We had a brief today which went well. The team got to check out the air traffic control tower and see a few fighters take off along with a few cargo planes land and take off. The control tower visit is always a highlight when the runway is active.
We were invited to have dinner at the facilities of a Turkish contractor on base. They had quite a spread for us. The menu was chicken kebab and lamb with flat breat and two tomato accents for the meat. Although I'm not much of a lamb eater, it was quite delicious. We had Turkish Baklava and chai tea for dessert. Delicious. (That's me on the left in the blue shirt.)The young man waiting on us looked so young and was very efficient and on top of his game. I wondered where he was from and if this was just a temporary job and if he would be able to go back to his home country and go to college. I was very impressed with him and my impression of him was that he was very quiet, smart and did his job well. You could just see his desire to do well in every way he performed his job; he was just so meticulous. His uniform was starched white and it looked like he had just gotten his hair trimmed. I wondered what he would be doing now if he had been born into a family in the States. I doubt that he would be in Iraq serving food in a Turkish dining room to foreign contractors like me. Sometimes I focus on people who would normally fall into the background of daily life. I mean that I don't know if anyone at that table was wondering about this young man or really could even describe what he looked like. For some reason, I just got to thinking about how different our lives are.
On the way back to the office we thought we were going to be able to see some Jackals, which I guess are kind of like a cross between a fox and a dog...well, i don't know what they are really other than they are considered a pest. Anyway, I can't describe what they are since we didn't see anything.
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