neurotic Iraqi wife
May 13, 2006
Alien Roaming The Green Zone...
Believe it or not, I actually cant wait to leave...Ironic isnt it...Atmosphere at work has become kinda morbid...Im counting the days now....Havent packed yet but did the " I want this shirt, I dont want this top" kinda thing....Still didnt find out whether I can ship directly to where Im heading to....Oh and listen to this...I call the guy who is responsible for packages and stuff, and asked him whats the procedure for a british citizen to mail stuff..."Oh sorry ma'am, if you dont hold a US citizenship, you cant..." Huh!!! What do you mean??? I ask in total shock...my jaws drop down...Well these are the rules ma'am...Where are you shipping your stuff to???I say the Emirates (had the urge to say Emigrates, since thats what LTC nice guy used to call it,lol)
Say that again the guy mumbles...The Emirates..The UAE...Oh wheres that the guys asks...hmm, now what am I supposed to tell this man, who first tells me I have to be US then tells me he has no clue of where the Emirates is...pointless conversation I mumble to myself...Then an idea came to me...Ok but HUBBY is a US citizen I say..."Heyyyyyy thats great" he said with total jubilation...as if i just said Im married to the president....hmm ok..its either me or this guy is nuts....So I say ok, but how will this solve my problem of shipping to the Emigrates...where??? he asks on the other end of the phone...I mean the Emirates...sorry....
Oh Maam..I dunno...what are you doing at 12??? maybe you can pass by and discuss the problem...Well needless to say I did infact go and see Mr Mailman who for some odd reason or another was quite excited when I told him Im the Brit who aint allowed to ship my stuff...He didnt really add much to the conversation we had earlier, except he was given a geography lesson on where the Emirates is....Oh well, atleast someone benefited...So less than 3 weeks to go and I have no clue how to get my stuff mailed....Im kinda bummed out...
A strange phenomena with this US citizenship as well...CAC cards or DOD cards as theyre called, now mine has expired 5 months ago..I was since told that they are still valid until March...Come March and I was told that I can fill out a form and request another one...filled the form, waited a week, then went to the palace to get my supposedly new badge...Ofcourse since I was kicked out of the palace the first week I arrived here (long story)...I did not possess an EMbassy Badge to get into the palace...so naturally i had to be escorted in...with my mobile phone, thumb drive confiscated at the door...got searched by a young Iraqi girl and then my escort was told not to leave me wandering about alone..AS IF...geez....
anyways we enter the palace...which as everyone knows used to be one of Saddam's lavish palaces, that is now being used as offices and what have you...I wait in line for the badging person to see me...After a wait of 45 mins...My turn comes...I go in...give her my last name...she gets the file out and tells me, oh sorry miss, but you cant have one...Why??? I ask...Cuz you aint a US citizen....UGGGHHHHHH...I was ready to explode...I said I know I aint a US citizen but Im a British citizen...Which in part should give me the same darn privilages you have since we got into this war as coalition forces....I was fuming at that time...Sorry miss but these are the rules...We got orders that we cannot issue CAC/DOD cards to non US citizens....
I again use the trump card I have..ok how about if my husband is US...will that make me eligible???No maam, but are you a resident of the US...No I splurt out...So no maam she shakes her head, Im sorry...GRRRRRRRR.....I walk back into the hallway...ask my escort to give me her phone...I call my supervisor and started shouting at him...YUP i had totally lost it....They probably cant wait to see me go....My supervisor tells me to calm down and that he will see into it...hmm..yeah right...see into what...I get escorted...i get searched...i have my phone and memory stick confiscated..I waste 45 mins of my time waiting and you tell me i will look into it...
I go back to the office pouting...I then get an email..actually an all hands email from my supervisor telling us that "TCN's (Third country nationals) are now not eligible for CAC cards...TCNs????OMG OMG OMG....lol...He sits right behind me...so once I got the email and read these words...I couldnt resist but say hey you know...Next time you guys think of a war somewhere in this world...I will make sure my TCN prime minister wont agree to it...so hence my nickname "the TCN"....oh well...Now I know how it feels for the Iraqis to be searched and probed when they come to work everyday....they must really hate us(Iraqi expats) to just pass the line without waiting...They cant have take outs from the DFAC...They cant carry drinks...Darn they cant do anything in their own country...no wander sometimes I feel they look at us with envy....
Oh well...So now HUBBY teases me all the time for being a TCN...and tells me "See I told you lets work on your green card application...but you refused...now you are just a TCN..." I think I need to strangle someone....ggrrrrr....So LTC H...Neurotic Iraqi Wife has become a TCN...Why did the Brits get into this unplanned war again???Can someone please remind me....I think Id rather be an Iraqi Associate than a TCN if u ask me...At first Iraqis were called Local Nationals, then for some reason or another, someone found that offensive so it got changed to Iraqi Associates…Im Iraqi, who lived in the Emigrates for sometime..then moved to London for more time…Got a British citizenship….Got married to a US who is also an Iraqi..What does that make me???An Alien roaming the Green Zone…
Say that again the guy mumbles...The Emirates..The UAE...Oh wheres that the guys asks...hmm, now what am I supposed to tell this man, who first tells me I have to be US then tells me he has no clue of where the Emirates is...pointless conversation I mumble to myself...Then an idea came to me...Ok but HUBBY is a US citizen I say..."Heyyyyyy thats great" he said with total jubilation...as if i just said Im married to the president....hmm ok..its either me or this guy is nuts....So I say ok, but how will this solve my problem of shipping to the Emigrates...where??? he asks on the other end of the phone...I mean the Emirates...sorry....
