After nearly two weeks in Egypt we have accomplished the main objectives of our stay and are finally ready to head back to good ole Amman, Jordan. As I write this, I'm sitting in a hotel in Alexandria on the Mediterranean coast pondering the events of the last two weeks, and how to condense such a story into something easily digestible. I could tell you all the things we saw and how numb my mind went after the third or fourth "really old thing with hieroglyphics on it", and I could tell you...read more

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Our arrival in Egypt was anything but easy. Our plan was to put our vehicle on a ferry from Aqaba and land in the Sinai in the town of Neweba. We did not expect to encounter as many problems as we did. On the Aqaba side, the immigration officer giving us our exit stamps "somehow" missed stamping one of our passports, something we didn't know about until a minute before we were supposed to drive the vehicle onto the ship. Fortunately the dock manager was sympathetic and allowed us to go...read more

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Well well well... lots to talk about on this one so excuse the length. First of all lets talk about the Dead To Red Ultra Marathon Relay. What an experience THAT turned out to be. To begin, everyone on the team was so stoked about finally getting to the race that I don't think anyone got a good night's sleep the night prior. We all showed up with smiles on our faces at the starting point. It was great to finally lay eyes on the Dead Sea... looked more like a big lake across which you could see...read more

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Well I've gone from having very little to do to having quite a lot to do, but I'm not complaining. I have begun embedding with a Jordanian unit some distance from Amman and that has been an adventure unto itself. I am unfortunately not able to provide a lot of observations right now but later I will tell you what I can about the things I'm seeing. For now, suffice to say that they are quite different from us in a number of ways. They want to be much better, but change is slow because their ways...read more

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Everything continues to go very well here in Amman. About the only thing I can complain about is having a bed and a couple of couches that I think came from the Inquisition. But, I'm working on having that stuff fixed, enshallah. For now, my day-to-day activities consist of going to the embassy for anywhere between one and four hours, depending on what I am trying to accomplish, going for a run every other day to keep preparations up for the Dead To Red Ultra Marathon Relay next month, and...read more

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Well, it's been about two weeks since arriving and I finally feel like I'm getting settled into life here. There's been a lot going on between work and "home". Most of my time at work has been spent checking all of the blocks necessary to get established in the embassy. Part of that process was having a short office call with the Ambassador, which was a great opportunity for me to meet the Chief of Mission and hear his thoughts on how to best support our objectives here. Aside from that, I've...read more

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Well... it seems I have gone from having too little to talk about in school to having too much to talk about after it. I will do my best to condense all that has gone on since my last post into something easily digestible. For starters, the flight to Amman was a breeze... literally. According to the in-flight screens we had a 220 mph tail wind for a good bit of the flight (thanks, Jet Stream...) so we ended up getting in about an hour and a half early. I was picked up at the airport by an...read more

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This note was handed to me on my way out the door from re-taking the DLPT today. Enough said!

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Leave time has been great. I can't say enough how great it is to spend time with family and friends. I think this is the first time I've been able to spend an entire 30 days at home between assignments. The only down side has been figuring out what to do with so much time. Everyone keeps telling me that doing nothing is the point... and I get that... but it WAS a bit challenging to go from running 100mph to idle overnight. But, as I said it has been fun. The trip to Disney World was terrific,...read more

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Well, getting out of Monterey proved to be a logistical nightmare. Overseas assignment into a furnished apartment meant sending three different shipments (two to Jordan, one to storage), putting the truck on a boat to Jordan from a port north of San Fran, and shipping the bike via private hauler to my parents' house. Plus, packing the things I need to have with me for a month of leave and travel to Jordan. But, with a little help from my very cool neighbors, I was able to get it all done and...read more

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