Iraq outtakes

Some behind-the-scenes anecdotes from this week in Iraq:

If Iraqis could vote...
Obama is popular among our Iraqi staff members, many of whom now forgo high-fives for the Barack-Michelle knuckle knock. However, Arabic-language channels made a big deal out of the Obama campaign asking two Muslim supporters not to sit behind the presidential candidate so their headscarves wouldn't appear on TV. There's also been lots of footage here of Obama reassuring AIPAC that all of Jerusalem belongs to Israel, which didn't go over so well, either.

Our drivers feel betrayed. The other day we were chatting after lunch and one of them asked me whether it was true Obama was Muslim. No, I told him, he's a Christian but has some Muslim forefathers. Another asked me why he moved the Muslim women, and I explained that campaign workers were behind the gaffe and that Obama had apologized for the incident. Abu Zahraa said he still supports Obama, reasoning that his Muslim ancestry might make him more sympathetic to the plight of Iraqis and Palestinians. Abu Feisal said the AIPAC speech had turned him off Obama, but that he would still vote for Obama over McCain because: "I just like his black face. It's close to us. He is not so different."

I then conducted a little poll: "If you could vote in U.S. elections, who would you pick for president?"
Our office manager's answer had us all laughing: "If I was an American, I would vote for Obama. But if I was Iraqi and could vote in U.S. elections, I would vote for McCain....because maybe he'll finish the s--- they started here!" But the zinger came from our British security adviser, who was also in the lunchroom: "If I were American, eh? I'd emigrate to England!"

"The biggest agent in the world"
One of my female Iraqi colleagues, the office sweetheart, is always asking for more adventurous assignments than polling parliament members about the status of forces agreement. The US military invited McClatchy on a day trip to Taji yesterday and I thought it might be nice to take along my Iraqi colleague for her very first helicopter ride. You have to understand: Iraqis seen associating with the US military, even (and sometimes especially) in a media capacity, can be marked for death by militants who view them as traitors and collaborators. Iraqis who work with Americans take great pains to shield their identities and jobs, which is why my colleague's name isn't mentioned here.

So, we set off for the helicopter landing pad in the Green Zone. It's next to a parking lot filled with dozens and dozens of the huge, menacing SUVs used by security contractors such as Blackwater. My Iraqi colleague's eyes grew big: "I've never seen them still like this. Only moving so, so fast in the streets!" We boarded the helicopter (after a brief struggle to put in her ear plugs under her hijab) and were strapped in. The rotors kicked dust in our faces, but we were too giddy to notice. This was her first helo ride, and probably my last for a long time.

We rose above Baghdad and my colleague had a big smile plastered on her face as she absorbed her first aerial view of her hometown's mosques, mazes of sand-colored villas, impossibly green palm groves, tidy squares of farmland and -- best of all -- the sparkling Tigris. We touched down in Taji, peeled off our body armor and toured a mechanics' workshop where laborers were refurbishing old U.S. Humvees for Iraqi use. I snapped a couple of pics of my colleague posing near the Humvees. ("It's the first time I've ever touched one!" she said.) Then we settled in for a joint US-Iraqi military ceremony in which we were seated directly behind Gen. David Petraeus, the commander of US forces in Iraq. I snapped a couple more souvenir pics, then we mostly baked in the 104-degree sun and interviewed some Iraqi and US officers.

At one point, my colleague and I flipped through the photos on my camera from earlier that day. There she was: striking a pose in her body armor, smiling in a US military helicopter, peeking through the bulletproof window of a Humvee, looking poised behind the top American general in Iraq. She gasped. "Just send them directly to the Sadr office!" she said, jokingly. "My God, I am the biggest agent in the world!"

Move over, South Beach Diet
McClatchy has another visiting American reporter here, a veteran California-based journalist named Buck Tharp, who proudly wears a T-shirt that reads, "Old Guys Rock," and is wildly popular among the Iraqi staff. Buck has been on a military embed in Kirkuk for several days. He's had to make treks in the midday sun, go without laundry service and endure many other less-than-fun aspects of embedded life.

Today, he emailed me an update that said he lost 4 kilos walking around remote bases in the sweltering heat. In typical Buck fashion, he added: "Dig it!" I wrote back that I'd lost 2 kilos in Taji alone and suggested we quit journalism and market the Iraq Extreme Diet. His reply pointed out the unfortunate acronym that probably would doom our fledgling diet business: IED.

Back to the drawing board...   

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Could the huge popularity of Michelle Obama be a sign of changing attitudes in the fashion industry? Vogue featured Michelle Obama on its cover recently. Michelle Obama in particular has ushered in new era of style and entertaining.