DiploJournal
Flag Day
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Early start this morning as we get underway, trying to keep our focus for the morning sessions while battling the temptation for minds to wander to this afternoon’s flag day ceremony. The assignments will be randomized so there is no way to know when a flag will be presented with my name attached. All we know is that we go into the room this afternoon and will come out an hour or two later knowing our first posts and our post-December 7 training schedules. We will know a lot more than we do this morning with, no doubt, many more specific questions.
There are some with palpable apprehension about flag day. For me, there are certainly some posts I’d rather receive than others, but overall I’m just excited to know where I’ll spend the next 1-2 years. I’ve done some research on the dozen or so posts I rated high on my list, but have intentionally not obsessed about it knowing there will be plenty of time to uncover details after I receive the assignment.
I started a pool for the least desirable post. The pool stands at $250, a small reward for taking one for the team. In a close race, the 50 participants voted Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, over Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea (this South Pacific post sounds fantastic until you get a sense of the high crime rate and the restrictions on movement of Embassy personnel). The cash will be a small consolation for those that that have the toughest known challenge ahead. With world events constantly in a state of flux, I suppose there is also some comfort in knowing that the biggest challenge will come in some unforeseen place whether by coup, natural disaster, or other event.
Best of luck to everyone in the 149th — I hope we all receive a high bid post. For those that draw Juarez, I’ll see you at the bar tonight.
I’ll update tonight with my post assignment.
Tags: A-100, flag day, Foreign Service, FSO, Washington D.C., Washington DC
Composure Under Fire
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Nope. No AK-47s or simulated explosions. We’re in the middle of skill rotation week. Rather than finding ourselves in a large classroom, we have been broken up into small groups to learn, internalize, and practice in front of a crowd a set of diploskills. My first session bright and early this morning focused on answering questions in a variety of settings: press briefings, social events, presentations, cocktail parties, etc. Essentially everywhere we go, we are expected to handle questions on a variety of topics, always keeping in mind that we are speaking on behalf of the United States.
We are a pretty social group. Discussion, debate, and argument for sport come naturally for most of us. Thus, this session was a lot of fun, albeit not easy. Learning how and when to say “I can’t answer that” or “I don’t know” is tougher than it looks. As I was answering questions on Colombia human rights violations and U.S. humanitarian aid to Sudan, I thought about all of those West Wing episodes during which CJ made it look so easy. At times, I felt more like Josh trying to walk back the President’s secret plan for inflation:
We all survived, composure more or less intact, but it was a challenge.
Veterans Day
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For most of the country, Veterans Day is a pre-Thanksgiving shopping holiday. No matter what your politics, however, spending the day at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial will make you forget all about the Wall-mart, Target, and Sears bargains.
For many of the hundreds gathered on a gray, rainy morning, Veterans Day is an excuse to make an annual pilgrimage to meet with their brothers in arms and salute the fallen. There is little celebration. It is a somber remembrance of an ordeal they survived together: an ordeal those of us lucky enough to be of an age that required no such sacrifice cannot begin to understand. It was striking to see this group — made immortally 18-24 by Hollywood — has aged into their 60s. Those looking for a name amongst the 58,261 inscribed on the wall included not just spouses and children, but adult grandchildren.
The poor weather seemed the perfect accompaniment to the mood. After some speeches, the honor guard played taps, and the crowd dispersed. Some sought to find comrades on the wall, while others filed slowly up the path. As I worked my way through the crowd, stopping every once in awhile to make a photo, I heard countless murmurs of “see you next year.”
Half oriented
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With tomorrow off for a mid-week Veteran’s Day break, the 149th has officially completed 1/2 of the A-100 orientation course. Never have I felt more taxed by an 8:30 to 4:30ish schedule. I confess to not quite understanding why it’s has been so tiring, but I’m confident I’m not alone. Perhaps I am just out-of-practice. I haven’t been in a regular classroom setting since the first half of 1992 (and let’s face it, the last semester of law school did not involve that much classroom time).
Each day has had a completely different schedule so the time definitely doesn’t crawl. After announcements and a quick overview of the day’s agenda at 8:30 sharp, we typically cover 2 or 3 topics before lunch, and then another 2 or 3 topics in the afternoon. Often we will have 15 minutes to grab something to eat before a “brown bag” lunch discussion with a visiting dignitary.
