I forgot about the Kleenex napkins…

 I thought that was so funny when we were in Nasiriyah last year, that the “napkins” on the dinning room table were actually boxes of Kleenex in pink and blue.  They fall apart in your hands when you use them to wipe your mouth but man–o-man they are better than nothing when it comes time to do that. 

The first couple of meals here in Najaf at our guesthouse were definitely consumed in the absence of any form of napkin-like material.  Awkward….someone finally said something about not having any “tissue” and within minutes two rolls of humble toilet paper showed up at our table. 

I guess that’s just how they roll here in Najaf. 

Sweet! No drama in leaving Istanbul and no drama entering Iraq.

What a relief.

I did have to wait for what felt like an eternity at the visa counter in Najaf however.   An hour can feel that way after a few days of airplanes, airports, and hotels.  But I made it with a little assistance from my local contact.  The same local contact provided me with a wild ride to our guesthouse…very glad that there were seatbelts in the car; I think we narrowly avoided three accidents during what couldn’t have been more than a fifteen-minute drive. 

I arrived to find our beloved surgeon at our guesthouse, prior to heading into the hospital for the day, smoking a cigar and playing video games.  He provided me with a synopsis of our trip so far and also a run down of how the last trip, Nasiriya , went just a few weeks ago.  Also got an update on the whole Iraqi program and what the goals are for each site.  So far, things seem to running quite smoothly here.  We have a four bed ICU and most of the children have done well in the OR and been quickly extubated and sent to the floor.  The TGA that was operated on yesterday apparently looks great and will be extubated today.  This child had the fourth arterial switch ever performed in this country.  The previous three have been performed by our team over this and the last trip. 

After my briefing, the night crew arrived home and I got to meet my nursing counterparts from Washington D.C. and Australia, as well as a German intensivist.  I am generally bad with names but the fact that I am here with two other nurses named Christine should make things at least a bit easier to remember.  We ate breakfast together and then had a quick drink and visit before we all went to bed.  I wasn’t anticipating sleeping all day but I didn’t wake up until my roommate started getting ready to go in for her shift.  They all just left the guesthouse a bit ago and I am here waiting for day shift to return home.  I’m excited to see my old friend Pasha (Pavel, Habibi…) my Belarusian intensivist friend, and Frank, a remarkable nurse educator originally from London.  And then there are the new faces to be introduced to as well. 

Not sure just yet when my first shift at the hospital will be, though I suspect it will be either in the morning or tomorrow night.  So for now, time to relax and rest up for what will hopefully be an uneventful trip. 

It’s a beautiful day in Istanbul!

Sunny and around 45 F.  Found my hotel shuttle, found my hotel, took a much needed shower and I’m going to take a shuttle downtown here in a few to see some sites!  I’m still holding out hope that the woman who was my Istanbul connection might be able to meet for dinner or something.  Maybe grab another nap (I have been sleeping in 2-3 hour chunks for over 24 hours now, and feeling pretty okay about it so far).   Then back to the airport around 0100 to catch my 0300 flight…should be in Najaf just in time to start the day. 

But leaving Istanbul might actually prove to be a bit of a challenge.  Apparently, everyone in the team so far has run into a little difficulty boarding their flights.  Hopefully things will have been worked out by the time I get back to the airport tonight but we will see.  The last person to arrive in Najaf got pulled out of line while boarding her flight by the officials who were convinced that she must be trying to board the wrong flight…why on Earth would a blond American woman, traveling alone no less, be headed to Najaf, Iraq?

So, once again, wish me luck!

I’m a little nervous about this trip…

 …but only a little. 

It is our first trip to this site.  If I recall correctly, the last time I was in Iraq I was on a second and a third mission to each site and we were still deeply mired in the figuring things out stages.  Those trips did not run entirely smoothly.  To say the least.  And this trip, our first time in Al Najaf, will be when we really assess the environment within which we will need to work.  This is the trip that we get to figure out if local meds just don’t work, or that there is no sink in the ICU, or that we have to worry about running out of oxygen from our wall set-up.  You know…

…details. 

This trip will also be a little different for me personally because I am arriving late.  Last one to the party.  And one of the last to leave.  The rational for that being that in the event that there are children who must remain in the ICU when it is time for the team to leave, that it would be great if we had sort of an ICU skeleton team to get them out.  So it will be myself, another nurse from D.C., and my Belarusian intesivist friend from previous installments of my blog, Pavel.

