Everybody Has One

These giant clamshells come from the Philippines but can also be found in the waters around PNG.

People said, "You're going to Pakistan!" "How exciting!" "How dangerous!" "What a fantastic experience it will be!" "You are so lucky!" And they were right. It was exciting, there was an element of danger and it was most definitely a fantastic experience!

People said, "You're going to Rome!" "How exciting!" "How wonderful!" "What a fantastic experience it will be!" "You are so lucky!" And, again, they were right. It was both exciting and wonderful. The two years I spent living and working in Rome were a truly fantastic experience!

People say, "You're going to Port Moresby, uh huh. Where is that exactly?" "Papua New Guinea!?" "Isn't that where one of the Rockefellers was eaten by cannibals?"

Let's be clear about one thing right away, while it's pretty certain that Michael Rockefeller was in fact eaten while in Papua New Guinea, the jury is still out on whether he was dined upon by his fellow man or consumed by a salt water crocodile. All the current research indicates that the cannibals down there haven't eaten anybody in ages. Headhunters are another story, but no one claims that Michael was a victim of those gentlemen and no evidence that he was has ever appeared in any of the souvenir markets hanging by its hair from a pole marked, "All Items Reduced For Fast Sale!!" However, a bit of headhunting does, apparently, still exist in the course of tribal warfare in the Highlands.

Papua New Guinea also has the distinction of being the last place that Amelia Earhart was seen alive, making it appear that flying off aimlessly into the uncharted South Pacific in a tiny two propeller aircraft was preferable to spending another minute on the island.

After people have googled Papua New Guinea, they come back to me and say, "Are you nuts?"

In fact, people now seek me out to give me what I have come to think of as 'The Bad News of the Day'. People outside the Foreign Service quickly become experts on the deplorable living conditions, the poverty and, more specifically, the high rate of violent crime on the island. "Do you know," they'll ask earnestly, "that Port Moresby is the worst capitol city in the world?" Again, in the interest of accuracy, Port Moresby was identified by the Economist magazine way back in 2005 as the 137th (with #1 being the very best) out of 140 capitol cities surveyed. It was clearly better than three other world capitols and, therefore, could hardly be considered the 'worst' as it didn't even qualify for the bronze medal. More current surveys rank Baku, Azerbaijan as the world's dirtiest capitol, Harare, Zimbabwe as the world's worst capitol to live in and on the 2011 list of the most dangerous capitol cities (with #1 being the most dangerous), Port Moresby ranks way down at 7th. There are neighborhoods in Washington DC that rank above 7th for crying out loud!!

People seem to feel it's their duty to seek me out to share their opinions with me. However, opinions are, indeed, very much like belly buttons; everybody has one and other peoples' are only of passing interest to me. I fully anticipate having a blast while I'm there.

My Foreign Service colleagues have the added benefit of being able to do 'research' (by which I mean that they listen to and/or create gossip, rumor and innuendo) regarding the embassy in Port Moresby. "Do you know," they'll ask earnestly, "that every single one of the Locally Employed Staff have quit to go work for Exxon?" (Our LEStaff are the backbone of our embassies and we could not function without them. To lose any of them is awful, to lose them all is an unthinkable disaster) Well, in fairness, not all of them have quit, we still have the ones that Exxon wouldn't hire! From the legions of people who have never been there, I have learned that the embassy staff are unmotivated, untrained and unwilling to work. Morale, they assure me with whispered sincerity, is low. "As you have never been there, how would you know that?" I ask. "I know a guy in Tokyo who has a buddy in Frankfurt who heard it from a friend in Jakarta and Jakarta is really close to Papua New Guinea." Ok then, as long as the information is that reliable I'll consider it. I have no idea what the situation is like at Embassy Port Moresby and I won't know until I get settled in down there. Part of me hopes that it isn't running with the efficiency of a Swiss watch because I'd much prefer to go into an embassy that needs some help and try to improve things than to go to one that is functioning perfectly and screw it up!

Whistling into this storm of negativity are the handful of folks who have actually served at our embassy in Port Moresby. To a man, or in several cases a woman, they are uniformly and enthusiastically positive about their time and experiences at the embassy and in the country. Some go so far as to call it the best tour of their careers.

Housing is somewhat of an issue in Port Moresby. About a year ago, right after I accepted a handshake for the job, I contacted post and asked them to reserve a specific house for me in our compound of six leased houses. I had the advantage of knowing someone who had just finished a two year tour there and she told me which house to request. "Make sure you get House #1," she said. We have six houses in the compound and three of them, including House #1, have balconies that face the sea. So I, dutifully, sent off my housing request to the Management Officer and GSO appealing to their sense of Management Brotherhood. I carefully mentioned that I have committed to three years at post and would really appreciate favorable housing. I must also confess to having a somewhat inflated sense of my own importance. After all, I would be the incoming Management Officer, a man of stature, a man of position and rank, and no longer a mere entry level officer. It felt pretty good to exercise my newfound power and I was already looking forward to that balcony with the sea view.

The utter audacity of my request apparently shocked the Management section into total silence because it wasn't until several months later, after the departure from post of the incumbent Management Officer, that I finally received a reply from the GSO. "Unfortunately," he said, "House #1 was going to be assigned to someone else. As were Houses numbered 2 through 6." Post, in fact, did not actually have a house for me, but they were looking. He felt certain that something would be found eventually and he would let me know as soon as that happened. In the meantime, I would just have to be patient. I can assure you that nothing brings your sense of self-importance back to reality quicker than having a guy who will report directly to you tell you that he'll find you a place to live when he has the time.

At post we have the six aforementioned houses, one apartment, a house for the DCM and, of course, the Ambassador's residence. We are adding several new American staff positions, a tandem (married officers who share a house) has left and been replaced by two single officers (who don't share a house) and we just don't have enough places leased to accommodate this influx of new officers. The housing market is ridiculously tight because Exxon has discovered an enormous bubble of natural gas in Papua New Guinea and is leasing up everything with four walls and a roof. In spite of that, the State Department reluctantly acknowledged that 'having a place to live' is required by the regulations and authorized the embassy to begin finding suitable housing for the additional officers.

This is a fairly straightforward procedure. Post locates suitable properties and after the Regional Security Officer (RSO) approves them for safety and security, post negotiates a lease. Finally, OBO (the overseer of all State property and leases overseas) must authorize the lease. The Housing section at the embassy found a building that is still under construction and reserved five apartments in it. As described to me, the apartments are two bedroom, two bath with balconies overlooking the Coral Sea. It's a new building right on the beach, with all the amenities, pool, gym, etc. and it'll be ready for occupancy in January or February.  The RSO gave the building a thumbs up for safety and security and the leases were then sent off to OBO for signature.

OBO looked at the bottom line on the leases, gasped, clutched dramatically at its small flinty heart and told post to "sober up and go find cheaper apartments." Post carefully explained to OBO that any acceptable properties in this dangerous city were going to rent for a king's ransom or more thanks to Exxon's entry into the housing market. After a bit of back and forth, which may or may not have included inviting OBO to "come on down and find a damn place yourselves", the apartments were leased. Ironically, several of those apartments are reserved for the OBO personnel going to Port Moresby to direct the construction of the new embassy compound scheduled to break ground early next year. Much more importantly, however, one of those ridiculously expensive apartments is mine! I'm fully prepared to be quite happy there.

A good friend of mine sat in on the internal negotiations for the apartments (which were conducted in Washington between OBO, post and the bureau) and sought me out to ask if I'd heard about my new place. "Sure," I said, "it sounds great! Ocean view, brand new building, brand new furniture and appliances package, indoor parking, secure and located right next to the new embassy site. What's not to like?"

