President Obama Visits Baghdad

Something pretty cool happened yesterday. I heard that the President was coming to this area and was glad that we didn't have that type of PAO mission (media facilitation) because when a VIP of that stature comes here, things get asinine. Anyways, I thought it was going to be a presidential meeting...like with the Prime Minister of Iraq or something. Nope.

Our First Sergeant comes into our office, "OK! The man is here, who wants to go see him?" We all stared at him; silence engulfed the room. "Well?" he said. "You better decide now because you don't have much time."



We all jumped at once. I grabbed my personal camera, my cover, and my weapon. "No weapons, leave them with me!" said 1SG. We brought our M4s into 1SG's office and six of us squeezed into the truck. I drove to the al Faw Palace and noticed the tight security at the intersections. We had to park down the street and walk to the palace gates.

As we got in line (long line too!), the MPs were shouting instructions about metal in our pockets, knives, etc. We entered the building and it was like walking into a concert. The band (don't know which one--1st CAV Band?) was playing songs from Cold Play and Radio Head. They were rockin'. Then they started playing the traditional American presidential music and we knew that the motorcade had arrived.



I was by the main entrance when President Obama walked in, staff and media pool in tow. Everyone started clapping and yelling. Everyone's personal camera was up taking in video or taking pictures. He walked up to us and shook hands...making his way around, until Gen. Odierno brought him into the conference room for his brief.



After that, the President came out to speak to all the service members in the rotunda of the palace. The speech was short and to the point. Thanking us servicemembers for our work here and thanking our families for their sacrifices. It was cool seeing and listening to him.

I felt a little strange while I was there with the media going nuts with their news gathering equipment. Weird because as a Public Affairs NCO, I'm used to facilitating these events for the media. We did A LOT of that in Afghanistan. At the palace, I was able to just stand there amid the mass of uniformed personnel and enjoy the moment. By the way, I believe that this visit was Obama's first as President. I've attached a short snippet of video of the President speaking to the bottom of the blog. It's been compressed too so it's a little low res.

Working Out the Kinks...

Here at Camp Liberty, I'm getting a little more organized and into the flow of things. Housing arrangements, check, got my CHU...and thanks to SFC Hilton, we have a TV, a fridge, and converters in our room. Food, always good on a deployment...and you can get it anytime. Work, check, I will be working on the 1st Cavalry newspaper layout, The Crossed Sabers. Anyone can access it on www.cavcountry.net. While I'm doing that, I will help out in the print section and maybe even be able to get out a do a story.

Most know I like Starbucks. A lot. I've discovered Green Bean Coffee and man, that is some dang good coffee! I've fallen for the iced white chocolate mocha. Every espresso-based beverage they make has two espresso shots--minimum! Mmmmm.
I went to the al-Faw Palace again today. A few more needed MND-I badges and the other three wanted to look around. I took a picture of the large chandelier in the middle of the building. SPC Anderson took a picture of me sitting in the famous chair.
Pretty soon I'm going to start getting my butt in the gym. Last deployment I gained 25 lbs. I hope to do that again....it may be a little more difficult here due to the heat in the summertime. If you drink more liquids, you sometimes don't eat as much.
I've been kicking myself in the butt because I haven't had my camera with me to take pics of my goings-on. Time to head out to chow...my stomach is talking to me. Oh and in the last picture, check out the landscape behind me...that's Kuwait. Nothing much grows where we were. We were at the 'range' to shoot off some rounds with our M4s and our M9s.