Postholes

University of South Carolina - News

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 16:31:00 +0000

USC researcher featured in National Geographic documentary

By Megan Sexton, msexton@mailbox.sc.edu, 803-777-5400

When archaeologist Jeff Rose set out for the Middle East to understand how the destructive forces of water came to inspire the biblical story of Noah’s Ark and the great flood – USC’s Jennifer Pournelle was there to lead him on his journey. Read More at"

University of South Carolina - News

Iraq, Irak, Al-Iraq

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 16:03:00 +0000

A very nice, multi-lingual blog, from an engineer in Madrid. One stop wrap-up of all things Iraq.

Winning Trends

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 22:27:00 +0000

Prof Dr. Ali Alattar, Vice-Chancellor, Basrah University, has already concluded research agreements with the University of Oklahoma and Oregon State, and is currently in talks with us here at the University of South Carolina. In this video, he summarizes emerging trends in research and US -Iraqi collaboration - stressing the overwhelming importance of water, water supplies, and water pollution mitigation. As is clear from this video, the faculty and senior administrators at Iraqi institutions are dedicated, capable, articulate, and determined to raise their standards back up to those of wold-class institutions. That's me holding up the podium.

Houses and Assemblies

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 03:10:00 +0000

The Autonomous Republic of Kurdistan, composing northeastern Iraq, is roughly the same geographical size as South Carolina, or central California, and is governed by its own President and Parliament. Like our own state legislature, that body comprises a House and a Senate. Also like ours, their House has a Speaker. There, however, at least as compared to my own state, the analogy ends. The Parliament is fiercely dedicated to improving education, and in demonstration of that, he requested that our delegation meet with him. That's me unseen behind the camera; him in the center; IIE President and CEO Allan Goodman on the left, and on the right, the Speaker's chief aid and foreign policy advisor - a returned Fulbright scholar. She was one of several extremely capable, talented, intelligent, and well-educated young women I met who have been appointed to positions of real responsibility. The second, we-the-faculty (myself and two others), met in a follow-up meeting: she was an elected member-of-parliament, held the education portfolio, and wanted our advisory input on draft legislation regarding private for-profit universities. Indeed, a full 35% of the legislature are women. (We could learn something from that example). Without distinguishing between private for-profit and private non-profit institutions, they'd trusted the "private sector" to help them rapidly expand higher education, and had been badly burned. They provided land grants, tax-free status, and mountains of other incentives. The for-profits grabbed the money and ran within a year, leaving buildings empty and students stranded without degrees. So diploma mills be forewarned: you'll get no further traction in Kurdistan. When these people say they want higher education, they mean it, and they know what that is. And now they also know the meaning of genuine accreditation.

Dawn in Erbil (Arbil, Irbil)

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 11:04:00 +0000

A view from the Erbil International Hotel. There have been a lot of conferences in Iraq since 2003, but this one, sponsored by the Institute of International Education, promises to have the kind of impact that extends across generations. "Models and Trends in Contemporary Education," a conference and training workshop will provide an overview of the contemporary higher education landscape, covering topics that include modern university governance, leadership and administration, financing, and institutional and program quality. Approximately 100 participants, including senior Iraqi scholars, university presidents, and deans will attend. Our goal? Rebuild bridges. Among Iraqi scholars; between Iraqi scholars and American scholars; among institutions. Wish us luck.

New Arrivals

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 07:00:00 +0000

In 2003, the Erbil airstrip abutted pastureland. The only flight in was on a Beechcraft operated by Airserv, which spiralled down to a bumpy landing and rolled up to a temporary trailer that served as customs, immigration, and flight operations rolled together. Your security team would hang out at a little tea cafe just outside the perimeter, awaiting the buzz of the inbound engine before roaring up in a boil of dust to meet you. Erbil now sports a brand-new, shiny, international airport, "the world's gateway to Kurdistan," with all mod cons, professional staff, and regular flights from Munich, Istanbul, Amman, and Dubai. And, thankfully, frigid air conditioning. Royal Jordanian still arrives from Amman at the ungodly hour of 3:00 a.m.; the crisp arrival is a wakeful blessing. The second blessing is the automatic 10-day visa granted all Americans on landing. The third is the low traffic volume at that hour: dashing to passport control, we realize that we needn't have bothered. We were it, and it took, well, as long as it took for two passport agents to scan and stamp us on our merry way. Tea?

