Inspector Rex:

It might be the worst television show ever made, but apparently it's controversial.

To murmur name upon name:

A common thing, to repeat the names of the dead with no other commentary. It has been part of the grieving ritual in Ireland for thousands of years. More recently it is the basis for the Vietnam Wall, for tributes to September 11 victims, for anti-war protests. Names have power.

So on this Memorial Day, say the names of a few of the 3728 coalition soldiers, marines, airmen, and sailors who have died fighting in Iraq. Whether or not you believe in what they are fighting for, their deaths are a tragedy. I will say the names of the Atlantans myself: Jamaal Addison, Tyler Brown, George Draughn, Jesus Fonseca, Carl Fuller, Stephen Johnson, Kun Kim, Victor Langarica, Lonnie Parson, Richard Quill, Diego Rincon, Paul Saylor, Jonathan Shields, Jonathan Smith, Bennie Washington, Donovan Watts.

A diving weekend:

I celebrated this Memorial Day weekend by going back down to the coast to do my advanced open water dive course. It was a good weekend, though exhausting.

The diving Saturday was pretty ordinary, my ears were playing up on the first dive (Underwater Navigation, actually using a compass accurately under water is really hard), the second, a Search and Recovery dive, was a comedy of errors (ten divers + a rope + a "missing" spanner that was picked up by one of the DMs after about two minutes = comedy gold), and the visibility on the night dive was pretty shit, though we did see some pretty neat fish at the end of the dive and I really liked diving in the dark.

But Sunday more than made up for that. We dived the two tugs out of Eden, the Tasman Hauler and the Henry Bolte. Both were sunk about 20 years ago, but the Tasman Hauler has stayed more or less intact over the years. It's just added a layer of barnacles and lots of fish life. The Henry Bolte has mostly pancaked in aft of the superstructure, so it's kind of like the Tasman Hauler has been dissected. They are both deeper than I'd ever been before, which a bit surprisingly made things like maintaining buoyancy easier. I didn't really feel narked, unfortunately, though my buddy did give me a hug (I think she was just cold). Saw a giant blue groper and lots of fish I couldn't identify and just looking at the wrecks was really cool.

I'm working on planning my next few dives. I'm hoping to go to Eden again the week after I get back from the States and then to Perth in July if everyone OKs my leave. Dive Rotto and hopefully Albany, though a lot of the dive operators seem to shut down in the winter. Then maybe a seal dive out of Montague in mid July... So many plans.

Football + smoke detector randomness:

It's time for the State of Origin series of rugby games, played between Queensland and NSW. I'm going to go watch it with some Queenslanders, so apparently I am not to wear blue. I think I personally prefer AFL to rugby, mostly because the guys are hotter and actually have necks (what? I never claimed not to be shallow). But this should be entertaining. Must go buy beer though.

Also, a couple of guys from the Embassy came out Monday to install more smoke detectors in my apartment. Now I have five for my three bedroom apartment. Monday afternoon when I came home, one of the new ones was going off. After a bit of a struggle, I gave up and took the battery out. I figured that four smoke detectors was sufficient. Only Tuesday at work I got a call from my contact at the Embassy about the beeping in my apartment. So the guy ended up coming back out and giving me another one.

My question is, how did they know? Maybe these aren't really smoke detectors at all... Just a theory.

Directed assignments:

I can't be bothered to drag out the link here, but I read that the State Department is considering using directed assignments for hazardous duty locations. While I don't think this is necessarily a bad idea, I think that the fact that directed assignments are required is a symptom of what's wrong with the US Foreign Service.

I've read somewhere that the US has fewer foreign service officers than Australia, despite having more than ten times the population (and probably more than that in international influence...I kid because I love!). The American Foreign Service is insanely competitive largely as a result of the small number of positions. The State Department tends to weight experience very highly in this process, and it indirectly seems to favor people who've been with other government agencies.

Nothing wrong with this, I guess, except that it brings in people who are risk-averse, who are precisely the sort of people who won't choose that posting as a consular officer in Baghdad. Add this to a much older population of FSOs than the equivalent in most other countries (in the UK and Aus, it's pretty much a job that most people start fresh out of uni, whereas in the US, the average age of a new FSO is upwards of 30), and you get a problem filling the dangerous positions.

I personally know many people who have volunteered for hazardous duty locations, for time periods from two weeks to two years. All of these people have something in common: they don't have any kids. A guy I know told me he would have been willing to go to Iraq up until the moment that his wife got pregnant with their daughter. And this is a totally reasonable position in my opinion. Beyond the obvious of "what would my family do if I got killed?" there's also the fact that families, for obvious reasons, do not accompany the employee to a hazardous duty post. That's an awful lot of time away from your child.

