HA Mission: Conducting the Mission

When we came to the village we setup to support distribution of clothes, personal hygiene items, and toys for one thousand of the local Iraqis. As soon as we arrived Iraqis of all ages came toward the school to see what was going on. While we wanted to interact with them, we had to ensure security of our vehicles and personnel as a number one priority.

Above is a picture of when we are approaching the school, the security forces there are the Iraqi Highway Patrol, they held positions outside as well as crowd control in the building. Below is a picture of me helping to hand out clothes to the locals. At times we had to control how much stuff they took because they just wouldn't stop - and it can cause some problems within the community if it looks like one family was favored over another.

Below is a picture of the Iraqis in and around the distribution line, typically the Iraqis wearing black and white or red and white checkered head dresses were local officials such as the City Council.

This experience was tremendously rewarding for me. It really showed and let me experience a culture that I would never otherwise even fathomed. The people were very nice and appreciative to us and to what we were doing to help out their people.