Queen Alia Int'l Airport Makes My List...

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 02:26:00 +0000

...of airports that are actually pleasant to transit. In 2003, there was one (bad) Pizza Hut, horrid, hard plastic seating, clouds of smoke, and a restroom attendant so unaccustomed to international travellers that, misinterpreting my short hair and slacks, she nearly suffered apoplexy when I attempted to enter the Ladies'. There's now a lovely array of cafes and shops, and I don't just mean the horrid Marlboro-and-Glenlivet Duty Free variety.

From my well-padded perch in "World News Cafe," I espy sumptuously tempting displays of Jordanian sweets and both Middle Eastern and Euro-style bistros. And yes, American fast food, for the KFC-and-pizza deprived. I have free wireless, and the smokers have been banished to an unfurnished room across from the toilets. At the cheerfully functioning foreign exchange desk, I swapped a handful of leftover bills in various currencies for enough Jordanian Dinars to indulge in a cappucino, perfectly-pulled by a Tunesian barrista, and a pressed chicken tikka sandwich. Given Amman's explosive growth, none of this is especially shocking. What I did find amazing was the New Dress Code. Its been shifting westward for awhile now, but never, in all my days, did I expect to see - wait for it - Arabic Men Wearing Shorts. In Their Own Home Country. It's like seeing adults wandering about the streets in their pajamas and fuzzy slippers. Oh, wait, I forgot. That's something we do see every day now, back on our home campus. Times are a-changin' all around.

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 01:32:00 +0000

Safe in Erbil. Beautiful airport, gorgeous hotel, no hassles.

Royal Jordanian Baby Boom

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Mon, 20 Jun 2011 01:53:00 +0000

There are always a lot of kids on flights to Jordan. It is, after all, a kid-friendly society. But this trip was as densely packed as a public playground. A veritable caravan of strollers, orbited by an asteroid field of wild-eyed small boys clamoring for one another's attention, awash in a neon halo of small girls in day-glo pink. So many, in fact, that "pre-boarding" had to be called by rows.

Amazingly, after the initial ear-splitting settling in it was quiet flight. Breast-fed babies dropped straight to sleep; their good-humored older siblings entertained themselves with a variety of electronic gadgets. Then, after dinner, the whole planeload settled in for communal slumber. A sort of aero-village, more entertaining than the crap videos on offer.

Radio Hotspot

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Sun, 19 Jun 2011 22:28:00 +0000

Here's a view of five guys squashed into the cockpit trying to fix the navigator's radio. After a half hour of box-swapping, the diagnosis is: oops - broken wire. Hmm. So, did they land like that? Or did it vaporize while we boarded? In this heat, I'm guessing the latter.

- J. R. Pournelle. Posted from my iPhone.

Location: Aviation Way,West Columbia,United States

First in Phones

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Sat, 18 Jun 2011 03:54:00 +0000

Inexplicably, instead of prepping or packing, I find myself rather obsessed with integrating "social technologies." The easily-imagined dream of writing once and posting everywhere is, in set-up at least, a harsher reality. I'm rather astounded to realize that I now spend more time writing on my phone than talking on it. For better or worse, this post verifies that I can now do with my phone what in 2004 I could only do with - well, with my HP Pocket PC. And an expandable keyboard. And a SIM card. But back then, it wasn't cool, just nerdy. Sigh. I really miss my pocket word processor. Guess I better see if there's an app for that...

- J. R. Pournelle. Posted from my iPhone.

