I was awakened early this morning at 5 am by the blaring prayers coming from the local mosques here in Mersa Martruch. I have now become accustomed to the incessant blaring five times a day, when we are anywhere near a local town. When I was young, I lived a block away from our local church. I remember the bells would be rung three times a day reminding us Catholics to say our prayer called the Angelus, and I used to think that was annoying. Today was a scheduled off day, well deserved. We have been running day and night for two weeks. The plan was to walk into town and take care of any personal chores. We are staying on Rommel Beach. The water on the Bay side is turquoise, I always wanted to see the Mediterrean but I felt like something was missing today because I was seeing it alone.

I think tensions are building, the little things are starting to bother me. I am very homesick, and I think this is contributing to my lack of patience. It is very normal for a group that spends a lot of time in a confined space, to start getting on each others nerves. This is in a sense very similar to how things work in the Firehouse. There we know each other so well, we can sometimes snap, over the stupidest things. Also adding to the pressure, is the Egyptian Secret Service and Police. They won't let us breathe, every move we make is shadowed.

I lashed out today at Ray, and that just was the beginning of the day long tirade. I was annoyed that he opted to stay in a hotel last night with Latif. Latif has been staying in hotels every chance he can, but it seems to be acceptable to the group for some reason. He is a special case. Neda is a sweetheart and I feel bad because I ripped into her about something she did. Probably the real reason I am upset with her is because she constantly refers to Iran as "My Country". She always calls herself Iranian, and this bothers me. I am extremely proud to be American. My Grandmother always told me that she was American, never referring to her Irish heritage. She was first generation, and spent a lot of time back in Ireland with her mother, yet never made reference to it. I have regained a new found patriotism, I for some reason have never loved America more. Even with all our faults, there is no place in the world like the good ole USA.

I have been reluctant to talk about what happened on September 11, 2001. Galit has been hounding me to talk about that day and I have been putting it off. When I finally decided to tell the story, one of the participants slept through it. The Afghani, Yahia was either too tired or just not interested in hearing about. Needless to say I was extremely angry about it and don't really have any interest in anything he has to say. The group has given him a nickname "Baby YaYa". All he does is sleep and eat.

We are scheduled to leave for Libya tomorrow, I think this also adding a little uncertainty in the group. Personally I really don't care about Libya. It is not important whether we get in or not. My feeling is that they will allow the group in except the Israelis. I have already decided for myself, that if they don't get in, then I am not going in. We should do everything together as one group.

We bought some wine, soda and beer and decided that we would have a beach party. I also noticed in the store, a fresh delivery of Hostess Twinkies. A little bit of Americana, I bought a box and it was the hit of the party. The mission has now changed, we are on a quest to find Twinkies in the Middle East.