sometime in the future. I think it would be a great place to explore. Pretty small country, most likely only take a few days. A lot of great culture.

Next up Spurring!

Thanks again for looking in.

November's Adventures

Here it is December already. At times it seems like it's flying by, but at other times it drags so slowly. I've been trying to keep active by doing different things. Below is a picture of my Tae Kwon Do class. I take it on Thursday and Saturday evenings. It's been fun so far, a little like drinking through a fire hose at times, but I'm hoping to catch up with Luke by the time I get home. He and I are thinking about taking classes together.

Just a silly pix of my son. He's a little camera shy though,

you might be able to tell.

I'm sure glad I'm not using film anymore. I shot a lot of this picture trying to capture a great sunset here at VBC. This one has some pretty good color to it but still lacks the real beauty of sunsets back home. The hill on the right is commo hill. The dirt is supposedly from all the lakes on base that were created by Saddam.





As I'm sure for all of you, Thanksgiving was a big event. It was a nice day for us as well. Although we couldn't close the clinic to celebrate, we made the best of it. We changed our sick call to the morning and just had the afternoon for urgent care.
We hung out at the aid station and talked and watched movies while we ate our meal. The meal was pretty good too. As always, we ate too much and just wanted to nap afterwards.
Below are some pictures of the day, starting with the chow hall.
We all took our food to go, a 45 minute wait in line.
It was worth it though.

Styrofoam Stryker with frosting paint.

Some of the decorations and a look at the chow hall.

The MSG (Master Sargent) and 2 butter frosting swans.

If you look really close you can see finger prints in the swans

where soldiers wanted to see what they were made of.

Psalm 100 in cake frosting.

All the decorations made it feel a little like being on a cruise.

Enjoying our food back at the clinic.

Notice the fine plates and silver.

Will and MSG getting some work done, before enjoying the meal.

There are always reports to complete.

Will can, at least, watch the movie from his conputer.

Getting the projector set up to watch "Year One".

It was worth what I payed to watch it, which was nothing.

Yes, another try at a sunset, like the clouds.

A wonderful ending to a nice,

but far from home, Thanksgiving.

I hope that yours was great

and that you spent time with family and friends

and really enjoyed them!

Next edition: My trip to Quatar

Thanks for checking in, Mike

My misadventures of the last month

Sorry it's been so long since I've written.

Life here hasn't been too exciting, every day kind of blends into the next. Which is good in some instances; no one is getting blown up. Believe me, I'm grateful for that.

It does create some boredom and sometimes causes changes in a person that can't be explained. As you can see below, soldiers will do strange things occasionally to pass time.

War Changes People!

As you can see I have recently joined the Flat Top Mafia. Here I am pictured standing next to the "God Father", let's call him John. His hair, by the way, is always outstanding. No one knows his secret. He is no longer a Captain, but is now a Major. Congrats to him! I think I am the oldest Captain in the army now. My boards are coming up soon, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

It's important to have a good set of friends here. A group of guys that you can relate to, tell your problems to or just blow off some steam about something beyond belief that has happened to you. It's a big army and it's moving in a hundred different ways all at once. Having that small group that you trust and belong to is more important than you would believe.

Below are some random pictures of a few things that have been going on here since my last post. I'll try and explain them as we go along.

Unfortunately, I cannot claim this photo. I was asleep during this. If you notice in the brown t-shirt is Will, the medical section's fleet-footed Lt. He participated in the "Scramble in the Sand" last weekend, where he was in second until this point. What you can't see are his feet, or shoes. That is because he has lost one in the mud. He tried to run on for a while but his foot began to hurt, so he came back to look for it in the mess. I guess he wasn't alone. Our medics helped out and found multiple pairs of shoes buried in the mud. By the way, these were his new shoes he won for coming in 3rd in his last race. He did find them and, as of yesterday, they were still drying out.

Below are a couple of pictures of the only type of flowers I have seen here. Since the weather has been cooling off they've been blooming. These were along side of Z lake. I took them Sunday while doing some Geocaching.

It almost looks like a quiet country lane. It's nice and pretty with the lake in the background to these bushes.