It is going to go by so fast…

Right now, sitting in JFK waiting for the next leg of my flight.  Off to Istanbul!  I have a much needed a hotel reservation for my seventeen hour layover and am hoping to take in some local sites.  I had arranged for a friend of a friend to show me around but sadly we had a major miscommunication about when I was going to arrive.  She showed up at the airport looking for me just as I was leaving my house to try to catch my first flight…I received a few very worried emails just as I was about to leave my house.  And unfortunately, she will not be able to meet me tomorrow.  But like I said, I have a hotel lined up already so that will help.  I think once I get a shower and maybe a nap I will be ready for a little adventure. 

Wish me luck!

Well, I’m all packed and I don’t leave for another 13 hours.

 My bag is overweight again.  It always seems to be on these trips.  I have my essentials, which are arguably more than is absolutely essential.  But I also have diapers and stuffed toys and liquid Tylenol and bubbles…and three bottles of liquor (last time I checked, southern Iraq was still pretty freaking dry).   I took the coloring books and the baby blankets out of my giant suitcase and put them in my carry on which gets the weight down on my suitcase to just shy of 70lbs, the reasonable upper limit for overweight luggage. 

So, like I said.  All packed.  And now what?  What am I going to do until  my plane takes off? 

I needed a bike for Burning Man….

So I did what any other person in my situation would do during this modern age: get on Craigslist and see what people are offering this week. 

Found it.  Found a few actually…stylish cruiser bikes in various colors and states of disrepair.  I figured $100-200 for a used bike would be reasonable and sure enough, I found the perfect fit.  Mint green with white trim…the add even described it as a “perfect bike to take to Burning Man” and the price was right.  Sold!

I contacted the guy who posted the add spoke with him via telephone a couple of times and eventually coordinated a time for me to go by his place to check it out. 

Scott.  That is what he said his name was I think…pleasant guy, but notable primarily for being VERY enthusiastic in his manner and speech.  Felt like I was talking to a kindergarten teacher who had just gotten a new puppy.  Huh.  Whatever, I’ll give him $150 in exchange for a snappy new bike to cruise around on the playa with, even if he is a little…odd.  And actually, given the Burning Man context, it actually seems pretty fitting. 

As I drove to the address I was given, it occurred to me that going and meeting some likely weird stranger at his house to look at a bike seemed to hold some serious kidnapping potential…as in, thinking to myself “Nah, I’m sure it will be fine…he seemed, um…nice…and this IS a nice neighborhood…” seemed like the beginning of some graphic horror flick where the girls gets kidnapped by the guy with the bike on craigslist and gets locked in the basement for sixteen years or something….

Obviously, lucky for me, that isn’t how it went down. 

I parked down the street and walked up the drive.  He came stumbling out of the house, bare foot and shushing my hello…

“Someone is sleeping inside…”  Tall.  Like lanky tall…and big eyes he opened wide to punctuate his speech.  Very, very animated whispering….honestly, I think he was shushing himself more than he actually needed to shush me.

“Wait right here, I will go around back and get it!” He tiptoed around what looked like shards of  glass from a broken neon light bulb in his bare feet. 

I stood there, politely waiting, feeling less likely to be kidnapped now.  The house was tucked back, off the street.  And there was a lot of stuff laying around the driveway and side of the garage.  Boxes with miscellaneous refuse., old office chairs, cowboy hats, lamp shades, plastic crates full of dusty old books…and boxes of dry food….crackers, pasta noodles.  There was a large van parked in front of the house that looked full…of stuff.  Was this guy one of those enthusiastic garage sale types or just a militant packrat?  Not that it actually matters…

He came back with my bike.  So cute!  A little rusty, but not too bad…nothing a little love wouldn’t take care of.  I took it for a spin around the block.  It felt great.  I felt like a little kid riding around without a helmet, completely the antithesis of the “cyclist” or “bike commuter” I have at times toyed with becoming. 

I went back to the pack rat’s house. 

“Why are you selling it?”

“Oh.  It’s not mine.  A friend of mine lost his house and I am storing a bunch of his stuff here…it is his and he is just trying to get rid of some things…so….”