The class segments cover a wide range of issues, from procedural (e.g., how to submit travel and per diem vouchers) to substantive (e.g., 18th and 19th century diplomatic history). With very few exceptions, the segments have been interesting and well-presented by an energetic staff. In addition to the orientation staff, we hear from an ever-changing cast of guest speakers including Ambassadors, Assistant Secretaries, specialists, and historians.
It’s been great stuff, but a lot of sitting and listening in an exceedingly crowded room. With the diplomatic hiring surge, the limitation for our class size does not come from the State Department budget or a dearth of qualified candidates. Rather, it’s the room’s fire code restriction that limits the number of new officers.
I find myself taking notes for no reason other than to force myself to stay 100% engaged. Although there are no tests or quizzes, note-taking precludes my mind from wandering to my bid list, what my kids are doing, or what I should do for dinner. By the end of the day, I’m done. That is, until it’s time to meet everyone at a bar for happy hour, or some other event. I’ve hit about half of the social committee’s events so far, typically those on a Friday night and/or close by my apartment.
The 149th is an impressive group and I’m looking forward to hearing about everyone’s exploits for years to come. In the meantime, we are counting the days until Flag Day on Nov. 23rd.
Tags: A-100, ELO, entry level, foreign service institute, FSI, state department, training
Rainy Week-end
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It’s been great to have some time this week-end to take a breath. The apartment is now in good shape after an expensive trip to Bed, Bath & Beyond, The Container Store, and the grocery store. My 250-pound air shipment arrived on Wednesday so I have all my clothes and even pictures of the family and art up on the walls to make it feel a little more like home-away-from-home. After a packed schedule of classes and first-post research during week one of A-100, it was great to have drinks with some of the class at a Friday night happy hour. I’m looking forward to getting to know people through more of those informal get-togethers.
The weather has not been great this week-end, so I’ve been holed up, knocking down some of the key items on my task list:
– Reading for next week’s class
– Researching various posts on our bid list
– Preparing my first reimbursement voucher
– Set up the home office with a new printer/scanner
– Laundry / Clean the apartment
–Misc. Paperwork
I also actually got my lazy butt to the gym which is all the way downstairs. No excuses left to avoid a regular gym routine.
A-100
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Things have been crazy busy with the first week of A-100. I have now taken the oath of office and proudly walk the halls of the Foreign Service Institute with brand spanking new State Dept ID badge. I’m afraid my entries, however, are going to get much less interesting for the foreign service crowd. Details about A-100, classes, bid lists, the bidding process, etc. are all pretty sensitive. I’m going to take the conservative approach and not talk about any of it publicly. I can say that the big dates are set:
November 23rd: Flag Day at which we will each receive our first post assignments
December 4th: Formal swearing in at Main State
I’ll post my onward assignment on the 23rd. Until then, some sporadic posts on other topics.
Road Trip, Day 5: South Bend, IN to Arlington, VA
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Somewhere over the Sierras, driving through snow, I started thinking that I should front load the trip so that I could relax the last two days with maybe only 5 hours of day of driving rather than 8-10. Even with the bad weather, the plan would have worked out just fine. I slept ’till 10:30 am on Friday, waking to more rain and a bunch of Boston College fans in the lobby preparing for their football game against Notre Dame. I did not have a difficult schedule or a specific goal in front of me other than stop somewhere in Pennsylvania.
Despite the bad weather and absurd toll roads, I made pretty good time. I have no problem paying for the right to use a highway, but $0.80 stretches broken up by toll booths with human beings making change and giving receipts seems ridiculously inefficient.
I came close a few times to getting a ticket, but the weather saved me (the silver lining of that black cloud following me cross-country). The first near-miss came in Nebraska as I zipped past an obvious speed trap. The traffic was sparce and I was probably 15 mph over the posted 70 speed limit. Once I saw the highway patrol car angled on the median, I eased on the brake. With the rain just pounding down, however, the patrolman didn’t budge. It was coming down so hard, he might not have gotten a good radar reading. Whether technology malfunction or lack of motivation, I lucked out.
The next one came in Ohio. Again, no doubt the weather gods helped out as I was plugging along around 90 mph when I caught sight of a highway patrol car coming up from behind. I slowed and moved over to the right lane, but he clearly got a good read on my speed. Instead of hitting the lights and siren, he pulled alongside as our wipers moved in synchronized high gear, and simply motioned to me to slow down. I gave him a knowing thumbs up and mouthed an exaggerated Thank You as he moved forward in his mission to keep traffic within the bounds of the legal limit while maintaining a spotlessly dry uniform.