He just shook his head and said, "Yeah, but they're small, very small."

"How small can they be?" I asked. "They have two bedrooms and two baths!"

"Yes," he said, "But they are very small bedrooms. Japanese small!"

So, apparently, I'll be living in a brand new 'cozy' two bedroom apartment with a view of the Coral Sea sunsets! Go ahead, try and make me unhappy about that. Of course, I'll be staying in a hotel for the five months just prior to occupying my new place, but I can live with that. Room service can be a wonderful thing!

Speaking of apartments, the woman who owns the one I rent while I'm at FSI has thoughtfully provided it with a treadmill. The treadmill, a state-of-the-art Reebok gym-quality machine, sits in the corner of the living room just by the tv. This apartment is a 'cozy' one bedroom, one bath and the living room holds the couch, the dining table, the tv and the treadmill. Lying on the couch to watch tv puts the treadmill directly into my line of sight. I am fairly adept at ignoring subtle offense, however, the treadmill goes too far. It questions my resolve, it assumes an air of silent disapproval and rolls its nonexistent eyes at my natural inclination towards laziness and sloth. I'll be resting on the couch minding my own business, happily watching reruns of Hillbilly Handfishin' while the treadmill assumes an air of mute superiority right next to the tv. A lesser man would undoubtedly succumb to this constant badgering and even I have been tempted to find my sneakers, put them on and begin exercising once again. But, I will not be bullied into submission by an inanimate machine. Instead, I realized that by turning the couch slightly and placing the pillow on the opposite end I can now watch tv without seeing the treadmill at all. Finding a non-aggressive solution is a key to good diplomacy!

I was told by several of the people who have served there that I would definitely need a vehicle in Port Moresby so I bought a Toyota 4-Runner online from a used car salesman in Japan. It's a 1996 but looks brand new in the photos and has fewer than 50,000 miles on it. The used car salesman's explanation for this suspiciously low mileage was that "Japanese people just don't drive that much." I suppose they prefer spending all their time in their tiny little apartments. Quite a few Foreign Service Officers have used this company when they've transferred to countries that require vehicles with righthand steering. The car, including shipping and insurance, cost a few thousand dollars but I can recover the shipping and insurance fees when I get to post because State will pay to ship a vehicle to post whether it comes from Maine or Tokyo. Generally, since we import the vehicles duty free as diplomats, we can sell them easily when we leave post. We're prohibited from making a profit but we can almost always recover 100% of the original cost of the vehicle. So I wired my several thousand dollars to Japan and have just received a notice from the company that my Toyota will arrive in Port Moresby on October 18th. That'll be perfect. As a rule, we tend to purchase vehicles that are low profile and won't attract any particular attention. Gray, white or black and no-frills are the norm.

This is my low profile Toyota 4-Runner in electric blue with fog lights, sun roof and bull bar!!

There will, no doubt, be things that I won't be able to easily acquire in Port Moresby. Odds and ends that might serve to soften the hardships at this critical needs post. Papua New Guinea is not one of our more sought after posts. It is, officially, a "hard to fill" post and anyone committing to spend an additional year there automatically earns a further 15% differential. The money is nice, make no mistake, but life must also be lived there during those three years so I just sent off my air freight shipment (UAB) packed to the gunnels with the necessities. Four boxes of cigars, a new iMac computer, a shower head to be installed in my bathroom that simulates an Amazon rain forest downpour, a full set of professional quality poker chips, a carton of sealed playing cards, three new bathing suits, a pair of flip flops and 20 pounds of Skippy creamy peanut butter. Bring on those hardships, I'm ready!

In the past month, Washington DC has experienced an earthquake that damaged the Washington Monument and rattled the desks at FSI, a hurricane that caused massive damage up and down the east coast and a flood of biblical proportions. I'm not referring to the flooding that accompanied the hurricane, that was unfortunate but manageable. I'm talking about the flooding that took place in my apartment when I inadvertently left the kitchen sink running while I sat on my balcony reading a good novel and smoking a cigar. The faucet in the sink has a lever that you push towards the water spout to turn off the flow. I was distracted and slapped at the lever but didn't realize that I hadn't completely turned the water off. It seems that the drain chose that exact afternoon to develop a block and, while I sat enjoying myself on the balcony, the sink filled and began to overflow. My conservative estimate is that it overflowed for approximately an hour or so before I wandered back in to get a drink. Water was everywhere! It took several bath towels to mop up the floor and every drawer in the counter by the sink was filled to the brim. The plastic garbage pail under the sink is a ten gallon model and it held the full ten gallons. Water had seeped under the exterior wall and soaked the carpeting in the hallway for twenty yards in both directions. The occupants of the apartment below me built an ark. It was not my finest moment but I coped with it by denying any knowledge of a problem when the building superintendent came down the hallway knocking on every door to find the source of the water. However, as the next natural disaster in line will certainly be a volcano, when one erupts in the middle of Arlington, I can assure you that it really won't be my fault.

I only have two weeks left in Washington and then I head out. I'll fly non-stop from here to Tokyo and lay over there for about six hours. Then I'll catch the non-stop flight on Air Niugini down to Port Moresby. State travel regulations give me the option of either using the Business Class lounge at the lay over point or breaking my journey and staying in a hotel. I prefer to just get there once I start going, so I'm opting for the lounge in Tokyo. Door to door, the trip will take about 30 hours and I'll arrive at approximately 4:30 am on a Sunday. Regulations also allow me to take the next workday off to recover but, unless I'm flat out of it, I'm pretty eager to see where I'll be working for the next three years so I plan to go in on that Monday.

I read in the news this morning that a French diplomat was partially eaten by a shark just off the beach in Port Moresby as he was sail boarding. The shark, for reasons that are not immediately clear, took a bite or two and then swam away. The Frenchman was flown to Australia for patching and repair and will recover. Two thoughts immediately came to mind when I read this piece of news. First,  sharks, apparently, do not respect diplomatic immunity and second, I wondered where he lived and if his spacious and roomy apartment might now be available!

With creative decorating and the strategic use of some mirrors, this apartment will look huge!!

Arrivederci Roma

Piazza San Marco - Venice

I ran the 5K Komen Race for the Cure on Sunday. The Race is an annual fund-raising event in Rome to benefit breast cancer research and it is a point of pride for the U.S. Embassy to field the biggest team of runners each year. There were almost 500 of us this year and several of us were very nearly competitive. In spite of that, all of us participated and enjoyed a great day. I have to admit that a lot of my motivation and desire to excel in the race took a hit when the first runner to cross the finish line (technically, I suppose, the 'winner') did so before I was able to cross the starting line. There were thousands of people in this race and as a fund raiser it was a huge success. For someone who had trained for the event by running tens of yards on a treadmill and visualizing himself, arms in the air, chest thrust forward, breaking the tape at the finish line, it was a bit frustrating like forcing a racehorse to pull a plow! However, after much shuffling forward with the masses, I managed to break free of the pack for ten or fifteen feet and sprinted up to the back of the group just ahead of me. Another small impediment to my competitiveness was my four year old running buddy, Claudio. Claudio is my friend Silvia's son and I ran with him today. I'm proud to say that I could easily have lapped him if I wasn't responsible for holding his hand! By the end of the day, of course, I was sitting on a curb weeping in pain and he was running in circles around me. My own modest estimate is that I finished in the top 100,000.

