While in Iraq, you get a one-week MWR trip to Qatar. On one of the trips we were allowed to take, this Qatari was selling camel rides. I didn't bother with it.

Here I am during a trip to Qayyarah to check on a water-pumping station.

Me in the office. 'BDOC' stands for Base Defense Operations Center.

I took this photo while flying over Baghdad. It is the Grand Mosque which Saddam was building when the invasion occurred. When finished, it was supposed to be the largest mosque in the world. I doubt it will ever be completed.

This mosque, I was told, was Saddam's personal mosque near the Al Faw palace. Now, it's located on Victory Base Complex.

This chair, located in the Al Faw palace was once owned by Saddam. It's a favorite spot for soldiers to get their pictures taken (can you tell?).

We went through training on how to search a suspect and I got to play "suspect".

A collection of rocket launchers. Hajji will often set these up, put a rocket in it, set up some sort of timer device, and then leave the area for the rocket to fire at a later time.

I was able to visit the Ah Shaw(sp) palace in Baghdad - one of Saddam's old haunts and now the home of MNC-I. These columns were huge.

QWBC, the FOB I was on, was an old Iraqi air force base and there were some of these old, beat fighters still lying around.

Here's one of my soldiers manning the gunner's post. This was during one of our trips into Qayyarah.

This a friend of mine, working for EODT security. He was actually deployed with me, but retired as a Sergeant Major after coming back and starting working for EODT back in Iraq. He's striking a tough-guy pose, but he's really the nicest guy you could meet

Everyone going overseas, no matter your job, has to learn how to do room clearing. Here we are training a "four-man stack". The squad leader is taking up the rear.

Believe it or not, this is what they served for dinner one night. I think it was a case of a Turk not translating to English correctly.

This is a mosque located on our FOB. No American was alloowed inside - even if you were security (like me) or an American Muslim.

This is the Al Faw palace at Camp Victory in Baghdad. Saddam used to occupy it, but it's now home to MNC-I.

Here's a couple of the Iraqi Army soldiers we had living on our base. Not exactly Western standards, but they tried.

Believe it or not, it does rain in Iraq, as these poor soldiers found out when they tried to move this large forklift over some muddy ground.

Here's my section training in house clearing.