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Top 10 things I can’t wait to do on my break from Baghdad

1. Catch up with my long-suffering fiancé
2. Eat a salmon and cream cheese bagel from Brick Lane (I really wanted to put this first but figured my boyfriend might complain)
3. See my mum, dad, sister, two brothers and my gran
4. Hook up with my friends over several glasses of wine/beer/anything alcoholic
5. Take a walk outdoors (it is too dangerous to walk pretty much anywhere in Baghdad)
6. Drive down a street without worrying about car bombs, roadside bombs or being kidnapped
7. Speak on a phone that is not crackly and does not cut out every second word
8. Live in a flat where the electricity works constantly (in Baghdad blackouts are so frequent that the few people lucky enough to have power don’t flinch anymore)
9. Brush my teeth with tap water rather than bottled water (this is what you are supposed to do in Iraq because the tap water - when it works - is filthy. Sadly I sometimes forget only to suffer hideous stomach cramps afterwards)
10. Use a hairdryer, wear high-heeled shoes and watch some decent television (not in any particular order)

Despite looking forward to all of the above I could not help feeling guilty about the ease with which I am able to travel in and out of Baghdad on my British passport compared with most Iraqis.
I don’t think twice about jumping on a plane and heading home to London. To them, however, such a journey remains an impossible dream.

(Picture (from left to right): Ruth, me, Louise and Charlotte having drinks in London last time I was home)

Stopped in Baghdad by masked gunmen

Wearing balaclavas and beige flak jackets, five gunmen marched in a line across the street I was travelling down in central Baghdad and trained their weapons on the approaching traffic to make the vehicles stop.
My feet went all tingly with fear – I’m not sure if this is a normal response to a scary situation but that is how my body reacts – and I yelled at the driver of my car to hit the brakes.
There was only one rather small car between me and these thugs, who turned out to be an Iraqi team of private security guards acting with impunity (as they so often do), rather than insurgents hunting for foreigners (as my feet had initially presumed).
This particular group was closing the road to allow a convoy of vehicles, carrying their politician or business tycoon boss, to pass with ease from a side street.
The driver of the car in front did not like the idea of being forced to stop by little more than local mercenaries so he revved his engine and edged forwards.
Big mistake.

Ever had to hit the deck while on the toilet?

The worst time for an alarm to sound on a military base warning of incoming rockets or mortar fire is when you are on the toilet. The second most inconvenient moment is while in the shower.
In the first scenario you have the uncomfortable dilemma of: Do I stay here in this flimsy portable loo and risk shrapnel injuries if the thing lands nearby, or do I dive outside with my trousers around my ankles probably to find that the shells explode far away?
Similarly, in the shower situation the thought process goes: Do I keep up with the lathering and stand a greater risk of harm or do I plunge gracelessly across the floor of this trailer stark naked (though with the potential of grabbing a towel on the way down)?
I have thankfully never had to deal with the alarm bell going off while on the lavatory. But I did have a rather embarrassing moment in the showers when staying at the main British military base by the airport in Basra at the end of last month.
The humiliation was rendered all the more complete by the fact that I dived through the shower curtains and on to the floor (with my towel) when the all clear rather than the incoming alarm rang out – well, it was my first morning at the camp so arguably an easy mistake to make.
Mortar and rocket fire has become such a daily hazard at the airport base and also Basra Palace, the military’s last stronghold in the city, that hitting the deck – whether mid-lunch, mid-work or mid-interview (as happened to me several times) – has become second nature to the soldiers.

Turning the tables on a roadside bomb

The bomb lay tucked inside a squashed cardboard box in the middle of a road in south Baghdad.
It was spotted by a US soldier during a patrol last month through a neighbourhood in Doura.
“I’ve found one,” said Staff Sergeant Gabriel Temples. “Do you want to take a closer look?”
Normally speaking, if someone were to ask whether I wanted to study a bomb that could go off any second I like to think that I would be running too fast in the opposite direction to respond.
But in this case, embedded as I was with US troops, the opportunity was too good to miss.
Roadside bombs, known in military speak as IEDs (improvised explosive devices), are the biggest killers of US and British soldiers in Iraq.
Typically triggered by a command wire, a mobile phone or a pressure plate, these devices can tear through the armour of a Humvee and even a tank, roasting those inside.
Curious to know what a live one looked like, I immediately said yes.

Tragedy of the 'Terps'

“Where’s the ‘terp’?” asked a British soldier wanting to speak to a suspicious-looking Iraqi policeman during a night patrol near Basra Palace, aimed at countering the threat of rocket propelled grenade attacks against an arriving helicopter.
The ‘terp’, an expression used by both the British and American forces for their mini-army of interpreters, dutifully emerged from the back of a small tank and trotted over to help.
Whether on patrol through a dangerous neighbourhood in Basra, busting into a house or simply guarding the gates of a military base, British troops frequently bring along an interpreter.
Such English-speakers are vital when it comes to communicating with Iraqis while on an operation, or forging relationships with local communities through building schools and clinics, a task that British officers see as paramount in the battle for “hearts and minds”.

(First picture: Ali Kamad, a 20-year-old interpreter for the British Army in Basra. He was kidnapped and shot dead by gunmen as he tried to return home from work one night at the beginning of June)

One quick boom and 17 lives are blown away

The explosion from the bomb lasted a split second then there was a moment’s silence before the screaming started.
A suicide bomber had driven a minibus packed with explosives towards a crowd of people queuing outside a Baghdad petrol station near a popular ice cream parlour.
He detonated his charge on a patch of grass verge dividing two busy roads, killing at least 17 passersby and wounding more than 30.
A thick plume of grey-brown smoke curled skywards, followed by confused bursts of gunfire.
Flames engulfed the area where cars and people had been standing.
Policemen at nearby checkpoints rushed to the scene, closely followed by the all-too-familiar shriek of ambulance sirens.

(Picture: Smoke from the minibus bomb on Thursday)