 Since the day I arrived in Italy, the departure clock has been ticking and the list of  'places to see' and 'things to do' doesn't seem to have gotten any shorter. On the Saturday night before Easter Sunday, a friend and I decided to fly up to Venice for Easter and return on Monday. It might actually have been a good idea or it might have been the bottle of Prosecco, we'll never know. At any rate, bright and very very early Easter Sunday morning we were in a limo headed for Fiumicino with EasyJet tickets to Venice clutched in our hands. Although we didn't have a hotel room, we weren't worried because every human being in Italy was in Rome to see Pope John Paul II beatified. Every human being in Italy that is except for the 400,000 extra visitors to Venice this year. The crowds were overwhelming, the sidewalks and bridges were jammed to capacity and the hotels were booked solid. With a bit of luck we managed to find a room in the very upscale Hotel Danieli on the Grand Canal just a bridge or two down from Piazza San Marco. The room wouldn't be available until later in the day so we went out to see Venice with the crowds.

I decided to buy a couple of the famous Venetian Carnival masks as souvenirs to take down to Port Moresby with me. I checked them out in various stores and stands but didn't see any that looked just right to me. Finally, as I was walking aimlessly down a wide street, I spotted two masks in the window of a small shop that seemed perfect. They were the classical theater masks, one with a smiling face and the other with a frowning face. They were painted in brilliant reds and golds and had fools brocades with bells all around them. I knew that they would be more costly than the 25 to 30 euro masks I'd been seeing but they were much nicer and I was prepared to spend a bit more. I wasn't really prepared for the 250 euro price tag, but a chair and a cool glass of water soon revived me and I got down to haggling. The shop owner explained that the masks I'd been seeing in the souvenir stands were made in China out of plastic but the masks I wanted were authentic Venetian masks made of paper mache, painted with gold leaf and crowned with real Italian brocade. "Go and look," she said, "you'll see the difference. Then come back and we'll talk." Damn if she wasn't right. I think the masks will look really good on a wall in Port Moresby and I'm perfectly willing to talk to you about that bridge you have for sale in Brooklyn!

The mask on the right reflects my expression upon learning how much the shop owner wanted for them!

We enjoyed a great dinner in a small osteria, a coffee at Cafe Florian and a stroll around town that night. We took a water taxi back to the airport in the early morning on Monday and flew back to Rome. All in all we were gone for 23 hours! When we added it all up, between us, counting all transportation, food, drinks, lodging and souvenirs, we spent approximately 3,000 euros. It was as nice a way to see Venice as I could imagine and, based on the availability of Prosecco, I plan to do it again some day.

A good friend of mine owns a really nice wine bar in Assisi. She is a certified sommelier and her place is stocked with an excellent selection of regional and national wines. It's cozy and comfortable and located right in the center of town. It's called Bibenda and it's a great place to sit and relax with a glass of wine while you're visiting Assisi. My own personal level of wine expertise allows me to confidently differentiate between red and white wine and I can tell if it has or does not have bubbles. Beyond that, I rely on my friend to educate me in the nuances of flavor, color and aroma. As part of my ongoing education in wine appreciation, I accompanied her to a gathering of wine folk at the Hilton Hotel in Rome. I believe I was the only person in the room who didn't a) own a winery b) own a vineyard or c) have a master sommelier's certification. We tasted 24 very special Italian wines and listened to an expert describe each one in great detail. Way too late in the process I learned that the plastic bucket alongside my wine glasses was so I could take a small sip of the wine and then pour out the remainder of the glass. I have a vague recollection of trying to make plans to go to Venice again, but that might just be my imagination.

As one of the guests of honor, my friend had places reserved for her and her guests right up in the front of the room. We were each given a small booklet that listed the 24 wines we'd be tasting that night. The others took copious notes based on the expert's opinions, then tasted the wines and modified their notes according to their own taste preferences. I put a little star next to the one I liked best and I was quite proud of the fact that I was still able to make a little star after tasting 24 wines!

These three were red wines!

When all is said and done my car will be shipped back to Maine, I will also have one air freight shipment to Maine, one surface shipment to storage and then on to Port Moresby when I move there in the Fall, one shipment to storage that will remain there until I finish up in Port Moresby and one air freight shipment from Washington DC to Port Moresby in the Fall. Now much of my time is spent trying to figure out what I'll need where and when I'll need it. The movers are coming on June 6th and 7th to pack me out and I'll need to be organized by then. It's a grueling experience that will require me to point at various belongings and state where I want them sent. Actually, upon reflection, it's not so much grueling as it is effortless and hassle-free. Over the years I've moved in every conceivable manner, from having a couple of friends help me put everything into a VW bus and then carry it all up four flights of a New York walk-up to sitting with a cool drink while others did the packing, hoisting and heaving and I can state without fear of contradiction that the later is by far the easier way to do it.

On June 6th a crew from the appointed moving company will arrive at my apartment and begin to wrap, cushion and pack my belongings. I'll be in the way most of the time in a purely supervisory capacity. It shouldn't take them too long to get me packed up and then on the 7th they'll return and load my stuff onto the truck and start it on its way. My sole responsibility will be to determine what goes where. You'd think I'd be right on top of that and, of course, you'd be wrong. I'm still wandering around my house pointing at stuff and not having a clue where it would best spend the next three years. Final decisions, in my case, are usually made by the packers as they randomly put stuff in pre-addressed boxes. Of course, this method of decision making results in increased levels of anticipation when I arrive in Port Moresby. It also absolves me of responsibility when things I desperately need, such as bedding and silverware, are in storage in ELSO and my five dollar custom-made wheelbarrow from Islamabad is first off the truck in Papua New Guinea. "What were those crazy packers thinking?" I can fume in righteous indignation.

When I packed out of Islamabad, most of my things went into ELSO until I arrived in Rome and then were sent to me here. Imagine my delight when I unwrapped my kitchen garbage pail complete with its Islamabad kitchen garbage! Fond, albeit mummified, reminders of meals past. In Rome, all my garbage containers will be emptied before the packers arrive. It's the least I can do.

So, on June 10th I'll leave Rome and head for Maine where I'll assume my customary position on the porch of the beach house. There I'll smoke the occasional cigar and begin to think about my upcoming job in Port Moresby. The beach in front of the house is absolutely perfect for walking. It's a three mile round trip from end to end at low tide and the sand is hard packed and gives the working class families from Boston a firm enough surface for their bocci games. So I'll walk the beach and think about the Financial Management course that I'll begin at FSI in July and the work ahead of me in Port Moresby as post goes onto the ICASS cost allocation system and also begins work on the New Embassy Compound. In addition to these two fairly complex and interesting projects, there will be all the usual day-to-day responsibilities of the Management section to oversee.

The Management section provides all the support functions for the Embassy. Housing, maintenance, logistics, human resources, finance, travel, transportation, shipping, IT, health services, language training and so on all fall under the auspices of the Management section. I find it to be, personally, the most satisfying place to work in an embassy, no two days are ever the same and the challenges test your abilities daily. While I'm sitting up at the beach in Maine, I'll be reading up on the State Department guidance for building a new embassy and the requirements for converting to ICASS. I'll be thinking about undertaking the financial responsibilities for post and all the million details that that will require. But mostly I'll be doing what we all do between posts, I'll be preparing to complain about my housing assignment.

There is a famous piece of sculpture in Rome known as the mouth of truth. It's supposed to bite your hand off if you tell a lie. I wasn't willing to risk it so I put my hand in the 'mouth of small fibs' instead!