I learned a few weeks ago that technically I serve anywhere in the world at the direction of my way up the chain boss. That means that legally they can direct me to go anywhere, and, after I take my home leave, I can't even quit to avoid the assignment (without paying the government a large sum of money). However, my job hasn't had to invoke this yet because there have been enough volunteers for the positions.

If I were Secretary of State, I'd start by begging Congress for money to expand the Foreign Service. If that failed, I would change the hiring to weight more highly people who've lived overseas (and not just people who studied in Europe). I would do less recruiting from government agencies and more from NGOs. I'd make it worthwhile, both during the post and afterwards, for people to choose to take the postings. I'd make it very difficult to get promoted unless you had taken a hazardous duty posting and I'd make damn sure anyone sent out on them was appropriately trained in the language and culture of the country. And, if necessary, I would use directed assignments to bring experienced people to hardship posts.

I'd also work on changing the culture that makes it much easier to get promoted if one is in Washington than in the field, so that my bright new risk-takers that I am bringing in won't get disillusioned TOO fast, but that's another post.

The State Department is changing their hiring and assignment processes now, though I have little hope that it will change the fundamental culture, and that's too bad.

*Note-- I am not a foreign service officer, but I have worked as a US government employee at two embassies. For a junior FSOs perspective, see this old, but in my opinion not outdated at all, article.
** Here's a link about directed assignments. I do not think what they are currently doing is the right way to go about the problem either and I sort of resent the thing about the money. People do these things for a variety of reasons, but the money can help compensate you for losing a year with your family, for sharing a room with 4 other people who are on different shifts from you, for all sorts of things that it's reasonable to expect compensation for.

Hazing:

We are getting a new employee next week. One of my coworkers is planning the hazing...er, introduction to the team. We have a memorial wall (of nameplates of people who have left the team), and I'm going to pick up some fake flowers to add to the ambiance. I think we're going to claim that they never found the body of one of them, and that our boss threw the other out the window.

Breach has also inspired us to suggest Mass as a team-building activity. I think we need to find the early morning Latin Mass that's sure to exist in Canberra.

Security clearance decisions:

I find this website absolutely fascinating. It's a list of decisions made about whether to grant DoD security clearances to contractors who raised some red flags during the initial process. The number of people who applied for a security clearance while not having filed their taxes is mind-blowing. I'm not sure whether anybody is prosecuted for this (or for lying on the form, which is a felony).

It seems that finances are the most likely disqualifying factor, with foreign influence or personal conduct (usually lying on the form) in second, and things like drug use or criminal conduct a distant third.

Maybe it's just the way that they are written, but they usually seem to get the decision right, also, which is nice to see.

Being an expat:

So one thing about being an expat is that you have a built-in group of people who will hang out with you because you have the virtue of having a passport in common. And mostly I like expats. These are people who share something else in common with me: a willingness to move halfway around the world and to agree to move somewhere else in a few year's time. Most expats are wanderers at heart, as I seem to be, people who get impatient at being in one place for very long.

In a place like Australia, obviously, the expat support network is not really necessary. I work with Australians and mostly hang out with Australians.

In the past week, Americans have caught me referring to a car park, arvos, and the lift, and, horror of horrors, I asked someone how they were going the other day.

I think I need to start spending a little more time with Americans.

Back in the US:

Most of you know this already, but I will be back in the US for a week mid June (I'll be there June 9 - 16). I'll only make it to the Baltimore Washington area, but I'd love to see everyone who can make it. Otherwise, at least send me your current number and I will call when I'm in a more reasonable time zone. My extension has been approved, so I will be here through probably the end of March 2008.

In other news, I'm thinking of joining the water polo team and should be going hiking this weekend. Why I start all this stuff at the beginning of winter is a little unclear.

Some days are harder than others:

I started to write a Mother's Day card for my mother today, it being that time of the year and all that. I wrote that I wished I could be there to take her out to brunch. And then I started to cry.

Jenny would always have done that before. I've been living away from home for quite a few Mother's Days now, so I would call and Jenny would take her out for brunch or lunch. I feel so guilty that I can't be there now, though my brother will hopefully be able to spend Mother's Day with my mom.

And that's how it goes. Most of the time you're OK, you can go through weeks without it being a big deal, and then something seemingly unrelated hits you, and it's like it just happened yesterday. Like I just got off the phone with my mother that morning, and this is the first wave of pain rather than the hundredth of the thousandth or whatever it is.