Oh Maam..I dunno...what are you doing at 12??? maybe you can pass by and discuss the problem...Well needless to say I did infact go and see Mr Mailman who for some odd reason or another was quite excited when I told him Im the Brit who aint allowed to ship my stuff...He didnt really add much to the conversation we had earlier, except he was given a geography lesson on where the Emirates is....Oh well, atleast someone benefited...So less than 3 weeks to go and I have no clue how to get my stuff mailed....Im kinda bummed out...
A strange phenomena with this US citizenship as well...CAC cards or DOD cards as theyre called, now mine has expired 5 months ago..I was since told that they are still valid until March...Come March and I was told that I can fill out a form and request another one...filled the form, waited a week, then went to the palace to get my supposedly new badge...Ofcourse since I was kicked out of the palace the first week I arrived here (long story)...I did not possess an EMbassy Badge to get into the palace...so naturally i had to be escorted in...with my mobile phone, thumb drive confiscated at the door...got searched by a young Iraqi girl and then my escort was told not to leave me wandering about alone..AS IF...geez....
anyways we enter the palace...which as everyone knows used to be one of Saddam's lavish palaces, that is now being used as offices and what have you...I wait in line for the badging person to see me...After a wait of 45 mins...My turn comes...I go in...give her my last name...she gets the file out and tells me, oh sorry miss, but you cant have one...Why??? I ask...Cuz you aint a US citizen....UGGGHHHHHH...I was ready to explode...I said I know I aint a US citizen but Im a British citizen...Which in part should give me the same darn privilages you have since we got into this war as coalition forces....I was fuming at that time...Sorry miss but these are the rules...We got orders that we cannot issue CAC/DOD cards to non US citizens....
I again use the trump card I have..ok how about if my husband is US...will that make me eligible???No maam, but are you a resident of the US...No I splurt out...So no maam she shakes her head, Im sorry...GRRRRRRRR.....I walk back into the hallway...ask my escort to give me her phone...I call my supervisor and started shouting at him...YUP i had totally lost it....They probably cant wait to see me go....My supervisor tells me to calm down and that he will see into it...hmm..yeah right...see into what...I get escorted...i get searched...i have my phone and memory stick confiscated..I waste 45 mins of my time waiting and you tell me i will look into it...
I go back to the office pouting...I then get an email..actually an all hands email from my supervisor telling us that "TCN's (Third country nationals) are now not eligible for CAC cards...TCNs????OMG OMG OMG....lol...He sits right behind me...so once I got the email and read these words...I couldnt resist but say hey you know...Next time you guys think of a war somewhere in this world...I will make sure my TCN prime minister wont agree to it...so hence my nickname "the TCN"....oh well...Now I know how it feels for the Iraqis to be searched and probed when they come to work everyday....they must really hate us(Iraqi expats) to just pass the line without waiting...They cant have take outs from the DFAC...They cant carry drinks...Darn they cant do anything in their own country...no wander sometimes I feel they look at us with envy....
Oh well...So now HUBBY teases me all the time for being a TCN...and tells me "See I told you lets work on your green card application...but you refused...now you are just a TCN..." I think I need to strangle someone....ggrrrrr....So LTC H...Neurotic Iraqi Wife has become a TCN...Why did the Brits get into this unplanned war again???Can someone please remind me....I think Id rather be an Iraqi Associate than a TCN if u ask me...At first Iraqis were called Local Nationals, then for some reason or another, someone found that offensive so it got changed to Iraqi Associates…Im Iraqi, who lived in the Emigrates for sometime..then moved to London for more time…Got a British citizenship….Got married to a US who is also an Iraqi..What does that make me???An Alien roaming the Green Zone…
3 Comments:
Maybe it is still too early to ask this question, but I'll try:
Knowing everything you know now, do you think the US-led invasion in March 2003 was right or wrong?
All the while.....there are people, real flesh and blood, putting their lives on the line, every day, for your nation. Ok, the whining has been decent schtick for awhile, but it gets old.
All people suffer and your suffering is real, but it is not special or unique. That is human life. I'm sorry to hear what you have had to go through just like I'm sorry about everybody's problems.
And note how the anon. above is trying to egg you on? That is the kind of person you are attracting. Sheesh.
I didn’t get how they realized that England is a TCN!
I have lived in the USA and now I’m living in Switzerland for some while. I’m from Brasil and since I got out of what people use to call TCN I have had the worse quality life ever. I moved to purse a PhD, everything paid by my country. I never humiliated myself to get anything from this FCN and I never will.
I’m very proud of being a Brazilian and I thank God every day for being a Brazilian. In fact, I thank God every day for being a Woman-Latin-South America-Brazilian.
I think that even Iraq people who never left the country are also expatriates, since they are not living in their country anymore. It “seems” that Iraq is a USA territory for sure, giving its population no rights about anything anymore!
I'm really sorry for all those troubles you are going through!
Post a Comment
<< Home