Location:S Lucas St,West Columbia,United States

Postholes Redux: Promises Kept, Albeit Delayed

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Fri, 17 Jun 2011 16:02:00 +0000

Half a decade and several trips later, I am prepping for another trip to Iraq. Last Fall, we pioneered the return of American archaeologists to southern Iraq. My latest outing? Filming with National Geographic Television in the Iraq Marshes! Stay tuned - that episode should air in August. Now, it's off to Erbil for a conference. About time I reinvigorated this blog, eh?

Outies Takes Iraq Out of This World

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Fri, 24 Dec 2010 17:00:00 +0000

I thought about the post-war (or was it still war?) period of 2003-2004 for a good long time after returning home. Of the many things I thought about, one was war fiction, and especially military science fiction. War books have compelling plots, generally along the lines of : there are good guys; there are bad guys. Sometimes some bad guys, that is, guys who were individually bad, redeem themselves and become heroic good guys. Anyway, the good guys win, or die valiantly trying. War's over. The End.

But nothing I saw in Iraq was ever that cut-and-dried. On any given day, it was hard to tell if, when & where we were having a war. It was generally impossible to tell good guys from bad guys - and there were many shades of both, on both sides.

Outies is science fiction, set a millenium hence, on a fictional planet. A lot of this blog makes it into the backstory. (Plus a lot more: See Kris Hirst's review in About.com, where she discusses Outies as Social Science Fiction.)

A Fond Farewell

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Wed, 17 Nov 2004 00:12:00 +0000

Durham, North Carolina.
As many of you have noted, I stopped blogging on my return to Amman from Baghdad. During the interim I was winding down my involvement in the USAID-Iraq HEAD program, which I departed at the end of my contract year (31 October 2004). I wish USAID-Iraq HEAD, and Stony Brook U., every success.

While all postings were always my own, I wish to be clear that I no longer have any affiliation with SBU or USAID-HEAD. Beginning tomorrow I will try to fill in some of the missing dates from my paper diaries, and add new posts. Note that I do think carefully about the security implications of my posts: public individuals in Iraq, by virtue of their position, are presumeably already known to people who might wish them ill. But in a public forum I do attempt to refer to events, gatherings, etc. that might be targets only in the past tense. I'd be happy to discuss them in more detail offline.

Visited Today Ain Qasr and Ain Soda (Azraq Marsh)

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Tue, 24 Aug 2004 03:37:00 +0000

Off at 8 am, on a jaunt down the Baghdad highway, into the Jordanian panhandle. We trundle through the city into and through the house furnishings souk: rolls of linoleum stacked against sleeping windows; parking lots lined with velvet-upholstered furniture. Out past Ain Gazal, where I am told Chalcolithic-Early Bronze Age horse burials inhabited limestone caves above the spring. Through the industrial district of Zarka, choked with smog; lined with vehicle graveyards that escalate from diminutive taxis to rusting semi tractors, the latter incongruously piled on rooftops. The highway is lined with trucks, truckers, truck traffic: a free zone with tarp-covered trailer loads of every make and model; then fuel tankers in line after line.

Main destination today is the Azraq wetlands: once vast marshes; maybe continuously so since the Pleistocene, fed by aquifers seeping from beneath the Druze mountains. Vast tracts outside the marsh are demarcated into lines and squares by piles of basalt stone. Within these censurations sprawl Bedouin encampments, brown burlap tents fluttering in the wind, the livestock off grazing the thin pasturage somewhere out of view. Aquifer pumping has so lowered the water table that exposed peat is cracking and sloughing off. The Royal Water Authority diverts 10% of water back into the wetland to maintain a small fraction of its former extent. The fringe of palms with tamarisk are reminiscent of Borrego Springs or Ocotillo Wells, although, if left ungrazed, the surrounding countryside would revert to salt scrub, not cactus desert.

