Brief

Most of first-year students at Yale Law School are mired in a 30-page writing assignment called a “brief,” which is a misnomer if I’ve ever heard one.

Anyways, apparently the Whiffenpoofs (or something like that), a Yale acappella group,  is having an open-bar event to celebrate their appearance on some reality show.  Hopefully I can get done in time to go…

In Iraq

Well, I'm in Iraq, most of you who read this also received the email I sent out, so I'm just going to post it here because I don't feel like retyping all that stuff:


Hello Everyone,

As the saying goes, my boots just hit the ground, around 4 am Iraq time, which is 8pm (the previous day) your time. Iraq is 8 hours ahead of the Eastern US, and as I write this it is 11 pm my time, so I haven’t been here for a whole day yet.

To give you a brief rundown of my trip, I left Cherry Point around 9 am, stopped in Newfoundland (why I don’t know), left there, stopped in Ireland, then Budapest, Hungary and then Kuwaiti City, Kuwait. The temperature in Kuwait hit me like a ton of bricks, it was 125 when we got off the plane, and then we bused to Camp Victory, Kuwait to wait out a flight to Al-Asad, Iraq, which is the closest thing I’ll have to a home base for the next 6-7 months. Camp Victory was super hot but it was a good rest period. All’s I did was call home as much as I could, sleep, read and basically just chill out. We left for Iraq Friday morning, (approximately 1am our time) out of Sali-al-Salem air base in Kuwait and got into Iraq, as I already said, around 4. It is hot out here, but nothing like Kuwait, it’s at least 15 degrees cooler and after acclimatizing to Kuwait the heat doesn’t bother me at all.

Today I took a nap, and after that just got used to the base. It’s really weird, this used to be an Iraqi Air Force base so a bunch of old MiGs (a fighter jet Saddam bought from the Russians in the 1980s) are lying around, some of them completely destroyed. Today I saw a concrete bunker with a crashed MiG in it, and I have to admit it was pretty cool. I’ve only been here a few hours, but I can already tell this place is gigantic. It’s without a doubt the largest military installation I’ve ever seen in my life, and I’ve seen a reasonable amount. Tomorrow I get an official tour from the outgoing public affairs people, and I’m hoping to hit a movie stand we affectionately refer to as the “Hajji DVDs”. Basically, these Iraqi dudes pirate movies and sell them here the same day they come out in theaters in the US, at a cost of $2.50 apiece, other than that I’m going to continue adjusting and hopefully I’ll get to work Monday.

Communications out here are better than I expected, and anonymous patriotic Americans send us enough phone cards that we can make a phone call per day without having to pay anything. It’s a nice thing to have, though when I go to FOBs (forward operating bases) I doubt things will be as nice and I might not even have email, so I’m trying to take advantage of being able to talk to people while I’m here, so hopefully I can coordinate a time through email to talk to each of you, even if for just a few minutes, and then call you.

My mailing address is:

Cpl. James D. Hamel
MWHS-2 DET A PAO
Unit 78092
FPO AE 09502-8092

I don’t really have any requests about what to send, so don’t feel obligated to send anything. I will however, tell you what not to send, because they are in such abundance: phone cards, bug spray and sun tan lotion. What I’d really like to see most is simple letters, something tangible to remind me of home. I’m also looking forward to all the children’s art work I’ll be receiving, because if my time in boot camp and other places has taught me anything, it’s that Bonnie Rose, Hannah, Kameron and now maybe Meghan and Emma love to send me drawings, and I love to receive them.

I would appreciate if you all would respond to the email as quickly as possible, as I’m sure I made mistakes in typing at least one person’s email address and I kind of want to gauge who exactly received this, so I can fix the problem.

That’s all for now, I’m a little homesick, but mostly happy to be here and finally contribute, even if only a small part, to our country’s mission. I’m excited about getting out of here and interacting with the Iraqis, and seeing what life is like from their eyes. Don’t worry about me, I’m fine and am not worried about myself, so you shouldn’t be either (this means you, Aunt Wee and Lindsay). I hope to hear from you all soon and will continue praying that all is well at home and thinking about you all often.

God Bless and Semper Fidelis
From Iraq,

JD

That was it, if I don't have your email address, then post a comment on here and give it to me, otherwise, email me at hameljd@acemnf-wiraq.usmc.mil

Take care everyone.

Back in North Carolina

I don't know what to say. I returned from home yesterday to NC with the schedule of going to Iraq on my 21st birthday, August 2nd. Hopefully that will happen, I'm so bored and lonely here that I need something to get my mind back on the right track. I feel really weird right now, like I don't want to hang out with anyone except for my closest friends or my family, and I have few really good friends here and no family.

Going home was awesome, but I feel like I didn't do everything I wanted to do, and I'm not talking about fun stuff, I'm talking about hanging out with people and putting a nice close on relationships that I've had over the years.


So I had that on my mind when my family drove me to the airport, I had an hour of sleep, I had the fear, excitement, anticipation, etc. that comes with deployment and I had the fact that I was flying to a place where I was going to be doing nothing, so close to my family yet so far away, for at least a few days before going to Iraq. Oh yeah, and the fact that even as I write this there's a possibility that I won't leave until Thursday or Friday.

Needless to say it was a crappy day, and I hate airports, and yesterday was incredibly emotional for me. I honestly can say that I felt more like a female than I think I ever have or will. Any thought about my family-a memory of Meghan singing "B-A-N-A-N-A-S" in the back of the car, the card that my little cousins made for me, or whatever-made me tear up. I couldn't watch Garden State because New Jersey's landscape is so much like Ohio's, the music is so relevant to my life right now, and the story of a guy returning home, realizing that home isn't what it used to be, etc. made me want to tear up. The comment he makes about about realizing that the place he grew up isn't really home anymore, and his theory that people settle down because when you lose your home you want to make a new one really resonates with me right now, and I'm sure it does with some of you too.

Yesterday I cried twice, and along with the time my grandma died those are the only times I've cried since I was 13 years old. So yesterday was weird, and I read a lot yesterday, from a biography on Winston Churchill, one of my heroes, and the Bible. The reason behind those two books: Don't know if I would say Churchill is the greatest man who ever lived (other than Christ), but he's close, and his life is in many ways similar to my own, so when I get down I read about him, because it gives me inspiration. The Bible is obvious, and though I didn't read a whole lot the first thing I saw when I opened it up was this, a quote from Christ in Matthew: "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest." That was intense when I read it, and was good to hear considering how down I was.

That's about it from me, I hope you all are doing well. I'm not going to post in this thing until I get to Iraq, so the next entry will be a couple of weeks most likely. Everyone stay strong and keep me on your mind, because you are certainly on mine.

Start up

Hello all,

As you know, I'll be leaving for Iraq in a few weeks from this post, and people in the know have advised me that a Blog is an excellent way to kind of update people on my day-to-day life without sending out infinite numbers of emails and phone calls.

There are obviously a lot of personal things I'm going to want to say through email and phone, but this thing will serve its own purpose, and also be a recorded journal of all my thoughts and feelings over the 7-month deployment. I'll also be able to post some photos of myself up here, either in this website or in another forum I'll have to create once I'm in Iraq.

I'm not going to update this thing very often at all, maybe once or twice before I leave. This is just an introduction, the real fun begins August 7. Take it easy.

JD