http://www.grist.org/advice/books/2006/05/03/gertz/index.html
Wing Man
How birding and blogging changed one soldier's time in Iraq
By Emily Gertz
03 May 2006
Jonathan Trouern-Trend has been a dedicated bird-watcher since he was
about 12. So in 2004, when the now 38-year-old Connecticut National
Guard sergeant got sent to Iraq, he had birds on the brain. While
stationed at Camp Anaconda -- a huge American installation located
about 40 miles north of Baghdad in the Sunni Triangle near the Tigris
River -- Trouern-Trend got to know the better birding spots on the
base, including a small lagoon and the camp dump. Since he was working
in intelligence, the base MPs didn't pay much attention as he peered
through his binoculars. He recorded his observations anonymously on the
blog Birding Babylon, and the matter-of-fact reports eventually
attracted a wide readership.
Readers took solace in Trouern-Trend's observations of nature in the
midst of a situation that seemed to be spinning out of control. "When I
go to vote on Tuesday," wrote one blog commenter in September 2004, "I
will look at the birds and take courage in the fact that -- as serious
and as real as they are -- war and politics are only a small part of
life." That same month, another wrote that she pictured Iraq "as barren
and rubble! Who would have thought birds and butterflies would find
havens there! We appreciate your reports and look forward to more ...
and your safe return."
Trouern-Trend spent a little more than a year on active duty in Iraq
and Kuwait, and saw 122 different bird species. His observations have
now been collected in a slim, illustrated book also titled Birding
Babylon, published by the Sierra Club. While it might seem impossible
for a book about the Iraq war to leave politics aside, this volume is
purely an appreciation of nature -- wherever it may be found.
Today Trouern-Trend is back home in Connecticut, where he works in
epidemiology for the American Red Cross and has recently created an
interactive site devoted to the natural biodiversity of Iraq. Grist
spoke with him by phone a day after he had taken his five children to
the zoo in Providence, R.I.
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