Reed brakes choke the open water—water buffalo keep patches of open water open. The springs are divided by an Umayyad wall designed to keep the salt from fresh water during medieval times. apparently one end had stone arches carved in animal reliefs, including elephant. A current rehabilitation project is adding a second pool system. The water buffalo are also a nuisance, damaging fencing and nets designed to protect fringe pools during rehabilitation. The reed is hard to identify—heavily cut over, it has dwarfed. Phragmites? It does not seem to be dense or tough enough to be Arundo. Staff poured us honey-sweetened tea in little glasses, then off we wandered through the brakes to an adobe observation hut overlooking a (literally) bucolic wallow. Happy, happy water buffalo.

Then north through Azraq itself—a two-dinar tire repair; shops catering to the highway trade bedecked with plush and plaster and plastic Tweety Pies (do people here even know of Sylvester and Tweety Pie?), because every trucker in the world must take presents home to his kids. One wonders: is it plush for girls, plastic for boys, and plaster for the garden? Cascades of nuts and seeds and spices and tins of olive oil; cheeses in oil; halvah and tahini. The road into town crosses onto the basalt fields sharply as crossing a watered pitch, past a series of once grand, now abandoned guest houses, and then suddenly looms the black blocks of Azraq castle: Lawrence's wartime HQ with its two-ton solid granite door.

Onward to Amman, the southern road, through horizon-wide pebble plains, trackless and capped with desert varnish, grazed clean of any puff of chaff. Along a long-dry wadi lies Qasr Amra—a little Umayyad bubble with its touristic roadway sign, as for a stagecoach inn along the Butterfield stage. Concrete cones, a meter high, run parallel awhile: these are markers along the old Mandate track to Baghdad. We careen behind, through, alongside truck convoys ferrying limestone nodules the size of squashed Volkswagens to facing-tile plants around the city. Qasr Kharanah, foursquare, turreted, heads a second wadi, overviewing an Epipaleolithic tell.

Dust devils boil past flocks of desolate sheep, fed from trucked-out grain; watered by tankers, but nonetheless allowed to graze to scorched earth any seed that dares germinate under the moisture-sapping wind. We pass a truck overtopped with green—cattail? reed? Headed toward the sheep camps.

Amman: Computing Days and Breezy Nights

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Thu, 19 Aug 2004 05:57:00 +0000

We've had a large new IBM instructional computing lab installed here at ACOR (American Center for Oriental Research), where basic computing, internet connectivity, and how to access archival and research sites is taught evenings after lectures. Spent the day troubleshooting, upgrading, and updating: all the behind the scenes back office tech support more-or-less taken for granted at home institutions. It's a great addition to regional instructional capacity: we'll probably use it again in the Fall for librarianship training (here, because the library, and librarians, are well-ordered and well-trained) in online cataloguing, circulation, and reference.

Had a glorious evening up the hill, at the classy British equivalent of ACOR (in their new building). Stunning time up on the roof: view of the city, fireworks in the hills, muezzin, sunset, windy, cool night, music, even a wedding going on down below (and still going on). Everything we imagine a wonderful time in the Middle East to be. Several Californians; lots of mutual acquaintances. Heaven, in fact.

The Land before Baghdad

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Tue, 17 Aug 2004 17:24:00 +0000

Amman.

The air for the flight out yesterday was stunningly clear, lending to pensive consideration of landscape, agriculture, and the land before Baghdad. I'll update this post later with a more descriptive account.

Arrived uneventfully to bustling Amman, to glorious weather. Cool, breezy, and clear. Second Session of our Summer Workshops is well underway, with participants ever more actively engaged. Roger Matthews has joined the teaching faculty for these last few weeks. (See our website for the full course list).

It was amazingly soothing to hear traffic late in the evenings: a sudden return to normal street life.

Bugging Out

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Mon, 16 Aug 2004 21:00:00 +0000

Baghdad.

If all goes well, phones and internet will be turned on at Baghdad U. as of next Saturday, so that we can finish troubleshooting before the fall quarter begins.

Things were quiet last night, except for another football victory interlude—largely thanks to a curfew preventing movement between the most troubled districts and the rest of the city. However, with the very noisy national congress in session, discretion is the better part of valor. It’s back to Amman for me, for now.

