Police call

I finally returned from the lake, and have now been able to get caught up enough to start posting again.

The lake visit was enjoyable, though it went on for too long. After a while, the soldiers started to get antsy. I took them on a platoon run one day. Since we were on a hill, we ended up running up and down the hill. One group just walked a lap, another ran one lap, and the third group ran 3 laps. Not only was it on a hill, but the elevation there is around 3,000 feet, so some of the soldiers were really sucking wind.

I also had them do a police call – pick up trash – of an area in front of the hotel. An arm of land jutted out into the lake and curved in front of the hotel. The locals like to go to the area to hang out and party. It was very trashy, so I figured it’d be a good will gesture to go clean it up. The soldiers were not too happy to hear about that plan.

We formed up at 1000. The Sergeant Major assembled everyone, and told them “Everyone that doesn’t want to volunteer for the colonel’s detail, move to the right. Everyone else, move to the left.” All the soldiers moved to the left. We split into two groups, and walked to the cleanup area.

We cleaned up 30 or 40 bags of trash. There were a number of Kurds there when we moved into the area, with more arriving as we worked. Some of them pitched in to help us. Lots of them offered to share their meals they were cooking, and many wanted to have their pictures taken with the soldiers. (We were in uniform; another source of grumbling). I saw a couple of soldiers dancing the Kurdish line dance with a family. One fellow translated for his friend: “He say, he love America, especially
American soldier.”

The soldiers really like mingling with the locals because they had not been allowed off the compound and seldom get to meet locals. A couple soldiers wanted to go back again the next day to do another police call, and almost everyone ended up actually enjoying it.