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Experience of a female soldier in Iraq
Gin Marie
United StatesGALLERYCONVERSATION
As we waited in the hot sun, the passenger opening in the gate started to open bit by bit. First it was just an inch, where it...
It was so hot, and we were wearing the usual uniforms—-pants, tee shirt, DCU top, vest, and helmet. After a while in that outfit you seem to move beyond sweating. You don't 'glow'—-you drip. You melt. You can feel the drops sliding down the small of your back, forming on your scalp. Sweat runs down your face, and because so much of your uniform is covered by the vest, it doesn't get touched by whatever air there is.
When I looked back at the gate, there were eight fingertips on the edge, and one dark eye peeping around it. I waved, and a little girl's face emerged. She was about ten, with curly dark hair and a heart-shaped face, wearing a purple velvet dress with a pink tee-shirt beneath it. She waved back at me, and I waved back at her. She giggled, then hid. Then she re-appeared and waved some more. Once we'd established rapport, she wouldn't stop waving, and raced in the house to get reinforcements.
I heard high voices behind me, and looked around to find the first little girl accompanied by another one and a boy. They all waved, then shyly stepped forward. I discovered that the first girl's name was Rania, while her shy older sister was named Rahel. I'm probably butchering the spelling. While I was being introduced to her brother, a sturdy boy named Usama—"bin Laden," he added cheekily—-another sister appeared, older and simply gorgeous.
Anyway, this older sister named Raher—again, I'm sure I didn't spell that right—-and she spoke some English. She wanted to know when she could go back to the university. All the kids clustered around us, Rania fanning herself and looking up at us with sympathy. The sweat was just pouring down everyone's faces.
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