Fierce Fighting, Fierce Hope

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Mon, 16 Aug 2004 00:32:00 +0000

Baghdad.
Email up, but Blogger’s been down all day. Fierce fighting near the Medical College. Windows rattling on and off for three days. Mortars falling in residential neighborhoods everywhere. Security guards posted everywhere. Daytime curfews have shut down transportation between city districts.

But good news nevertheless: things are reported as quiet in Mosul. More work has managed to limp along, and I’m told that back at Stony brook the Grayson library sort is nearly complete. I cannot describe the courage exhibited every day, day after day, by those around me. There is great hope and promise in this country yet.

Deaf, Dumb, Blind, and Tense

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Sun, 15 Aug 2004 01:26:00 +0000

Baghdad.

The U.S. server on which our internet access depends has been inaccessible all day, leaving me feeling deaf, dumb, and blind. Tense, tense, tense: everything and everyone is tense. I spent the day twiddling with a PowerPoint presentation showing some of our progress. I’ll try to post it to the site once we get re-connected.

Combat Football and the Late Show

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Sat, 14 Aug 2004 01:24:00 +0000

Baghdad.

In the course of a workday, life seems pretty normal. Office, email, meetings, more email, write a bit, more meetings, more email. Outside, traffic flows; shops bustle. It’s been a week of tension, all through the city; all through the country, but you only really know that, here, by noticing irregularities. Someone returns from Amman, overland. They’re extraordinarily bright. Smiles, laughs, and a fevered gleam that comes from extraordinary relief at arriving safely. The there’s the meetings. Too many. With too many people. Behind closed doors. Closing time is prompt. Windows and doors are shuttered early. No one is allowed to walk anywhere alone.

And you know things are coming to a head; that things will get worse before they get better, when the helicopters start thundering overhead, on their way to the next round of mischief and misery, for one side, or another, or both. You know the mischief has indeed begun, with fierce intensity, when blaring horns weave their way through traffic at double the average speed. On their heels come sirens: first police, then ambulance. And you know that the ambulances are in response to fighting somewhere, because they blare everywhere, in every direction, heading for every hospital in the city.

But all of this happens with a bizarre sort of time lag, betwixt the hours when you know things are happening far out of view, that may one day affect your day-to-day work, and some mention—sometimes any mention—on the TV news. First there’s a murmur on the street. ‘It’s bad.” What’s bad? “We just need to get home. It’s bad today.” Yet all around, traffic beeps, shops bustle; a virtual parade of watermelons are carried down the street from the fruit stand. Two days later we see film footage of the extent of the fighting; the hundreds or thousands (hard to tell) demonstrating in the streets in some far-off neighborhood.

Thursday night was exceptionally bizarre in this regard. All was normalcy: the shops, the traffic, the bustle of loading docks. All was awry: the brightness, the meetings, the walk home; the gunships, the horns, the sirens. Then silence. Then cheerful sounds of a Friday evening get-together next door: laughter, clinking glasses, a blaring TV. A game of some kind. The rising and falling cheers of (I’m guessing) a football match. A happy evening. I was lulled to sleep.

I awoke to discover that, instincts intact, I’d just hit the floor behind cover, as a roar of gunfire engulfed the city. It volleyed; it rolled; it thundered; it erupted from beneath my very balcony. Shouting erupted with it, from every direction: hundreds, it seemed thousands, of--of cheers? And fans screaming GOAL!!!!? I realized that I’d been jolted from sleep by—a winning side in a soccer match? Yes! Iraq defeats Portugal! Securing a place in the Olympics! The gunfire was deafening. It grew in intensity. It swept eastward, then westward, then eastward again. Then in a staccato riff on dueling banjos or howling coyotes, distant burps were answered by local reports. As it began to fade, I could once again hear my neighbors clearly—unconcerned, laughing and clinking and happy. I became extraordinarily bright myself. I climbed sheepishly from the floor.