One very important function that Management serves at post is to help new arrivals settle in and then to assist departing employees with their outbound move. Once we receive our TMFOUR (our orders), we can have our tickets issued. However, prior to actually taking possession of those tickets we have a check-out list of things to do and signatures to acquire. All of our ID cards, ration cards, CAC cards, MFA cards, parking permits and security badges must be accounted for and turned in to the proper offices. Our commissary account must be settled up and closed. All our telephone and two-way radio equipment must be returned and all bills paid in full. Our health unit folder must be picked up and hand carried to our next post. We must schedule and receive an outgoing briefing from the RSO. Our State Dept. computer account must be transferred to our onward assignment. Our apartments must be inventoried and inspected and any damages must be paid for in full. Our home internet and cable bills must be settled and our accounts terminated with those companies. Our local bank accounts must be closed. We have to appoint a sponsor who will assume responsibility for covering any unpaid bills after our departure. We must complete our final EER and ensure that any EERs that we are required to do for others are completed. The check-out list is extensive and only when it is completed and signed off by each of the various sections, can we be given our tickets.

The Management section in Rome has done an excellent job of organizing out briefing seminars to help guide us through the details of our departures. They have produced a guidebook and a series of checklists and sent individualized countdown spreadsheets to each of us that sit on our computer desktops and can  be accessed every day. The guidebook even has a detailed list of suggestions on what to pack in your air freight shipment, what you'll need on home leave, what might go to storage, etc. I really hope that the packers have a copy and that they've studied it!! While the lists and guidebooks are helpful, if the Management section here was really interested in helping me they would simply assign someone to do it all for me.

Someone said, "Give me five reasons why you enjoy working in the NIV section." Okay.

I've completed my language training and can now muddle through simple conversations in butchered Italian. I've discontinued my volunteer work at the animal shelter and taken my final trip up to Bibenda in Assisi for my wine lessons. I've seen as much of Italy as I'm going to see on this trip and am already making plans to come back. My ride to Fiumicino Airport is scheduled for the morning of June 10th and my tickets are sitting in the HR safe waiting for my signed check-out sheet to be released. I'll spend this weekend seeing some friends and next weekend getting ready for the packers. I'll miss Italy and all my friends here, but I'll be back. In the meantime, I have one heck of an adventure ahead of me in Papua New Guinea. I just hope they give me a really nice house!

I'm quite certain that white ties are not required after Labor Day even in Port Moresby.

Everything's Negotiable

After bidding and lobbying and hugs and handshakes and finally, at last, paneling, you would think that you'd be finished with the entire process and would be all set to move on to your next post. You would, of course, be wrong.

Now you have to negotiate your transfer details, aka your orders, from your present post, or losing post, to your future post, or gaining post. It begins with the actual timing of your move but it doesn't end there. Your itinerary, any required or desired training, the shipment of your UAB (Unaccompanied Air Baggage) and HHE (Household Effects), the shipment of your POV (Privately Owned Vehicle) and your Home Leave will all have to be determined.  You begin the process by filling out a TMTWO form online and hitting the 'submit' button.

The TMTWO is the form you use to carefully craft your plan to cover all the details of your move and it's surprisingly interactive, coherent and easy to complete. When you have completed the form to your satisfaction, you hit 'submit' and it's automatically routed to all the parties who need to approve it: your supervisors, the HR sections at both posts, the Bureau assignment officer in charge of your move and HR in Washington DC. Then the games begin.

The losing post doesn't want you to leave until your replacement is physically pushing you out of your chair, while the gaining post wants you to arrive ten minutes after you've been paneled. In addition to the losing and gaining posts, you must also receive the Bureau's blessing on your transfer plans. So getting everyone to agree to the timing of your move seems a logical place to start.

In Rome I worked out a departure plan with the NIV Section Chief and our boss, the CG. Based on my arrival here in August 2009 I would be, theoretically, expected to depart from Rome in August 2011. My rotational tour had me working in the Econ Section for one year and then transitioning into Consular for my second year. However, because the officer I was replacing in Consular left post early, I was pulled into the NIV section in June instead of August. I was quite happy with this arrangement because I enjoy Consular work and this would give me an extra couple of months working with a great group of people.

I'll be the Management Officer in Port Moresby and the DCM there recommended that I take a course in Financial Management (FMO) at FSI before I report to post. The course is nine weeks long. I also have to take mandatory Home Leave after Rome. This is leave time we are given in addition to our regular annual leave. It must be taken in the US and is designed to ensure that Foreign Service Officers spend time in America between tours. I have over thirty-five days of Home Leave on the books.

So, sitting down with a calendar, an abacus and a slide rule, I worked out my itinerary. My proposed itinerary, or TMTWO, had me leaving Rome in June, taking most of my Home Leave before the FMO course, taking the course, then taking a final week of Home Leave in September to attend my son's wedding and finally heading down to PNG immediately after the wedding in the beginning of October, hungover but happy. The officer who will replace me in the Consular Section is already in Rome, working in the Econ Section. Therefore, leaving early isn't as much of a problem as it would otherwise be and so, Rome agreed to release me in mid-June, approximately two months early, based solely on my enrollment in the FMO course.

Upon discovering that I would be leaving Rome in June, PNG promptly asked me to forgo the training course and report to post immediately after Home Leave to cover the early departure of the incumbent Management Officer. Rome coughed discreetly into its hand and withdrew its approval for my early departure because I would no longer be attending a training program... and, I was back to square one. Now I would have to stay in Rome until August, not receive the Financial Management training, take my thirty-five days of Home Leave and still arrive in PNG in early October. Rome, it seemed, was willing to accommodate PNG when it came to training schedules but mere staffing shortages warrant no sympathy between posts.

In fairness, PNG is a very small post with fewer than a dozen American officers so gaps in staffing can have an exaggerated effect there. The current Management Officer was scheduled to depart in September but is, I would imagine, being pressured by his onward assignment to report there early. Once Bureau realized that I would either arrive in PNG in October with Financial Management training or I would arrive in October without it, they weighed in and re-set my original itinerary so that I'll arrive in PNG in October after my FMO training. The timing of your transfer will require some give and take all around.

Next on the list was negotiating with HR in Washington DC for the shipment of my car. State shipped my car to Rome for me and on my TMTWO I asked them to ship it back to the U.S. when my tour ends. It's a left-hand drive vehicle (as so many American cars tend to be) and PNG follows the British habit of driving on the left (or as we commonly think of it, the 'wrong') side of the road so I don't want to ship my old Mustang down there. I explained this in my TMTWO and stated that the government wouldn't incur any storage expenses in the U.S. because I'd put the car back in my garage.

I received a brief message from HR advising me that they "would not ship my POV back to the States simply so I could use it for Home Leave".  Realizing that there had been a miscommunication somewhere along the line, I decided to call the HR tech and explain the situation a bit more clearly. Silver tongue'd devil that I am, I was certain that I could sort this out in a couple of minutes on the phone. After all, my car would require special permits in PNG, post recommends against shipping left-hand drive vehicles and I wouldn't feel comfortable driving a left-hand drive vehicle in a right-hand drive world anyway. Therefore, if it wasn't going to PNG, the only option left would be to send it back where it came from...to Maine.

I suppose that my biggest failing is that I lack imagination. HR correctly brought to my attention during our conversation that a third option does indeed exist as noted in 14FAM615, the rules and regulations that govern our moves. "If you don't want your POV to go to your next post, we will ship it to our storage facility in Brussels (ELSO) and hold it until your post after that and then, we'll ship it there". "But", I said, "PNG will be my last post because I have to retire at the end of that tour". "In that case", the HR tech replied, "we'll ship it from ELSO back to the States when you retire"!

Somehow, shipping my car to ELSO, storing it for three years and then shipping it to the States made more sense to HR than simply shipping it to the States when I leave Rome. Helpfully, my HR tech reminded me that I could, in fact, purchase a right-hand drive vehicle at my present post and a) ship my old car to ELSO, b) store it there for three years, then c) ship it home, and they would d) ship the new vehicle to PNG. Yep, it's all right there in 14FAM615! Fortunately for me, those same regulations allow me to ship my POV to "an alternate destination" using 'cost-contruct'. This means that I can choose to ship the car back to Maine and pay the difference between the cost of that routing and the cost of shipping it to PNG or shipping it to ELSO and storing it for three years. Under 'cost-construct', the least expensive option is to simply ship it home so, in the end, the car will go back to Maine and I won't have to pay anything out of pocket. I have to make these arrangements with our Transportation Dept. in Washington after my orders are cut. Why, you may well ask, can't that be put on my orders? Beats me.

