After spending a large part of yesterday trying to convince the M4 satellite phone to work so I could download some email, I gave up in disgust. Time for plan B. I'd heard about an internet café down town, time to go and find it.
Don't go out after dark! Ooops! A late night journey through the lawless city: Ali, my driver, who speaks no English, guides his ageing Lincoln through the organic chaos of the city's modern roads, ripped up and aged by bombs and tanks. His eyes dart everywhere, and while his ominous presence breeds a certain security his obvious discomfort does not.
No road rage here, just practical and tacit agreement on the new rules of the unregulated road.
The Baghdad Internet Café: a shining technological oasis in the burnt out desert of Baghdad's once 'swanky' main shopping street. Cyberspace knows no bounds. Business men, journalist and soldiers are all drawn to this place with an unpronounceable name, an instant high speed satellite link with the outside world. And only $4 per hour.
As I sit and wait for my turn at one of the makeshift plywood cubicles, the soldier in number 5, directly opposite me, stands up to leave. On goes the helmet and the flak jacket and crashing down goes the gun, knocked from its cradle as he turns. It lands with a crack, pointing at me. No good! For an instant I wonder if he's remembered to put the safety catch on. And then I wonder if machine guns have a safety catch?
Seeing the look on my face he shrugs apologetically. "Where ya from, England?" "No, Scotland" I spit my customary and rather childish response. Again, he's 19 and from 'down south'. Nineteen, wasn't that the average age of the soldiers who died in Vietnam?
Just checking in with his girlfriend, who he hasn't seen in four months and won't see for another two, a nervous log on in anticipation of a digital "Dear John." Seems his relationship has survived to fight another day. He proudly tells of his part in the 'fall of Baghdad', more of a stumble really. He came to fight, but has spent most of his tour watching his comrades die in the peace. Not for the first time on this trip I feel sorry for the soldiers.
We live under a curfew here, between 11 pm and 4 am, not that they had to tell me that, I'm staying in the hotel, safely behind our AK-47 armed guards on the entrance. It's a kinda cool place, not the westernised luxury that most of the big media are in, but a small friendly family affair.
The quiet of night is punctuated by the crunch of tanks hurtling down the highway and bullets piercing the dark silent sky. Spooky. Watching from the window, the tanks stop just 30 meters from the hotel, decanting their heavily armed troops. The soldiers are looking for someone, hope it's not me! They search all around our hotel, as I watch in the darkness trying not to move. Gunshots ring out and the soldiers regroup and leave. I've no idea what it was all about and don't find out until morning that last night's entertainment left two people dead.
At times you forget the danger, at times you fear it.