But what goes up, must come down. The velocity of a bullet, having reached the apex of its trajectory, and falling once again to the ground, is the same as it was when it left the muzzle of the rifle, discharged into the sky. Following the jubilation, came a different kind of rifle fire. More pointed. Single shots. With a different kind of shouting. Angry shouting. Angry fire. Some of it from directly beneath my window. Then silence. Then horns. Then sirens. Then, finally, a less easy quiet, with night watchmen milling like disturbed ants on the street. Finally, relief, and, in the wee hours, sleep.

So it came as no surprise to hear on the morning news—having caught up at last with the wind—that fighting in Sadr City had been fierce on Thursday, with scattered fighting thoughout the city. What did shock was the news of a British journalist kidnapped in Basra, abducted from his very hotel room on the very football evening. I spent my Friday alternately doing normal things: a bit of email, a bit of washing up, a bit of writing—with plotting exit strategies and contemplating some security meetings of my own for Saturday morning. Then, in the afternoon, four explosions rattled our windows—about half a mile away, I should think. Then sirens. Then helicopters. And then an evening movie on the tele. And now the waiting, for the news delay, that will tell me what has been.

Combat Archaeology

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Thu, 12 Aug 2004 00:45:00 +0000

Baghdad

One might well ask what fighting in Sadr City and Najaf has to do with archaeology. Nothing. Everything.

Nothing, at the moment, in that it is physically happening far from where we are. Sometimes we hear gunships flying overhead. Sometimes, if the mortar fire and counter-fire is really intense, we here a distant rumble, mostly drowned out by traffic noise.

Everything, over the past few days, because of Sadr’s calls for, and threats of, violence. No doubt you see in the news interviews with locals, righteously (and rightfully) indignant at the prospect of American troops entering the 3-square-mile cemetery to root out insurgents. But there is more to that story.

First, the reaction against American troops continuing the fray is merely a part of a reaction against all foreign adventurism here. A quote: “We tell them all: why are you coming here to fight Americans? Go fight them in your own country. This is our country. Everyone should just go home. Do not come here and kill us because you wish to kill Americans.” But, above that, beyond that, is a resurrection of fear regarding Iran and Hezbollah. Here, the “first” Gulf War refers to the Iran-Iraq war—and it is still etched in memory. There’s a strong conviction that Iranian factions are sponsoring a good deal of the violence. Shia from Basra, formerly sympathetic to Shia from Iran, now see the latter as spoilers who wish only to take over control of holy sites in Iraq. Another quote: “They care nothing for this country. It is not their country. They wish only to push us aside and take what they want. But this is my country, not theirs. It is my country first. That comes before any religion.”

Second—and here’s the bit that has more to do with archaeology at the moment—are the afore-mentioned calls to violence. Earlier in the week, flyers appeared, circulated to Christian-owned shops. Convert to Islam, they say, and you will no longer be in danger. Yesterday, Sadr declared a “curfew” on all ministries, police forces, military, emergency services, and government offices, warning employees to stay home “for their own safety.” His “supporters” (are they his? Are they Iranian-backed “organizers? Who knows?) then attacked ambulances and water-delivery trucks serving his own neighborhoods.

So although nothing overt has happened outside Sadr City, it casts a pall and slows street-level commerce. Some businesses closed up for the day; some just closed early; others are opening late this morning. While this did cut down on traffic, making a certain amount of running around and purchasing that much easier, it also meant that yet again the university was closed, and no work done. As the uni is normally closed Thursday and Friday (the local weekend), we will not finish this week after all.

There’s no general upwelling of support for all this. Sadr’s fighters, in the local view, are a bunch of hired thugs, and he is himself the worst kind of political opportunist. I have now heard this universally from people of all religious stripes: Christian, Sunni, Shia. A chilling quote from a man normally most kind and gentle: “They should just kill him. We are sick of this. He cares nothing for his people. He cares nothing for this country. He’s just a thug pretending to be a religious man.” And from his wife: “This is not Islam. I’ve read through the Quran, line by line. There is nothing there that says what this man does is right.”