I honestly believe that they still think that I'm trying to scam them into shipping my car home so I can use it for Home Leave and somewhere in the dark suspicious part of my psyche, I believe that if I weren't going to the U.S. between posts they would have shipped it home without batting an eye!

The remaining chips on the table are the pack-out and shipping of my personal stuff, some from Rome to the U.S. and then to PNG and some from Rome directly to PNG, an approved access to the storage facility in Hagerstown while I'm at FSI, my request to use one week of my Home Leave after the FMO course and the actual routing of my trip to PNG. This last point is important because, depending on the routing, the trip to PNG from the east coast of the U.S. can take up to 40 hours!! Why do I suspect that the only acceptable routing on my orders will require me to row in the economy section of a small boat from Hawaii to Guam?

In other good news, my Class One Medical clearance will need to be renewed prior to my departure for PNG. That means a full fluids, filters and working parts tune-up before I leave Rome. In anticipation of this medical examination, and in full recognition of the deleterious effects of nearly two years of Italian food and enough gelato to pave a hockey rink, I have re-loaded the C25K program on my iPod and begun to run again! I, of course, use 'run' in the figurative sense of the word. I actually amble, meander, saunter and stroll on a treadmill in the gym in my apartment building. Breaking into anything more than a trot makes it almost impossible to hold my cigar and turn the pages on my book.

I took a trip up to Siena a few weeks ago and managed to climb the bell tower! I was somewhat surprised and moderately disappointed when post refused to send a helicopter to bring me back down!

Here's the view going back down the 479 steps.

For Christmas my son, the soon-to-be chef, gave me a brownie pan and five boxes of brownie mix. The entire NIV section in Rome thanks him.

Thanks!!

I have four months left in Rome (assuming my orders will finally be approved) and reservations for the guest room are now difficult to obtain as family and friends all jostle for a last visit to the Eternal City. I will stop volunteering at the dog shelter next week and I plan to spend my remaining weekends seeing as much of Italy as I can before I leave. I'm pretty sure that once HR discovers that I intend to use my POV to travel around the country, they'll insist on shipping it to the States immediately. Anyway, it sure will be nice to have it back in the States so I can use it while I'm on Home Leave!

PNG'd

I knew I should have copyrighted my name!

During orientation in the Foreign Service, among the many things you learn are dictionaries worth of acronyms. PNG'd, for example, is a bad thing. It means that you've been declared "Persona Non Grata" by the country in which you serve and you must leave. Diplomats can be asked to leave a country for violating its laws or in retaliation when host country diplomats are expelled from the U.S. or simply upon the whim of a dictatorial head of state. In either of the latter two instances there is a certain cachet in being PNG'd but in the first case, it is never thought to be career enhancing.

In my orientation class, we looked amongst ourselves and tried to guess who would be the first to become an ambassador and we reached an almost unanimous consensus on one candidate. He has not disappointed us and is well along the right track. When I suggested that we might also take a shot at forecasting who would be the first to be PNG'd, the opinions were more varied. However, I say with pride that I won the vote, if only by a narrow margin!

As of Monday last, I have been officially PNG'd. Fortunately for me, however, PNG is also an acronym for Papua New Guinea and that's where I'll be going next. I was offered and have accepted a handshake to be the next Management Officer in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, just made her first trip to Port Moresby in what I can only imagine was a visit to prepare them for my arrival. It was thoughtful of her to do so.

The bidding process for my first mid-level job, which began on August 5th with the release of the summer bid-list, is over. My goal was to find a Management Officer's position at a smaller embassy or consulate and the position would have to be non-language designated because I didn't want to spend any more time at FSI learning another language. So, from the more than 2,000 positions available on the original bid-list, I had between twenty and twenty-five spots that met my criteria. These had to be narrowed down to fifteen because that's the maximum number of bids we are allowed to submit. I picked fifteen jobs, prioritized them according to my own personal preferences and began to lobby.

Between August 5th and the end of the bidding process I sent and received 276 bid related emails. In addition to these were the emails sent directly from posts and bureaus to my various references and the subsequent responses. I can't imagine that there were fewer than 30 reference related emails. In addition to the 300 or so emails sent and received, I made about twenty telephone calls and had four telephone interviews. Lobbying is a serious business.

Because the decision on who will be offered which job is a collaborative effort between the post and the respective bureau, a candidate has to lobby both ends of the pole. This is especially important for first time mid-level bidders because many, if not all, of the people who control the job won't know you yet. So you introduce yourself and attempt to convince a group of total strangers that you are a well qualified and serious candidate for their vacancy. It is a time consuming and frustrating process.

There is a date, in our case November 8th, before which no handshakes can be offered. This is to ensure that everyone has a fair and equal opportunity to present their strongest effort for the jobs they want. In reality, however, many posts/bureaus have already pre-selected the candidate of their choice and will let you know early on that you "haven't made our short list of candidates".  While it isn't pleasant to hear that, it is a reality and it allows you to focus your efforts on jobs that are still actually available.

Towards the end of the process I had a realistic shot at four positions. After doing some more research (which consisted of tracking down people from each of the posts and soliciting their frank opinions), I removed myself from consideration for two of the jobs and received offers of a handshake on the remaining two. Port Moresby was my top remaining choice and I accepted it. It was just a simple as that!

As the Management Officer, I'll have responsibility for the infrastructure, finances, human resources and all the other services the embassy provides to its employees. I'll have most of the embassy's locally hired staff and three or four American officers reporting to me. Oh, and I'll be responsible for the embassy yacht.

Embassy Port Moresby has a 42' motor yacht that serves as an Emergency & Evacuation vessel and can be used by Embassy staff on the weekends. The waters around the country are filled with tropical reefs and several World War II wreck sites. There are all the usual South Pacific pleasures to enjoy: scuba, fishing, sailing, drinking cleverly named beverages filled with fruit and little umbrellas, and watching spectacular sunsets. On the flip side, Papua New Guinea does get fairly negative reviews in the media due to a sky high rate of violent crime, astronomic unemployment figures, crushing poverty, cholera, cannibalism and a bit of headhunting. At least it won't be dull.

The native dress seems to consist of something called "a penis sheath made from a dried gourd" which, I assume, I will only be required to wear to formal State functions. I am uncertain as to how one goes about being fitted for his gourd. Does one size fit all or are they individually tailored? Is there a choice of linings or only whatever it is that is on the inside of a gourd? The only photo I could find online showed a gentleman wearing his with panache and a white tie. I have a white tie.

I have spoken to several colleagues who have served there and to a man, or in one case a woman, they have enjoyed the experience without reservation. The biggest drawback to being there is that it takes about 40 hours to get there from the U.S. However, there's a rumor making the rounds that Continental might begin a direct Port Moresby - Guam flight which will cut 10 hours off the journey. It just keeps getting better!

This is either the Coliseum or one of the better hotels in Papua New Guinea.

I am still working as a Consular Officer in Rome adjudicating non-immigrant visas. Things became slightly more interesting here this week when a young woman came to the security check point and put her bag on the x-ray belt. She was wearing red leather boots and a long black coat. Standard procedure in this case required her to open her coat for a quick visual inspection. When she did so, it was noted in the duty log that "she was wearing red leather boots and a bulky black coat, no other clothing .. at all". Madam, your visa is approved!

