Day Ten

Day Ten
05 August 2007
There is still a lot of setup work to do as we get started on unpacking the phones around 0900. The phones are pretty easy since all we really have to do is set the network configuration to enable DHCP and plug it in. These switches don’t provide any power so the phones here have to be plugged into the wall too. The desks have built in power outlets (that we did not re-wire, by the way) but there are only so many. This problem is solved quickly though when the contractor poet produces a box of cheap multi-socket power strips. Each socket has a little on/off button below it in a different pastel shade and the voltage meter of each strip is framed by a large red heart. These guys have the weirdest stuff.
A corn dog and a pizza later and we were back at the DOC finishing up the phones for the G offices. Not all of them were working or anything but we had done all we could from our end. It would have helped had the lines been tagged but, alas!, t’was not so.
I went back to the room and puttered around the internet trying to find out more about Cisco IP phones and 3Com switches. I was kinda irked that of the hundreds (if not thousands) of pages I found dedicated to these products, only one small paragraph had anything at all to do with what I was working with (How to factory reset a 7900 series IP phone), and even that wasn’t really helpful at the moment. Ah well. It’s dinner time anyway.
After some satisfactory ribs, warm cheese tortellini, and an interesting attempt at a quesadilla, I had another kind of task. Apparently the building contactor next door was having some trouble installing a drier for his printer. I figured I could use the opportunity to learn some 25 Bravo stuff (they’re the computer guys). He stays in a pretty nicely appointed trailer on the DOC side. It appeared to be an easy fix. I went to the printer manufacturer’s website and started the download of the whole driver suite for the series. It was a rather large file (40 something megabytes) so we chatted about the usual stuff. Where we were from, how we liked it out here, what we planned to do when we got back home, etc. The download was done in only eight minutes! It would have taken all day on the connection in my room! It took twice as long to install but it worked out. The test page printed just fine and that was that. With a quick handshake and a thanks I was out the door. I decided right then and there that I wouldn’t rather be a Bravo than a Sierra.
It was nearing midnight when we realized that no one had seen the contractor poet or his techs since dinner. Knowing this place they could have been arrested or at least detained. Possibly kidnapped…shit. Off I went to the DOC ready to spring them from whatever evil had them captive. If only I had a stylish cape for the occasion. Or a tail, of course, but that could always come in handy. As soon as I turned the corner I found them hanging from the ceiling by green ropes. Wait…there was a ladder there. And the ropes were coming out of a box of CAT5. Hmm…Ooooohhhhh. They were just running some more lines. Well, at least I had good intentions. HAHAHA.
Back on the GC side, my NCO and I were having a smoke when an interesting character came into the conversation. He is know as Wathic Wathic, apparently, and he has a bunch of metal bars sticking out of his left leg near the ankle. He went into the story and I was impressed from the start. He was driving to get to work (here at the GC) and had planned to drop off his nephew with some family on the way. Down a side street, a couple of cars pulled in front of his and slowed to a stop. A bunch of guys carrying AK 47s (a normal thing here, actually) got out of those cars and approached his window. They said they knew he was helping the Americans and if he didn’t stop they would kill him and his family. He told them to fuck off which caused the first guy to reach into the car and pulled Wathic Wathic out through the window! WW got to his feet and was promptly greeted with a butt stroke to the head. He grabbed the AK and held on tight. The guy told him to let go so WW punched him in the face and started to run down the alley. They were shooting at him, of course, and at one point he fell. He turned around and opened fire on them with the pistol that had been hidden in his jeans. He may have hit one of them because they scattered at that point and took off. He realized he’d been shot and hobbled back to his car; quickly coming to the realization that those guys had taken his nephew. They phoned a few days later and said his nephew was fine and would be returned for seven thousand dollars. “Kill him.” said WW, “I don’t have that kind of money.” and hung up. A week later they called again asking for five thousand. “Kill him.” Another week later they called again. This time they worked out a deal and for twenty-five hundred dollars, WW’s nephew was set free. And what makes it even more incredible is that this is the second time he’d been shot for helping us! And he’s still here doing all he can to help the coalition! Meeting the Iraqi Rambo is a pretty eye opening experience. This man knows the difference between right and wrong and that the right way is going to be hard and painful but worth it in the end. And just knowing he exists will keep my hopes for this country alive.
My mind keeps me up until nearly 0300 but soon enough it becomes…