Aliza Nadi, Bahrain

There’s so much I want to write, but it hasn’t been easy till now.  I guess that’s what happens when you’re in a location for no more than 2 days, and filming is at the top of your list. 

And there’s so much we want to capture on film, to bring back home, to show everyone in the states. 

There are so many stories you want to tell, because the ones telling them deserve it, and the ones back home need to hear it.  You start feeling like crap when you have to pick and choose when you want your camera on, when you want it off.  It’ll be worse when we’re in that edit room, deciding who’ll make the final cut. 

I can write more from Bahrain, because it was decided that we couldn’t film in the country.  The Navy base told us about the country’s strict regulations, that there’s no freedom of press, that we can’t even film the beautiful aquamarine coastline.  On the base itself, there was about a small courtyard that we were restricted to film in.  That’s where the band was playing. 

The base here is the most atypical so far.  For one thing, it has grass, lots of it.  You feel like you’re on a bustling college campus.  And the PX is about half the size of Walmart.  There’s plenty of folks in civilian clothes, and there’s a packed parking lot.  Apparently, many live off-base.  Two camels, Jamilah and Aziza, sit right at the entry, for folks to take pictures with, and even go on a short ride. 

Outside the base, Americans are milling about, eating in the restaurants and dancing in the clubs. The sun is unrelenting.  Teenagers drive their BMWs and burn rubber on the main streets.  Bahrain was one of the sites I was really looking forward to, but it’s not exactly what I was expecting.  Sure it’s fun and relatively liberal, but all these restrictions have been disheartening.  I miss Djibouti the most, surprisingly.  But I didn’t realize it then.  I was having breakfast with Najlae and Aaron the morning before we left in the Bob Hope Chow Hall.  "Our two days here in Djibouti feel like an eternity," I told them.  I realized I sounded like a jerk when I found out the airforce captain across from me was deployed for 1 year.  And I realize it was pretty cool, because the people and the comradery made it worthwhile.

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