Taking the castle in Assisi by storm.

My friend Mary came down from Embassy London for a quick visit to Rome and we did all the usual tourist stuff; visited the Coliseum, drank Prosecco, toured the Vatican and ate chocolate. Much of what I've enjoyed about living in Rome is the willingness of my friends to come here to visit. We had a perfect day for a drive up to Assisi and found a great little osteria in which to have lunch. It was one of those places where you just ask the waiter to bring you whatever is good that day. The meal was incredible. After lunch I told Mary that the guest room in Port Moresby would be hers for the asking and she said, "40 hours, cholera, cannibals, and crime, are you crazy!"  Hey, I have a boat!

Mary tossing her coin in the fountain and wishing to come back to Rome. PNG... not so much!

Knowing myself as well as I do, I fear that I am already drifting into the "that's interesting, but what does it have to do with Port Moresby" mode. This seems to be a fairly common occurrence in our lifestyle because we usually find out where we're going next long before we've finished what we're doing now. I still have a lot of things to finish at work and there is still an awful lot of Italy that I haven't seen. I won't know for a while yet what my actual date of departure from Italy will be and it's dangerous to lose too much focus on the job I'm doing now because, although I have a handshake on the PNG job, I still have to be paneled for it. Paneling makes the offer final and official and it can take place any time up to two months after the handshakes are given. Situations can and do arise prior to paneling that cause handshakes to be broken so until you are paneled you don't pack your bags. After I'm paneled for the job, I can begin to work out my travel orders which will then determine when I'll leave Italy, where I'll go from here, how long I'll stay there, what training I will require and when I will finally arrive in PNG.

I'm not finished with Italy by any means, but I am beginning to imagine what life in the South Pacific will be like. I'll be there about this time next year and there's a lot of stuff that has to happen between now and then. I'll have to get ahold of a comfortable dried gourd for one thing. So, pack up your red leather boots and plan on coming down for a visit! Did I mention I'll have a yacht?

Reflections From My Cage

Air kissed but not handshook.

The past month has been pretty interesting. Since the bid list came out on August 5th, I've been lobbying various Posts and Bureaus in an attempt to find my next job. Initially, all my lobbying was done by email and one of my good friends at post kept encouraging me to call the Posts in which I was interested. "You've got to set yourself apart," he said, "and let them get to know you a little more personally. You've got to let them know you're really interested. " 

"Look," I said, "I've bid fifteen jobs and my references are really strong. I've written a decent letter of introduction to each of the fifteen Posts and to each of the Post Management Officers at the responsible Bureaus. I've followed up with another letter explaining why I want that particular job and why I'd be a good match for it. I think I'll just wait to see what happens." My rationale was that, surely, out of fifteen jobs, I'd get one on the strength of my experience, my EERs and my references. 

What happened was that, in short order, I received notification from four of the more interesting Posts on my list to "direct your energies towards other positions because, due to the volume of interest we've received for our Management Officer vacancy, we will, unfortunately, not be able to further consider your bid." I even failed to make the short list for a Post that only had five bidders! The whole process seemed to be open, transparent and above-board in a closed, secretive and pre-determined sort of way.

There is an online bid list that we can access to see how many total bids there are for each job to date. The problem here is that our bids don't have to be submitted until October 12th and many people spend a lot of time lobbying prior to actually submitting their list. So, you may be looking at a job that only seems to have five people interested in it and feel you have a pretty good shot at it, but twenty other folks might be calling and writing to the Post expressing their interest prior to putting in their bids. Posts and Bureaus begin to cull their lists of candidates long before the bid lists are officially submitted. Although no jobs can be offered or accepted prior to the date stated in the bidding instructions (in this case it will be November 8th), in reality many decisions are made long before the bids close on Oct. 12th.

Since I wasn't being considered for jobs that were at my grade, I realized that the 'stretch' bids on my list were not going to even be a remote possibility. That took care of six more bids and, suddenly, I was down to five potential jobs out of the original fifteen. It was time for some drastic measures. It was time to follow good advice and begin making phone calls.

As I mentioned once before, the object of lobbying is to get a 'handshake' which is an official agreement between the Post, the Bureau and yourself that they'll offer you the job and you'll accept it. Handshakes can only be given after November 8th this year. How, you may well ask, does one begin to narrow the field down and focus on jobs that are actual possibilities? The easy ones are the Posts that let you off the hook early by telling you that you haven't made their short list. Then, much like at a high school prom, you begin the process of trying to figure out where you stand with the ones that are left. When I was in high school we sent our ambassadors out to find out if one girl or another would actually consider dancing with us before summoning up the nerve to go and ask her. In the Foreign Service we use phone calls, but it's the same concept.

I began calling Posts and Bureaus and soon learned which jobs were, in fact, positions that I would be competitive for and which weren't. In this phase of lobbying, both bidder and Post/Bureau try to determine where they rank on each others list. And, just like in high school, you don't want to be the guy who tells all the girls/Posts he loves them. Only one Post can be your top choice, it's a fact. At some point in the process you have to make that decision and then you let that Post know. Then, if all the stars are properly aligned and the gods smile down upon you, the Post let's you know that you are their top choice too. Then, my friend, you have just received an 'air kiss' otherwise known as a 'wink-wink, nudge-nudge, say no more' (the Foreign Service is eternally in Monty Python's debt).

Nothing is official yet, so you continue to lobby for other jobs but with the understanding that, should your top choice change, you will immediately let the first Post know and they will do the same for you. Closer to the handshake deadline, commitments become much firmer and Posts might actually tell you that they intend to offer you a handshake and they want to know if you're going to accept it. This is a 'hug'. Hugs really do make you feel warm and fuzzy, they're nice. Still, a hug is not an official offer either and all that those who have received them can say is, "A Post seems to be interested in me now but I'd better wait until handshakes are given before I say any more."

There are a couple of Posts that seem to be interested in me now. I am in a fortunate position because I don't have any strong preferences about where I live. I am much more interested in landing a job as a Management Officer than I am in trying to go to or avoid any particular country. There are one or two places in the world that most people do not want to go to, so I have a pretty good shot at a couple of those countries. One of them is so remote that Telecom Italia doesn't seem to be aware it even exists and doesn't have its country code in the system. Making that call was an interesting experience. I am, apparently, the first person ever to attempt to call from here to there.

If I don't get a handshake on one of the remaining positions on my list, I'll be asked to re-bid from what's left or I'll just be assigned somewhere, so I'm taking my air-kiss very seriously. 

Reservoir Dogs?

This photo was taken at Marica's wedding by one of her guests and she sent it to me with a note that said that it reminded her of that movie, "Pond Dogs". Before anyone begins to mistake the characters in the photo for Quentin Tarantino type tough guys, the guy on the left got lost in a tunnel on his way home from the reception. Admittedly, it isn't all that common for people to get lost in tunnels, but I managed to do it. I blame my GPS.

There is a tunnel in Rome, or rather on the outskirts of Rome, that leads, I am sure, to the River Styx and the gates of Hell. Virtually every tunnel I've ever driven through has been a pretty straightforward experience. You enter the tunnel, you drive a while, eventually you see the aptly named "light at the end of the tunnel" and you exit the tunnel. After leaving the wedding reception late in the evening, I followed my GPS's directions and drove into a tunnel I didn't remember driving through on my way to the reception. The tunnel was a long one and the road curved steadily to the left. Ten seconds after my GPS announced that it had lost satellite reception (because I was in a tunnel), I rounded a curve and saw that the road forked. Who puts options in a tunnel? And, if you're going to build in options, don't you think it would be polite to put up a sign or two? Whoever built this road didn't think it was necessary at all.