A rumor is circulating, supposedly corroborated by several witnesses: on the day of the church bombings, before the bombs went off, al-Arabiya and al-Jazira reporters were already on hand, cameras trained on the doorways on the sheltered side of the church, just in time to catch the screaming victims burst out. How, it is asked, could they have known to be there? Who knows. Maybe it was coincidence. Maybe they were not in fact there at all. But in this climate, Sadr’s calls to random violence certainly do not need any more media outlets. That sort of publicity is its own kind of adventurism. It merely pours gasoline on the fire. Violence ends—by ending. By everyone—everyone—laying down their arms. His community would be better served by wiser elders teaching its young men some traditional negotiating skills.

Good News and Threats to Fruit

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Wed, 11 Aug 2004 00:40:00 +0000

Baghdad
A New York Times piece today, commenting on the government shut-down of Al-Jezira reporters, was headlined something to the effect “no bad news allowed.” Now, of course, the Times was addressing appropriate concerns that free press not be suppressed. But I must question the very substance of the headline. No bad news? From Iraq?

My impression is that there has been very little except bad news reported from Iraq. This despite concerted and often successful efforts by a great many citizens to calm things down and move life onto a—if not normal, than at least hopeful—footing. The utter failure to report any of the good news has been demoralizing for a lot of people—most of them Iraqi; and a dedicated few of other nationalities--who have not had a day’s respite in over a year. They’d like a little credit for what they have accomplished.

So, I’m not going to deliver bad news today. I’ll leave that to the wire services. Even without Al-Jezira, I am sure they’ll find plenty. I’m going to give credit where credit is due, and concentrate on some good news.

Yesterday evening, after the office closed, I went grocery shopping. This may sound utterly mundane. It was. That’s the point. No-one harassed me. No-one closed the door. No-one nervously thanked me for my custom, then requested quietly that I not come back. I made my selections from well-stocked shelves, paid predictably high-ish prices for imported items, and predictably dirt-cheap prices for local commodities, then went on my way. Nothing at all out-of-the-ordinary happened.

Next stop was a roadside fruit stand. Much haggling ensued over a watermelon the size of New Jersey. Insistence (on our part) that it not be cut for a sample. The melon is cut nonetheless, with a knife worthy of a bad b-movie. Now that it is cut, we don’t want it. Now that it is cut, we must take it. A price is named worthy of a Brentwood organic grocer. For an unwanted, uncut melon? Never! We buy elsewhere. Mundane. Again. Despite much brandishing of melon knives, only fruit was threatened, and in the end we bought two monstrous melons for about $1.00 each.

Of course, you are hoping for archaeology news, mundane or otherwise. Much of the past several days has been mundane indeed, spent reviewing invoices for equipment orders, making final decisions about placement of things like flatbed scanners and fax machines, and figuring out what, if anything, we are to do about the leaky roof at Mosul. As at home, it somehow takes the combined decision-making skills of at four Ph.D.s, the CEO, an IT chief, a senior civil engineer, a security chief (travel to, from, and within Mosul is dicey), a systems integrator, a budget analyst, and a secretary to accomplish this. (And these are only those of whom I am aware). But accomplished it is: installation at Baghdad U., Inshallah, is to be finished this week, and work will start in earnest at Mosul U. in the next several days.

Other good news is USAID’s donation of a used 4WD vehicle for the duration. We must first figure out how to pick it up from an undisclosed location, but it is destined for Baghdad U., so that they can get out to their field school at Sippar.

Mortars and Other Minor Inconveniences

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Mon, 09 Aug 2004 23:03:00 +0000

Baghdad

We had a scary moment yesterday in the Green Zone. Entry is controlled by double barriers. As we were held up between them for inspection of our car, the security guards suddenly dived behind the concrete bunkers, leaving us like little rats in a have-a-heart trap. We thought for a chilling moment that they’d found an explosive in the undercarriage. It’s a deadly-force-authorized zone, so we did not want to simply leap from the vehicle. We slowly opened the windows, then the doors, to ask what was up. Finally, a shivering Gurkha motioned that we were to come inside. Apparently, mortars were falling somewhere so distant that we could not even hear them. After five minutes we had the all clear, without actual incident.

