Why must the Russians ruin things for everyone?
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It seems rare these days that the Foreign Service gets much positive press. When something is screwed up, the media is all over it, but the day-to-day actions of our diplomats is often under appreciated. I was pleasantly surprised to see this opinion piece in The New York Times today.
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The story today coming out of Athens helps me remember that you never know exactly which are the “dangerous” posts to work at. The U.S. Embassy in Athens was struck today by a rocket-propelled grenade. Fortunately, no one was injured in the attack.
I find this still somewhat, unfleshed-out news story to be disturbing. According to CNN:
The U.S. military operation Thursday in the northern Iraqi city of Irbil that resulted in the arrests of six Iranians has drawn a sharp denunciation from Iraq’s Kurdish regional government.
A spokesman for the autonomous regional government and its presidency expressed their “alarm” and condemned the Thursday morning operation.
They characterized it as a raid on the Iranian consulate in Irbil, “which opened in the provincial capital in an agreement between the Iraqi government and the Iranian government.”
I suppose I should consider myself fortunate that it has taken this long, but I feel that I have finally run head-first into the language training wall. I’d been warned that it would happen and witnessed the unpleasant experience first-hand about a month ago when it happened to my wife. Now it is my turn to feel like a no-progress-making, non-Russian-speaking idiot.
I took advantage of a pleasant holiday break from Russian classes to catch a few new films. Most of the Oscar heavyweight contenders usually come out right at the end of the year and I saw at least two, maybe even three, that will be up for some awards.
The watercooler talk among the new Junior Officers and the wannabe Foreign Service Officers out there has recently focused on the newly announced changes to the Foreign Service testing process. Granted, the buzz has probably been quite a bit louder among the wannabe’s because for those of us already in it is more of a “Huh…that’s interesting” kind of thing because we’ve already made it. It is a much bigger deal to those still trying to get in.
I’m not doing consular work my first tour, but for those of you who wonder what it is they have to deal with…
According to Business Week, the Foreign Service is the 6th best place to launch a career for new graduates. The article focuses on the training that new consular officers receive, which isn’t what everyone goes on to to, but the majority do so it makes sense. You can read the article here.
This evening I took a walk down to Olsson’s Books, a DC area bookstore chain, to attend a discussion with John Brady Kiesling who was in town to promote his new book, “Diplomacy Lessons: Realism for an Unloved Superpower.”
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