I randomly chose left and began an odyssey that lasted over half an hour because that wasn't the only fork in the road in the tunnel. None of the forks had signs and none of them led to an exit. It was about 2:00am and mine was the only car in the tunnel, so following someone else in the desperate hope that they knew how to get out of there wasn't a possibility. Eventually, after making a completely random series of rights and lefts, I wound up on a ramp leading out of the labyrinth and broke free into the dark night air. I was in a part of Rome that was totally unfamiliar to me. My GPS clicked back on and said, "Re-calculating. Make an immediate U-turn and drive 25 miles." Making a U-turn would have 'immediately' put me back into the tunnel so I opted to ignore the annoyingly insistent GPS, drove through the deserted streets of Rome for another hour before I saw a familiar road and finally got home. When I described my experience to my colleagues at work they said, "Oh yeah, well, when you go into that tunnel you just turn right, then left, then another left and then go straight a bit and make a hard right, then go past the sign that looks like it's warning you not to go that way but it isn't and you'll be fine." Simple when you know how.

If you peer through this window long enough, you can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

I'm being sent TDY to Naples next week for ten days. TDY stands for temporary duty and it means I'll be helping out at the Consulate there while one of their officers is away. I'll be doing much the same type of work I do in Rome and I'll get to experience life in Naples for a short while. It should be an interesting change of pace. I was up in Ravenna a couple of weeks ago with friends and saw their famous Byzantine mosaics (Ravenna's, not my friends'). Ravenna is also the burial place of Dante Alighieri or, more appropriately, the burial places of Dante Alighieri. He has a very ornate tomb with his name on it, an ivy covered mound with a sign stating that his bones were hidden beneath that dirt during the 40's and a crypt of some sort also claiming to have held some part of his mortal remains at some distant time in the past. Dead for over six hundred years and the man still has three places to sleep.

The perfectly perpendicular tower of Ravenna. 

I've spent some time relaxing on my 'terrace' lately. It's really the cage that OBO built to give me access to the fire escape, but I enjoy sitting there and smoking my cigar in the fresh air. The whole lobbying process seems somewhat inefficient to me but I'm not ready to begin suggesting improvements because I haven't really completed the whole process and I'm still learning some of the steps. Recently, due to a grave oversight on the part of the responsible authorities, I was given tenure and last Friday I was promoted. As I've always said, I'd rather be lucky than good! Now, if I can just get a handshake on that job in "wink-wink, nudge-nudge, say-no-more", I'll be the first to say that the prom was a success.

Two Weddings and a Baby

The bid list came out today and the smile simply means I don't really understand the process!

Bidding season is upon us.  It is the nature of the beast that every one, two or three years a Foreign Service Officer changes jobs and posts. Your first two assignments are 'directed', which means that you bid from a list of positions reserved for entry level officers. Your bids go to and are evaluated by a group of Career Development Officers who then assign you to one of the spots. Neither post nor the bureau really get too involved. Your first two jobs should set you up for tenure. By the end of your second tour you should be off language probation, have served as a Consular Officer for at least one year and have received at least two performance reviews or EERs. Then, with any luck at all, you are recommended for tenure and you bid mid-level positions for your third tour.

The 2010 Summer mid-level bid list came out on August 5th and there were 2,602 positions available to bid. Of these, 1,458 were overseas and the remainder were in Washington. Out of the 1,458 jobs overseas, 934 were at the 03 or 02 grades. Further narrowing down the list, there were 130 Management jobs among the 934 positions. Of these, only 30 were not language designated and 8 of those were 02s. You are required to enter at least six core bids. Your mandatory core bids must be "in cone/at grade". That means, in my case for example, that I have to enter at least six bids that are at the 03 grade and are in the Management cone. Out of 2,602 positions, 22 were potential core bids for me. The starting date for these core bids must be realistic with respect to the end of your current tour. If the position you are bidding requires a language course or any other training, you must factor that in. So, let's say your current job ends in August 2011 and you would like to bid on a job in Cambodia that begins in September 2011. If it's 'in cone/at grade' it would qualify as one of your six core bids. However, if it's language designated and you don't happen to speak fluent Cambodian and the full language course lasts for almost one year, then you can't realistically bid the job.

So, you sort and shuffle the bid list until you identify six positions that are 'in cone/at grade' and a) require a language in which you already have fluency, b) have a built in time frame for learning the new language or c) are not language designated. Fewer and fewer jobs are not language designated, but in the Management cone you can still find one or two. Once you've identified six core bids, you may select up to nine additional jobs to bid. These bids can be in cones other than your own and can be at a grade above yours, which is called a 'stretch'. If all this sounds confusing and time-consuming, it's only just begun.

I decided for many reasons, first among them being that I'm really really bad at it, to not learn another language. I'm fluent in Italian, unless someone who actually speaks Italian hears me, so I'm already off language probation and have checked that box. I've also decided, after a tour as a GSO, another as an Econ Officer and a third as a Consular Officer, that I want to return to the Management cone for my next assignment. It didn't take me very long to sort and shuffle the list to come up with my six core bids. Then I found nine other jobs that I am interested in. So, I now have fifteen positions on my bid list.

All fifteen are either GSO jobs at larger posts or Management Officer jobs at smaller posts. The locations range from 'right next door' Montenegro to 'other side of the world' Papua New Guinea. I've ranked the fifteen jobs in order of personal preference and, at the moment, Podgorica, Montenegro and Hanoi, Vietnam are tied for top choice. Ten of my fifteen are core bids and the other five are one-grade stretches. So, if I were bidding an entry level position, that would pretty much be it. I'd send my list in to my CDO with a well thought out justification for assigning me to my top choice and I'd sit back and wait a couple of weeks for the notification.

However, bidding mid-level is a pasta of a different flavor. The first difference is the timeframe. The bid list came out on August 5th but we don't have to submit our bids until October 12th. The posts we've bid will receive our formal bids on October 18th. No positions can be offered until November 1st. What, you are justified in asking, does one do between August 5th and October 12th? One lobbies. Lobbying is the major difference between entry and mid-level bidding.

You must do several things right away in order to be a viable candidate for any position you bid. Your resume and employee profile in Human Resources must be up to date. While you're doing that, you have to line up several potential references from people you've worked for, people you've worked with and people who have worked for you. Then you have to send 'Look at me, look at me' letters to the posts to let them know of your interest. On top of that, you have to send similar letters to the Bureaus at the State Dept. in Washington that are responsible for those posts. The posts and/or bureaus that are interested in your bid will then contact you and ask you to either give them the contact information for your references or to ask you to contact your references and have them send in their recommendations. This generates another round of emails between you and your references.

You must walk a fine line between showing sincere interest in a post and becoming a stalker. Posts want to know that you're interested in the position, but they don't want to be harassed by overeager applicants writing and calling them every other day. I've decided to send an initial letter of introduction and wait to see what happens. I am, however, fully prepared to go to phone calls, candygrams, and wired money transfers if it will help get me the job I want. There is no guarantee that I'll land any of the fifteen jobs on my list. If all those jobs go to other people, I have to replace them with a new set of bids from a markedly shorter list of 'leftover' positions.  If I can't land a position through lobbying, I will be assigned to any job anywhere including back at the State Department in Washington.

Since August 16th, when I sent out my first letters, I've sent and received over 140 bid related emails and there are still six weeks left before the bids close. Many of the responses I've received are basically form letters telling me where to send my references and how many to send, but the most personal response was from a post that let me know right away that I wasn't qualified. That crushing disappointment aside (by the way, when they described the job to me I agreed with them) I should know some time after November 1st where my guest room will be located come August 2011. My understanding of the process is that the dance becomes more intense as we get closer to the bidding deadline. Reference checks and telephone interviews will help posts make their final selections and job offers are given shortly after November 1st. A job offer with an acceptance is known as a 'handshake' and that's the goal.

