Being a Good Neighbor
By CPT Patrick Farrell, 244th EN BN Plans Officer
TIKRIT, IRAQ - The 244th Engineer Combat Battalion (Heavy) out of Denver, Colorado is reaching out to their new neighbor, the Al Saquor village northwest of Tikrit, Iraq. This small village with a population of 1,244 has been through some hard times recently, as piles of rubble from battles both past and present are scattered throughout the town. Shards of glass lie strewn everywhere in a town where many of the children do not have shoes to wear. There is a limited supply of electricity and fresh water, and the unemployment rate is near 100%. Many of the locals held jobs at the Iraqi Air Force Academy, which is now occupied by US forces and known as Forward Operating Base Speicher, occasional home to the 244th. The economy is stimulated mainly by makeshift roadside stands set up to sell ice and soda and souvenirs to the passing military convoys.
While the primary mission of the 244th EN BN is to improve the living conditions of the soldiers of the 4th ID across northern Iraq, soldiers are being asked to volunteer their time once or twice per week to help out in the village. The soldiers of the 244th have embraced the idea of adopting their neighbors and offering their help. To date, the 244th has brought their heavy construction equipment into town to clean up the rubble, hauling nearly 200 loads away in their 20-ton dump trucks. Plans are in progress to get the new generator purchased by the US military operational to supplement the unreliable power grid in town. Contracts are also being solicited to get the irrigation well and pump replaced to allow the formerly lush green village to once again rise out of the dust and rubble that dominate the area. A new soccer field is being leveled with a road grader that has not been committed to a mission yet. New playground equipment was designed and custom built by a team of carpenters and the first pieces were installed in Al Saquor this week.
One soldier, SPC Kevin Kossow, volunteered his assigned piece of equipment, a welding trailer, to visit the village this week and was kept busy repairing the old bicycles used by the children and adults of the village to get around. Many soldiers go to the village to provide security in the work areas, and are surprised by the warm reception. This is in contrast to the usual hostile work site they have seen in other areas of Iraq. They pass the time in the heat reaching over 120 degrees speaking to the local villagers, mainly children excited to meet US soldiers and test their expanding vocabulary of English words and phrases. The local economy is further stimulated by the brisk sales of cold soda and bartered exchanges of US dollars for Iraqi Dinars.
The Battalion?s Physician Assistant, 1LT Craig Robinson has also traveled to the village, and has attracted the attention of the locals with the universally known symbol of the Red Cross on the sides of his ambulance. His skills have been tested from applying Band-Aids to children?s feet to cleaning up after a circumcision gone wrong. Despite limited communication ability when there is not a translator in the area, Doc Robinson is fast becoming a trusted and relied upon supplement to the small medical clinic in the village.
The nurse at the clinic wanted her daughters to meet SPC Heidi Silver, a female US soldier about their same age, and it became an interesting cultural experience. Unsure at first about entering the home of the locals, several soldiers accompanied her. After the females spent some time discussing issues such as careers and the differing roles of women in their respective societies, the Iraqi family, true to their culture of being excellent hosts, started bringing out plates of food for their visitors: flat bread, rice, vegetables, fruits, soups, biscuits, tea, and other items that were unfamiliar to the soldiers. The translator informed the soldiers that not to accept the food would be an offense their gracious Arab hosts, so the soldiers reluctantly tried some of the food. It proved to be the best meal that many of them had eaten since leaving the US!
More plans are in the works for the 244th to keep the village moving swiftly down the path of reconstruction. Volunteers are not hard to come by, as many of the soldiers have now experienced the appreciation that the Iraqi villagers displayed, and are eager to get back to the task. More than one soldier expressed that it had been their best day yet since arriving in Iraq a month or two previously. And it is likely that it was the best day in quite some time for the Iraqi villagers too.
Market Data 
Markets 