Once in Ohio, the rest centers started showing Washington, DC and my ultimate destination on the map. Reprogramming the GPS to my condo address, the computer told me I’d be pulling into my parking spot around 9:00ish. That sounded much better than another rest stop motel so I pushed on.
Once on I-70, I figured I was in the home stretch. No more snow and even the rain had lightened up. I wouldn’t hit any commuter traffic on a Friday night after 8:00 pm. Cake.
Well, not exactly. As I crested a hill, I noticed my windshield was starting to fog up. I was surprised because after much experimentation over the past week, I found the optimum air conditioner settings to keep the windows clear and the cabin warm enough, even in the 25 degree weather of Western Wyoming. After blasting the defogger, I realized it was not an interior problem. Instead, I was heading into extremely thick fog that reminded me of the California Central Valley’s Tule fog. Traffic wasn’t packed, but in some ways that made it scarier. The fog came up very fast and I could only see one or two car lengths ahead of me.
I quickly hit the fog lights and the emergency flashers, slowing to about 25 mph. I felt like a complete wimp as a Honda Accord passed me quickly on the left. An immediate screech vindicated my caution as the Honda slammed on his brakes and swerved onto the shoulder to avoid hitting the car in front him. I was really rethinking the whole “let’s get home tonight” strategy, but there was nowhere to stop so I just kept driving and eventually came out of the fog unscathed.
I found my underground parking spot around 10:30 pm, and spent then next three hours unloading the car and putting things away in my new home away from home. I slept very well.
Final Stats for the road trip:
- 2900 miles (give or take)
- 580.1 miles per day
- 114.15 gallons of gas costing $348.04 (24.86 miles per gallon — not exactly a hybrid)
- Just under 2 gallons of black coffee (mostly the bad, see-through, kind)
- 7 sighted highway patrol cars, 0 tickets
- 2-1/2 books-on-ipod completed
- 5 blog entries
I promise no more weather descriptions at least until I get to my first foreign post.
Tags: Cross-country, Driving, fog, Foreign Service, FSOT, I-80, Indiana, Ohio, Road Trip, Travel, Virginia, Washington DC
Road Trip, Day 4: Lincoln, NE to South Bend, IN
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Another day of driving in the rain. After a long stretch, the corn and wheat fields of Nebraska and Iowa gave way to the tangle of highways outside of Chicago. I haven’t touched on food this trip because, frankly, the food available to I-80 travelers isn’t worth mentioning. America is facing an epidemic of obesity. Every truck stop, small town diner, and fast food joint I encountered on this trip made its own contribution to the collective hardened arteries. Hitting each of the three main food groups — fat, salt, and sugar — the available options turned meals into nothing more than 20-minute refueling sessions.
With that in mind, I’ve been looking forward to a stop in Chicago since Day 1 of this trek. It would have been much easier to bypass rainy rush hour Chicago traffic, but to do so would also require bypassing a world class meal (and a chance to catch up with my nieces and my sister-in-law). My brother-in-law, Bruce Sherman is Chef and Partner at North Pond Restaurant and it’s been several years since I’ve had the opportunity to visit.
I wish I’d taken better notes on the dishes that just started appearing, but safe to say, it was all amazing. After a delicious appetizer-sized amuse bouche and a glass of champagne, the first course involved a mix of Alaskan Spot Prawns and Smoked Rainbow Trout next to an Autumn Vegetable Confetti, on top of a Shrimp Bouillon. The first course I ordered fit the feel of the rainy evening perfectly: Sherried Roasted Kabocha Squash Soup, Goat Cheese-Parmesan Gnudi, Pancetta, Brown Butter, and Candied Pecans. There is nothing more comforting than a rich soup. I could have stopped there and been more than satisfied, but I avoided the roadside grease today specifically to ensure I’d have room come dinner.
For a main course, as much as the steak beckoned, I went with an intriguing Arugula-Cheese Crusted Bass Filet, Charred Fingerling Potatoes, Green Beans, Sweet Onion a la Plancha, and an accompanying Arugula Coulis. The bass just melted in each bite. A generous glass of white, paired by our server, fit perfectly. Although all the desserts looked great, I tried to resist, opting instead for a double espresso to fortify another couple of hours of post-dinner driving. Of course, the coffee arrived with figs done three ways: Caramelized Black Mission Figs, Honey-Cream Stuffed Kadota Figs, Lemon Pound Cake, Fig Sorbet, Pine Nuts. After an obligatory protest, I scraped the plate.
