2 MAY:
It really was Saddam’s old game preserve, and most of that was cleared out and leveled. But there was a section of canal or something that was left untouched. It had all the marsh grasses and palm trees, right next to Pad 8. We had to walk by it to get to the chow hall that was built (eventually), and every so often you could hear something rustling about in the undergrowth. Probably a leftover game preserve critter, or (more likely) the rats or stray animals we mentioned earlier. Or maybe Gollum, who knows? It looked like the kind of place he’d hang out at.