A Most Memorable Christmas!

But talking about Somalia for Christmas, again I was there as advance party so there wasn’t a lot of us there, the whole regiment hadn’t deployed. Most of the regiment was deploying after Christmas. We did have a padre there, a priest. And we held a Christmas service in the desert in Somalia. A tree was flown in, I believe the tree came from Norway, the “Herc” brought it in and it was decorated with chem, what we call chem glows, the little sticks that you snap and shake and they light up at night. And it was decorated like that and we all stood around the tree and it was dark. And there was, of course, no light pollution there at all and so when we say dark, I am saying dark. It was pitch black. And the stars were shining and the tree was lit and the padre said his Christmas mass and to this day I would say it was the most moving Christmas I have ever had in my life. I still get a little emotional thinking about it. It was something, there was almost something mystical about being there and celebrating Christmas and the connection to the first Christmas. As corny as that may sound, you know, in the middle of the desert, not in the middle of snow and it was quite moving. It gave you an opportunity to reflect on what you were doing and what was really on the line and how important all of that sort of ties in. It’s still something I talk about all the time when people talk about what was the most memorable Christmas in my life. Curiously it was not with my family, it was out in the middle of the desert in Somalia at night with a handful of soldiers.