The early morning moon the other day. Not sure if it captured it well, but the color was a nice thing to see. We have actually had some clouds. Had rain a couple of times too. One good storm turned everything to a muddy mess for a couple of days. Got a boot scraper installed outside of my CHU for that reason. The weather has been much more tolerable, yesterday at lunch time it was only 79degrees. It felt wonderful!

Below is a couple of sunset pictures from outside my CHU overlooking Commo Hill. A lot of sand in the air that day. It made for some nice colors. Kind of like the ozone days in Texas.

The following pictures from from my trip to the IZ (international zone) or the Green Zone in downtown Baghdad. The first one is just looking out the front window of the the up armor. This stretch of highway reminded me of a Texas highway for some reason. Something down in San Antonio. Sometimes I think there are more American cars on the road here than back in the states.

This is my ride of choice. A up armor HUMVEE. I bet I could get out of any traffic jam in the states with this thing. I rides pretty nice too. On base these are sometimes more comfortable to drive than the NTV's we have (non tactical vehicles). The NTV's don't take the bumps as nicely. Something about the up armor having an extra few thousand pounds of armor makes them ride more smoothly.

Didn't see too much at the IZ, I was there to give immunizations to some of our guys stationed there. The building in the next picture is still used but won't be much after we leave. On one side you can see the wall bulging out. The dome on top shows the damage from one of our guided missiles. There are some other hits on it too, but for now it's home to someone.

I am not sure what this is suppose to be. They call it the "flying man". We couldn't get out on the highway and read the inscription. You know traffic, and it's in Arabic.
I think these are the instuctions for guards. This was found at the top of an old guard tower. I also found a Geocache there. A good view of the southern part of the base.

Well it is a short tour this month. I will try to be more attentive to the blog and write more often. Sorry it's been so long. Sometimes you just get in a rut.

Thank you again for looking in on my little world. Please take care of yourselves. Chris and the kids just got over the flu, hit them hard but they are recovering nicely.

Keep them in your prayers!

Thanks, Mike

Geocashing in Iraq

If you don't know what Geocaching is, let me tell you a little bit about it. Basically, geocaching is treasure hunting with a GPS! I'm not sure how long it's been around, but there are over 900,000 sites listed on the geocaching website. When you sign onto the website, you can look for hidden caches in an area by typing in something as simple as your zip code, and maybe a distance you are willing to travel. Then you can read about all the different caches in that area, locate one that sounds interesting, get the coordinates and set out to find it's treasure. The GPS will get you close and then the hunting begins. Some are big. My first one here was in an ammo can. As the pictures will show, some can be very small, as well. The small ones are called microcaches. At home, with the kids, most of the caches are big enough to hide little trinkets. The kids can pick one out to keep, but the geocaching rule is that you must replace it with a treasure of your own. That way there is always something for the next person to discover. It's a fun way to spend some time outside and a little bit challenging too. There are over 130 caches where I'm currently stationed.

Before we go any farther with this I would just like to thank the person that made this all possible. Without him, I wouldn't be over here enjoying this sport on the only morning I have off.

I didn't realize that he was this tall.

There's another picture like this, still intact, on base somewhere else, but I haven't found it yet. The silly hat is to protect my big noggin, while I ride my wife's new bike around the base.

Below is Danny (Sgt. Danny Hayward) and me with one of the caches we found. As you can see, it isn't very large and can be easily hidden. Notice the lake. It's the same one that the giant fish from the video lives in. Danny has a far off look because we are both trying to get pictures at the same time.

This was the first one we found together. We knew roughly where it was without the GPS, but some of the clues led us in circles. When we finally found it, we said "duh". It's like texting, geocaching has a language all its own.
Below: the cache is the little tiny black thing in my gloved hand. It's about the size of 2 hearing aid batteries and has a magnet on the back for holding it in place. It unscrews to reveal a small roll of paper that you sign, to prove you were there. Amazingly enough we got it back inside.
It's a fun way to hang out with friends. I don't think I'll find all 130+, but I'll continue to knock them out as the opportunities arise.

It's becoming more enjoyable lately because of the lower temps. It was only about 97 that day, with a slight breeze.

I know that it snowed in Bend on my wonderful wife's birthday. What a change from here! Wish I could have been there to enjoy it with her and the kids. Please keep them in your thoughts and prayers.

Thanks for looking in!
mike