Jun 17 2008
Gift from Riza in Dahuk
On COL Pfenning’s last visit, we spent some time in Dahuk. I love visiting my office in Dahuk because I get to spend some time with Gee. He took care of me when I first arrived in Mosul last year and became a quick friend. Another fun part about spending time in Dahuk is interacting with Riza. I’ve mentioned him before, but in case you forgot, Riza owns the company (Riza Company) that provides the life support services for my office in Dahuk. He rents the house for the offices and living space, provides the cook, meets the security guard requirments, and everything else it takes to support the Dahuk office.
If Riza hears that I am in town, he will always stop by the office and insist that I go out to dinner with him. We almost always go to the Malta Restaurant in Dahuk. As with many other cultures, the Kurdish people love to give gifts. When I lived in Seoul, South Korea, I had to be careful about saying I liked something I saw. If Worker, my landlord, heard, he would buy whatever it was for me as a present. He would not allow me to refuse, and if I reciprocated, he would give me athank you gift for giving him a thank you gift.
Roza heard that this was COL Pfenning’s last visit to Dahuk, so he wanted to give him a gift. As we were standing in the office after dinner, I told COL Pfenning that he was getting a gift from Riza. COL Pfenning tried to decline, but soon came to realize that Riza is persistent. Fortunately, Riza did not want to give anything that violated any ethics regulations. But since Riza was giving a gift to COL Pfenning, he decied that he need to give a gift to CSM Seitner and me as well.
As I went up to get my present from Riza, I gave him a big hug, which he was not expecting. He smiled and laughed. Then I had him move him pistol from the back to the front for the dramatic effect in the picture. As you can see, the gift was a small rug decorated with the Kurdish Flag.
The Thunder Run has linked to this post in the blog post From the Front: 06/17/2008 News and Personal dispatches from the front lines.
Riza seems proud of his country and of his relationship with the U.S. Army and yourself. Great job building goodwill in the community. I’m also impressed with your attention to detail re:gift size rules. In H.S. I remember dining at the home of my girlfriend from H.S. thru Cow year(not sure how much I talked about her) and her Dad describing his job as “wining and dining Military Officers and finding out what they want.” His employer was later hit with very serious ethics penalties. My ex-GF apparently decided to play for the other team; Google thinks she’s a field-grade Army JAG officer. So the moral is the kids are watching.