We drove back to the offices amid reports of bad fighting in the West of the city, and sporadic outbreaks elsewhere. So we closed up early. It was a rough night. I was repeatedly awakened by explosions rattling the building. One was close enough to send spent gravel pattering gently against the window. I gave up trying to sleep and, with some sense of irony, watched Top Gun. I was somewhat reassured by the lack of helicopter gunships, police sirens, and ambulances. My street is a major thoroughfare, so after the Church and Ministry bombings the red lights and sirens went on for hours. Had anything really bad happened really close, it would have lit up the street. I heard distant shouting; a rattle of gunfire. But in the morning, the shops along the way opened as usual, albeit late. I’m a bit groggy today; having trouble concentrating on the work at hand.

Baghdad, when a church is bombed

noreply@blogger.com (J.R. Pournelle) — Mon, 09 Aug 2004 02:37:00 +0000

There is a city around this city.
Where glass rains down, splattering shards in cobalt drops across the dusty steps
The haggard eyes of witnesses red-rimmed, blackened, staring, fists balled, throats hoarse from shouting at the sky, from begging God to stop the rain.
...
There's a city around this city, its rings of squatters camps long since leveled, sown with salt, rebuilt in regulated rows; reordered into neatened grids of cinder blocks in modernizing city schemes
Old byways turning in adobe bends toward the leafy cool of shaded canal-side gardens, now erased in one bold sweep of urban engineering.
Rings gone, the grids, the straight long streets now turning nowhere, leading nowhere, encircling all the same, with a prowling hope imported from the long-gone squatters camps without, now a marching, lockstep ache within.

There is a city around this city: it hides, it shields, it breathes a desperate grasp for turnings, coolness, a place along the Tigris banks, a place no more outside, a place no more the Arab street;
a place no more the clothes the speech the furious and futile pride of a second city a made city a city forced and framed from rural remnants still despised
and now displaced by space and time from old ancestral lands and ways.

There is a city around this city. It shuttled once from night to night in black sedans--black cars, hot cars, big cars, red cars, four-wheel armored SUVs, red sports coups, battered beaten orange and white and dented rusty taxicabs—
shuttled, roared, crept, sped, through the beaten, brutal nights from Palace moat to Palace basement; from torture cells to satin beds.
It chokes today, a smog of fear, hovering along the concrete ribbons that ring and cross and exit but never never leave; that hang above, a dusty pall along horizon hinterlands.

There's a city around this city. War rooms, tents, and offices; HUMMVs, EWACs, Tactical Commands; a soldier-city, a city of soldiers, they hover, glide, ride, patrol, surround, transgress, withdraw: a web, a cage, a deliverance from thirst;
distractions; terrors, a band of brothers; a company of friends:
A city they are too, of crime and hope and fear and boredom; of jobs well done and duties shirked as many and as variable as the city they surround and barely comprehend.

There's a city around this city. In it pipes, and out again: electric grids and oil pipelines and air supplies and boiler parts; satellite dishes like rooftop mushrooms, like bracket fungus stepping up the sides of concrete urban forests; plastic flip-flops, computer chips; highway truckers, convoys, road trains feeding, bleeding: money, imports, spare supplies; technicians, merchants, engineers.

There's a city around this city: of industry and land fills; glass factories and furniture repairs; a dying city, a trying city, a city under attack, assault, explosions, mortar rounds, assassinations, kidnappings, shortages, scandals, extraordinary efforts, high stakes, past profits, future fears.
…
There's a city around this city. Where window glass rained down to cover twenty New York city blocks, in a pyroclastic flow of office trash, screaming jumpers, smoke, and ash, and burning fuels: The haggard eyes of witnesses red-rimmed, blackened, staring, fists balled, throats hoarse from shouting at the sky, from begging God to stop the rain.
These witnesses, this city, seen and wrapped around the globe.

[Now Published in: Excavations: A City Cycle]