It was an amazing meal and really great to catch up with everyone. Having served in Haiti and India with CARE, my sister-in-law had some excellent advice over dinner. The in-law designation is just for factual accuracy. I’m so lucky to have acquired eight brothers and sisters when I married E a couple decades ago.
After dinner, a quick hug goodbye and I was back on the road. My plan was to bang out a quick 100 miles beyond Chicago to avoid the heavy morning rush hour traffic. I imagined light traffic and a clear, fast highway. There wasn’t the bumper-to-bumper traffic I’d experienced coming in to town, but it didn’t really matter. Rain coming down in sheets combined with lots of road work, narrowing several areas to one lane, and confusing my GPS to no end. Lots of white knuckling through Chicago and its outer burbs before Indiana and smoother sailing took hold.
I rolled up into South Bend, Indiana, home of the Notre Dame Fighting Irish (and more bad food). Having just crossed over the Eastern Time Zone, I hit a welcome bed around 2:30 am, figuring I’d sleep late, put in a moderate day of driving, and get in to DC by noon on Saturday.
Tags: Chicago, Cross-country, Food, Foreign Service, I-80, Indiana, Nebraska, North Pond, Road Trip, Travel
Road Trip, Day 3: Rawlins, WY to Lincoln, NE
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I consider myself an optimist, particularly of late. Given the state of the world, I think a healthy dose of optimism is a pre-requisite for a life in diplomacy. That said, I can say objectively that there is a very dark cloud following me. Literally.
The Weather Channel website provides a very useful interstate driving map and it seems all of the harsh weather predicted for I-80 tracks my progress precisely. Today, it was blowing snow and pretty dense fog as I crossed Wyoming. Clearing Cheyenne, the snow gave way to rain which followed my progress across Nebraska to Lincoln where the day ended. Having never been to Nebraska, I was amazed to see mile after mile of wheat. I just figured it’d all be corn given the namesake mascot for the University.
Lest anyone forget, Cornhusker football dominates Nebraskan culture this time of year. I flipped through the local stations on the radio and couldn’t get away from it. AM Radio: Jesus, Jesus, Sports, Oldies, and Jesus. The sports talk initially sounded promising until I realized that it was ignoring major league baseball playoffs, the full slate of NFL football games, hockey, and everything else but Cornhusker football and, specifically, a brewing quarterback controversy. FM Radio: Classical/NPR (from Wyoming), Country, 80s New Wave, Country, Classic Rock, and Country. News breaks talked of weather and the quarterback controversy. This while I’m driving past an exit for the Tom Osborne Expressway named after the infamous Cornhusker head coach.
Don’t get me wrong. I absolutely love sports. When shooting a college game from the sidelines, it is very easy for me to get caught up in the drama and emotion of the moment even if I have no connection to either team. I cried at the end of Rudy. I can’t shake the feeling, however, that I’m driving through an episode of Friday Night Lights.
Radio — at least for music — appears well on its way to obsolescence as a medium. Why listen to commercials interspersed with music you didn’t choose when you can craft your own commercial-free 20-hour playlists? For this sometimes tedious trip, I’ve been switching between various playlists that include a mix of rock/pop, hip hop, and R&B that span stay-awake classics from the Who, Rolling Stones, Elvis Costello, and George Thorogood to Black Star, Hieroglpyhics, and Mos Def to Grace Jones, Sly & the Family Stone, and Etta James with lots in between. So far, drowsiness has not been a problem.
I’ve also tried out the concept of audio books. I haven’t had a long commute in over a decade so I’ve never had the need before (other than a road trip to Los Angeles years ago during which we listened to the then-latest Harry Potter book). I went to the library and found two books on CD of interest: T.C. Boyle’s Talk Talk and Roddy Doyle’s Oh, Play That Thing.
I’ll leave the serious literary critiques to my eldest son who knows more about literary theory than I could ever hope to comprehend, but I really enjoyed Talk Talk. I’ve been a fan of T.C. Boyle’s after reading Tortilla Curtain and Budding Prospects. Talk Talk uses the same great ear for dialogue, both internal and external, and follows the events surrounding an identity theft nightmare encountered by a Southern California deaf woman and her boyfriend. Bouncing perspectives between the victims and the thief, Boyle builds a surprising amount of suspense as the protagonists collide at the end of the book. I was also pleasantly surprised to find one part of the book involving a cross-country driving trip that coincidentally followed my precise route. The audio book definitely helped my miles slip by quickly, particularly since Boyle did his own reading, complete with accents for various characters.
