Fishing in Baghdad

There's really not all that much to do for fun around here. There's a movie theater - movie room actually - but I've only gotten to see half of one movie in nearly a year here. There's the MWR, but there's only so much to do there.

As you learned in my last post, this complex is practically teeming with fish, and naturally, I have been taking advantage of this opportunity as much as possible. There are at least a dozen lakes, multiple canals and lots of little pools. All of these were intentionally stocked by the Ba'ath Party folks to give the elites of the old regime a place to relax.

Naturally, all of this is still here. Some of the infrastructure is crumbling. Many of the elaborate aqueducts and water lifts and piping are damaged or abandoned. Algae and weeds proliferate - especially in the summer when they bloom in the ever-present sunlight.

And in this environment, the fish live and thrive. As you saw in my last post, the Saddam Bass - the aggressive breed of carp that live over by the palace, grow to very healthy proportions indeed. Elsewhere, the fish are generally smaller, but in a few areas, they're actually bigger. One photo that's going around via email shows an Army Sergeant man-handling a massive fish whose head alone is a foot long, and when stretched out, is as tall as he is. That fish was caught at Camp Slayer, a few miles away. Judging by the hefty fish-hanging hooks left over from the old antebellum days (below), there used to be a few of those around this base too. Most of the giants, however, are gone or too crafty to be caught by the likes of me.



I generally go fishing with my friend Chris, who is a Marine Captain from Montana who works with me. Here he is trying his luck on a pond on the Northwest side of the base. This particular spot was not too good for us. We saw a couple of big ones - leaping out of the water to catch a bug or swimming close to the shore in a clear area. But they didn't bite.

The fish, it seems, are very smart, and since these waters are so full of pollutants and bacteria, Americans only play catch-and-release with them. Thus, many of the bigger fish have likely been caught more than once and thrown back. Perhaps they learn. I would.

The Camp Victory fish seem to have very little interest in lures. I've caught a few at a place called Lost Lake with them, but outside of that area, they simply don't bite. I've watched my lure cross right in front of the nose of a two-foot carp and he simply ignored it and kept on about his merry way.

So Chris and I have scouted out dozens of locations (Chris looking for a new spot above) and tried a variety of baits to get them interested. There are no worms in sand, so that's out. I've seen a grand total of about 2-3 lizards ever, so that's out. Chris even had his dad ship him two kinds of special bait from back home. Neither seemed to work.

What does work, as I learned eventually from talking to the old-timers around here, are pop tarts and bacon. This we grab on our way out of the dining facility after breakfast and then go in search of a good watering hole.

This was the first fish I caught, back in April.

Chris caught this fish by the Al Faw Palace. Directly behind him is the bridge where the "Saddam bass" (see previous post) go to feast.

Fishing should never be about catching fish unless you're trying to live off of them. For the most part, fishing is about getting outside, relaxing, taking your mind off of work and just watching the wind blow softly across the water and the birds sweeping by from palm tree to palm tree. Chris and I generally talk politics or history. Very rarely do we talk about work or the war.


Fishing is also a good excuse to visit parts of the base we never see. This place is so big, and has so many hidden spots, that even though I've been here for 10 months, I haven't seen 75 percent of it. Going to work, or the gym or the chow hall, you just kind of see what's on your way. Walking around, looking for fishing spots, we find some pretty interesting places. At one hole - which a British soldier had pointed out to us, we found a small golf driving range. But this wasn't your ordinary range. A few spots were set to tee off and the targets were in the middle of the lake.


The first target was a small platform about 3 feet by 3 feet, set off about 15 yards from the shoreline. Jutting out from the middle of this setup is a small Australian flag. Strewn about the platform are about two dozen golf balls, testifying to the fact that some people can actually make the shot. I grabbed a club - not being a golfer, I can only say it was the kind folks use in sand traps - and tried my luck. I took a couple of practice swings, then dipped my hat into a chest full of golf balls and brought out a dozen or so. I tried and tried, but never could quite hit the island. A few of the balls came close, but plunked wide right mostly. Some skipped across the lake. One I hit so hard it skipped three times, then went right up onto the small island behind, slapped across the driveway and struck the small building. No one came out to look, so I was safe.


Out at a considerably-larger distance was another small island just like it, this one with a small American flag flapping away from it. Probably 50-60 yards off. As one might expect, the number of golf balls aboard this island was considerably smaller - two or three. I took a couple of shots at it, and seeing they were futile, then selected a driver and aimed my club at the tower over at Baghdad International Airport - about two miles off. I hit about a dozen balls and watched gleefully as they skipped across the water. With amateurish form, half the balls were duds, but one or two seemed to sail on forever. Didn't strike any airplanes, I'm sure, but it was fun.

Caught this guy with a pop tart. Blueberry.

This little fellow, I caught with Corn Pops.

I usually go fishing on Monday mornings, when I have a little time off work. Back earlier in the year, you could go fishing in the afternoons, but with the heat of the summer bearing down on you, you really don't want to stay outdoors too long once the sun climbs up to its mid-day peak.

One day, before things got too hot, however, I did go out and planned to stay around until noon. It was good to see the sun. Working nights, I never see it, and I need that Vitamin B. Or D. Or whatever.

It was a beautiful day with relatively low smog...for Baghdad. It was a pleasant, relaxing time: Helicopters flying overhead as I'm casting towards a small island holding a palace that was blown apart by cruise missiles in 2003. There's no action here now, but there are pillars of smoke rising off in the distance in Sadr City, and the sound of F-16s overhead give me a clue as to the cause.

The distant battle aside, it was a pretty calm and quiet day in my little bubble of a world. I was close to the wall and there was an Iraqi neighborhood just a couple hundred yards away. I didn't even have a watch to tell the time, so I just idled the time away blissfully until I heard the call to prayer from the nearby mosque. I knew then that it was lunchtime and packed up my gear. As I walked back down the powdery sand trail, I heard the Imam singing in his warbly tunes. He was calling on the faithful to pray and reflect on life. They were shuffling towards his mosque, and I was shuffling away. Sorry man. I just got done fishing. What better way is there to reflect on life?