Off camp and bleeding out...

Today I had my first daylight tour off camp...we drove into the town of Rumaila to the clinic to get blood work done for my exit visa.  It was a very strange process, as most seem to be here in Iraq.  Aside from the armored convoy and body armor and ubiquitous guns setting the scene for some kind of modern-day Apocalypse Now, you have to offer a blood sacrifice to be allowed to leave this country.  Considering that the government requires the blood sample, it is surprising how difficult it is to be allowed to let someone take some blood from you here.  It requires tons of paperwork, passports, copies of passports, passport pictures...very nearly an act of God if you happen to arrive at the clinic before your "fixer".  So, we did happen to arrive before our fixer and so had to wait at the door to the clinic, which was barred by a an Iraqi policeman.  Everyone else could go in, just not us...fixers, while paid for their services, tend to think that they are doing you a favor by coming and expediting bureaucratic operations, so they just turn up whenever they feel like it.  Our fixer today decided that he would sleep in, and every time we got him on the phone he would tell us that he would be there in fifteen minutes...for two hours he was going to be there in fifteen minutes!  I found this behavior to be callous and unprofessional, but I was informed that it is just the way things work here - fixers, it seems, are somehow above reproach and replacement.  Luckily, a fixer for another segment of my company arrived and agreed to help get us seen, so literally four minutes later we were having blood drawn and getting the appropriate endorsement placed into our passports - amazing what a fixer can do, right?!  After three hours of waiting all it takes is a native Iraqi bringing in an envelope of currency (I guess that was what was in the envelope) to make things happen...the most interesting part of the clinic though is that I couldn't discern any way that they could tell the blood samples apart once they take them.  I am, of course, no expert in the medical sciences, but I didn't see the blood technician marking the tubes that he was putting our blood into with any identifying marks, there appeared no paperwork linking a tube of blood to a person...like so many things here it likely will remain a mystery to me.

Here is an interesting, completely unrelated, observation...Iraqis like to touch.  I have never been anywhere where I get touched in public like here.  Everyone touches you, they put their hand on your arm when they talk to you; they pat you on the back for reasons I can't work out.  I don't mind it, honestly...it is friendly, in fact, just different from the US where people are both protective and respectful of personal space.  I notice also that even men here offer a sort of kiss to each other (on the cheek) when they meet...you would never see that in Houston (well, outside of Montrose, at least).  I think that the friendly exchange of a pat or a hand on the arm, the physical expression of pleasure at seeing someone, is one place where Americans could learn from the Iraqis...we are often so closed off from each other in America, I believe.

On the way back into camp I was able to get a better view of the landscape...it is unearthly here. It seems as if none of the desert has been spared the blade of a bulldozer, everything is scraped smooth in some areas while driven into berms in others.  This altered surface is then intersected haphazardly by pipelines running here and there, like rusty veins pumping the blood of a country and people, many of which are supported off the ground with everything from what appear to be sandbags to what I believe are old coffee cans. Everywhere is trash...blown in by the wind - plastic bottles and bags, paper wrappers, and styrofoam.  And then there are the husks of machinery, cars, and tanks (that's right...TANKS) rotting in the sun.  Many of the tanks are on their sides or flipped over, so I can only assume that battles were waged here.  But everywhere the cogs of industry turn - out in the distance you can see the camps of multinational companies, drilling platforms abound, flares burn everywhere you look, and trucks carrying equipment and supplies crowd you off the blacktop with alarming frequency.  And then, to make it even more discombobulating, there are the signs off the side of the road: CAUTION: MINE HAZARD. Just an empty expanse beyond the sign, unfenced, and apparently riddled with land mines.  I was aware that the area that we are working in was a mine field at one time, but I didn't realize just how widespread the mines are.  Note to self: don't take a roadside picnic in Iraq...might end up eating in a mine field.

Picturesque, right?

Pipelines, derricks, and refineries as far as the eye can see

Natural gas flares in the Rumaila Oilfield

Aside from the trip off camp this morning the day has proven to be relatively uneventful.  Our client representative is currently off camp in Jordan, so the pace was a bit more leisurely than usual, though it is looking to be a bit of a long night tonight.  Until tomorrow then...

8:05pm and the workday isn't even close to over yet...