M will no doubt take me to task for something I’m missing, but I think Boyle’s downfall is his endings. While I thoroughly enjoyed all three books, I felt a bit disappointed when each of them ended. Not entirely satisfying for me, but not enough of a problem that I’m giving up on him. Tonight I downloaded Boyle’s Drop City from Audible.com to gobble up the last couple of days of driving.
Tags: Boyle, Cross-country, Foreign Service, FSOT, I-80, Nebraska, Road Trip, Talk Talk, TC Boyle, Travel, Wyoming
Road Trip, Day 2: Elko, NV to Rawlins, WY
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It’s so great to get comments and email from people who find this blog interesting, informative, and/or entertaining. I realized from one such message this morning that I provided no context for this road trip other than conversations with local friends and family. Sorry ’bout that. Here’s the belated explanation.
I start A-100 (essentially diplomatic boot camp) in Washington, DC (actually Arlington, VA) next Monday, October 26th. State provides extensive arrangements via individualized Travel Orders. Typically, this includes moving the candidates stuff via ground transport (up to 18,000 lbs.), storage for most of it, delivery of a small air shipment to the candidate’s temporary address in the DC area (necessities for the 4-12 months of training), and plane tickets. For those of us who cling to some romantic notion of a cross-country road-trip (i.e., masochists), State will also reimburse mileage plus expenses to drive one’s own car to DC.
I wanted to have my car in DC for a variety of reasons: easier commute, easier to visit my two sons in Philadelphia, PA and College Park, MD, allows me to bring more stuff to DC, and I didn’t have time to sell my car before departing. I love to drive and have never had the opportunity to do a true cross-country drive. One more thing to check off the bucket list.
With all the other things I had to do this past week, I didn’t get to pre-plan the trip as meticulously as I typically would. My family would be shocked to see there is no folder with details of each day’s expected progress, reservations for hotels, etc. That said, I did spend some time looking at a map and did a little research about routes. State uses Mapquest (didn’t know anyone still used Mapquest as opposed to Google Maps) to determine the reimbursable mileage: 2,884 miles from Palo Alto, CA to Washington, DC. In all of its bureaucratic wisdom, State determined that the trip should take 6-1/2 days assuming the government mandated 440 miles of progress per day.
I chose to take I-80 as it appears to be the most direct route and affords me the opportunity to see a few states I’ve never before visited. After leaving California over the Sierra-Nevada mountains (see yesterday’s entry), the route takes me through Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and then down to Maryland, DC, and Virginia. So far, so good. After two days, I’m just shy of 1,100 miles down.
Today’s driving took me past Salt Lake City and into Wyoming. The Utah Salt Flats leading up to the Great Salt Lake look very similar to Death Valley. Must be tough to maintain cars in this area with all the salt flying around.
The weather was mostly sunny with a little rain toward the end of the day that turned to snow just as I pulled into the hotel in Rawlins, WY. Wyoming has been, as expected, wide open spaces and canyons that look like Wile E. Coyote and his rocket sled will fly by around each turn. This was the main route for both the Pony Express and the Mormon Pioneer Trail.
I have to say, I-80 has been fantastic. I’m used to Northern California freeway driving: three or four lanes in each direction with way too much traffic and drivers who refuse to follow basic etiquette: if you are not passing the lane immediately to your right, you are in the wrong lane. Traffic on I-80 East has been really moderate. It’s been mostly big trucks and RVs. So far, it has been a completely divided highway (you can see the parallel Westbound I-80, but it’s a good 40 yards+ away separated by walls and usually a lot of scrub land). The posted speed limit in Nevada and Wyoming has been 75 mph which means I can drive very safely between 80 and 90. Best of all, what traffic there is tends to stay in the right hand lane unless passing. I have yet to see a Highway Patrol car or speed trap. I’m making good time as it is so I don’t feel the need to push it into triple-digit speeds. At least not very often.
Keep the messages and comments coming…
Tags: Cross-country, Foreign Service, FSOT, I-80, Nevada, Road Trip, Travel, Wyoming