“Oh. Okay, $150 right?  Here is $160.”  I handed him a little, pre counted stack of twenty-dollar bills.  I really didn’t expect to get change, figured that I could manage with parting with that extra ten bucks even before I knew that it was going to a homeless guy.   He offered to sell me a heavy-duty lock for my new bike but I told him that I actually already had one…

“Oh, great!  Okay…um…you want some food!?!  I have a lot!”  He sort of scampered off  (yes, I said scampered and that is actually what he did) around to the back of the van and opened it up for me.  It looked like he had just robbed a bakery….the whole back half of the van was full of loaves of artisan breads.  “Here, take some bread!  What kind do you like?  Here take a few!”

“Um…do you have any…um, how about one with rosemary?”

“Yeah, okay, here you go!  You don’t just want one!  Take more!  I have lots!”  He is wildly gesticulating while he enthusiastically encourages me to help myself to the pile of bread.  “Oh, you want some crackers!?! Or Pasta!?!  Oh, I have cookies too!  And salt!  You need salt don’t you?  Everyone needs salt! Do you want Kosher or Iodized!?!  What else you need!?!  Oh, do you see anything else you want!?!” By now he had opened the garage to reveal floor to ceiling of shelves packed with boxes of…stuff.  Like he had not only robbed a bakery but also the local thrift store.  On the floor were several boxes and bags of food…he literally had two boxes full of salt…three different brands…and yes, Kosher and iodized where indeed options. 

Not wanting to be completely rude, I graciously accepted a loaf of rosemary bread, two boxes of Wheat Thins, two boxes of spaghetti noodles, and a thing of Kosher salt along with my new bike. 

“You sure you don’t want any cookies!?!” 

There is nothing like a massage to ruin your day.

I know what you are thinking: “Great Kristen, you have so little to say at this point that you are going to actually bitch about having a massage.”

Relax (ha!).  I’m not really going to bitch about it, just making the kind of tongue and cheek observation that one can only make when they have the luxury of being on vacation.  And since I seem to be suffering from a lack of material in my novel new life, I am just going to run with it. 

So, for those of you who do not keep close tabs on me and my whereabouts, this weekend I am occupying a fancy schmancy time share condo up in South Lake Tahoe (THANKS MOM!).  Sweet digs to be sure (and man o man, they almost got me to sign up for one of my very own…but I think they may have still gotten my number since it appears that I have purchased a ten day vacation on Maui for sometime in the next eighteen months).  And Lake Tahoe, just as I remembered it from a brief drive-by I did back in my Mammoth days, is stunning.  But while Tahoe is the kind of place ripe with pristine natural beauty that I often frequent, the novelty of the aforementioned fancy schmancy condo is a bit disorienting.  Those of you who know me well can attest to me being more the camping, sleep-in-your-car-at-the-beach or live-in-a-van-with-your-stinky-boyfriend kind of gal rather than your grandma’s luxury time-share type. 

(Cue the Talking Heads right here…)

In the spirit of occupying someone else’s life, I decided to book myself an overpriced, ski vacation town massage this morning, as my back has been tweaking out (I think I am out of shape for working those 36 hour weeks…I know, you feel REAL sorry for me for that one too).  

It was great.  Maybe not worth the exorbitant price tag but I am, after all, pretty spoiled with the $6 medical massages I was getting on my old insurance plan. 

Then I had lunch with an old friend, which is probably another story onto itself (seriously…here is a little trailer for you: I had lunch with my best friend from first grade whom I have not heard from for a solid thirteen years).

My plan for my day had be as follows: get up, make coffee/breakfast, enjoy the jet tub in my unit with a hot bath, attend overpriced massage, meet childhood chum for lunch, rent kayak and paddle around this big blue bucket of crystal clear water, spring the dogger from the kennel for a few hours (no dogs allowed in fancy schmancy land) and go for a walk and maybe sit on the beach with her for a while, then dinner and chill. 

Things didn’t go awry until after lunch.  Somehow lost my motivation to finish the day strong (sorry dogger, but maybe I will catch a second wind here and we can go for a little sunset stroll). 

Like I said, I blame the massage.  Just too relaxed.  Clearly.  Plus it got cloudy and a little windy and kayaking sounded cold.  Going back to my big leather couch and gourmet coffee maker to write for a while and maybe read sounded better to me. 

So here I am…. 

“Letting the days go by…”