Typical mid-level bidder prior to getting a handshake.

I still volunteer at the animal shelter on Sundays. It's located 31 kilometers north of my apartment and this morning I got stopped at a random check point by the police. They were checking documents and the insurance card in my glove box had expired a week ago. I explained that I had the new card on my table at home but forgot to put it in the car. They explained that it was against the law not to put it in the car. I explained that I am a diplomat and carry a card from the MFA that says I am not subject to arrest. They explained that I was still subject to a very hefty fine. They, of course, were, unfortunately, correct. While two of them went off to huddle and determine exactly how hefty the fine would be, I chatted with the third officer and mentioned that I was on my way to the animal shelter just up the road to spend the day cleaning kennels and feeding the dogs. Turns out that they knew of the kennel and like what we do there. I received a very polite warning, a request to put the new card in the car, no fine and a wave good-bye. Who knew that scooping dog poop would trump diplomatic immunity?

Someone tied a puppy to the gate yesterday so we have a new little guy to take care of. He's about four months old and is black with a white stripe on his back between his shoulders. He's built low to the ground, like a dachshund. Naming the dogs is a serious business so I suggested we call him Puzzola which means skunk in Italian. That didn't fly with my Italian co-volunteers so we ended up calling him Skunk which I have insisted is a very common name for really cute puppies.

Skunk, or as I like to think of him..Puzzola!

At the embassy, one of the women in the NIV section is getting married next Friday, another one is getting married in two weeks, a third is having a baby and the fourth is in the process of re-evaluating her current boyfriend with an eye towards upgrading. As you might imagine, we don't talk about baseball very much at work.  We adjudicate visa applications between discussions of wedding dresses (my position, when asked, is an unwavering "that looks nice"), wedding flowers ("those look nice"), wedding reception table decorations ("I like those, they are very nice"), baby clothes ("that's cute), baby names ("You don't hear the name Griselda much anymore. Old family name is it?"), and "He is taking me for granted!" (Uhhhhhh, huh. Hey did you see that the Yanks won last night?). The two weddings will be over by the middle of September, the baby will be born by the end of the year and the boyfriend will be voted off the show the next time he is "stupid", so I give him a week. The World Series won't be a big topic of conversation this year, but I have high hopes for the Super Bowl. Surprisingly, none of the women has the least bit of interest or sympathy when I start to whine about the bidding.

My car needed to have an oil change and friends at the embassy told me to go down to the Navy base in Naples to have it done because it is very expensive, at least 80 euros, in Rome. There is also the hassle of having to provide your own filter because none of the auto shops in Rome stock filters for 1995 Mustangs. So, I drove down to Naples on a Saturday morning and got my oil changed. The base is like an enormous Wal-Mart (are there any tiny Wal-Marts?) complete with movie theater, grocery store, food court and auto repair shop. They had the filter for my car in stock and changed the oil in about 30 minutes. The oil, filter and labor came to about $40, or close to what I'd pay in the States. The tolls down and back were around 30 euros. The gas, even with my discount ran close to 50 euros. You just don't get real good mileage in a 1995 Mustang with an old very fuel in-efficient engine. Then, the four tires they sold me on the spot rounded the whole package up to around $700. But, hey, at least I didn't pay 80 euros for an oil change in Rome.

Although I have some favorites on my bid list, I'll probably come running to the first post that gives me a come-hither look. Port Moresby ("very nice"), Nairobi ("it looks nice") or Reykjavik ("a nice place") are all in the running. All in all, it should be a very interesting couple of months and I have the phone number for those singing gorilla telegrams taped above my desk, just in case.

And Why Do You Want To Go To America?

Leaving the catacombs beneath Villa Taverna on my way to the Wine Tasting Event.

Italy is part of the visa waiver program which means that most Italians traveling to the US on vacation or brief business trips do not require a visa. However, there are several categories of visa for which even Italians must apply, such as student visas, religious worker visas, government official visas and my personal favorite, 'O' visas which have the annotation, "Person of Extraordinary Ability" printed right on them. I'd like one of those myself. Then there are third country nationals in Italy who require visas no matter what their reason is for travel. Our workload, therefore, on any given day is split roughly fifty-fifty between Italians requiring special categories of visa and third country nationals requiring visas of any type. My consular colleagues in the foreign service who work in some of the visa 'mills' (Mexico City, Manila or Mumbai for example) and interview 100 or more applicants each day would not be overly impressed by my workload. I typically interview between 25 and 30 applicants a day, four days each week. I process investor, government and diplomatic visas in the afternoons. On a particularly tough day I might refuse five visas. Like I say, folks who work in the trenches would consider this soft duty.

 It is, nonetheless, interesting duty and here's how it works in Rome. The Visa Chief, my immediate supervisor, determines how many reservation slots will be available on any given day. That number is passed along to a call center contracted to handle telephone inquiries and reservations. Visa applicants begin the process by going to the Rome visas website and filling in an online application form (DS-160). They then make a reservation with the call center for an appointment on a specific day. The call center charges their phone number 15 euros for that service. They are told how much the application for their category of visa will cost and they go to a local branch of the BNL bank, pay the fee and are given a receipt. The new fee is $140 for most visitor categories. That fee is non-refundable whether the application is approved or denied. Each family member must have a separate application form and pay the full fee.

On the appointed day, the applicants line up outside the consulate. They must have their passports, DS-160 forms, BNL receipts and any supporting documentation required for their category of visa. They may not have cell phones, other electronics, bags, backpacks, cartons, cases, or weapons. They may be on line for as long as two hours before they are passed through security into the NIV (Non-Immigrant Visa) Section. 

Once inside, they are met by one of our Italian staff members who will quickly check their documents and briefly explain the next few steps. She will then give them a number and ask them to wait until their number is called. Visa applicants are remarkably short on patience and will spend most of their 'waiting to be called' time wandering back to the staff member to ask if their number has been called yet. She remains calm and courteous at all times and resists the urge to slap them upside the head and say, "You have number 47, we have just called number 7. If you interrupt me again, I'm going to give you number 87!"

When their number is called, they go up to the first interview window where another Italian staff member enters all their information into our visa adjudication template. This staff member then takes their fingerprints and rechecks all of their documentation. When she's finished, she puts their application form with supporting documentation and payment receipt along with their passport into a bin and then directs them to the interview waiting area. She asks them to wait there until an officer calls them for an interview. I am one of those officers.

I pull the passport, DS-160 and receipt from the bin and call the applicant up for their interview. By the time they see me, they have experienced the frustrations of filling out a form online, dealing with a reservations system by phone, paying a fairly substantial amount of money to a bank clerk, standing in line outside the consulate for quite some time, passing through a rigorous security system, waiting to be checked in, waiting to be processed into the NIV system and then waiting again for their interview. I am behind bulletproof glass.

Our regulations state that all visa applicants are considered to be intending immigrants and that it is their responsibility to demonstrate to the satisfaction of the consular officer that they do not intend to immigrate to the US. They 'demonstrate' their intentions with their documentation and their interview. In short, they must convince us that they have greater reason to return to Italy than to remain in the US. Sadly, some intending immigrants are not entirely truthful when asked why they want to go to America. Rarely will a 20 year old Albanian hairdresser who has been in Italy for eight months and can barely pay her rent say anything but, "I've always wanted to spend two weeks at Disney World."

In Rome we have the luxury of time, which many of our colleagues at busier posts do not, to refuse visa applicants with apologies and explanations. I typically say, "I'm sorry but I cannot approve your application today because your ties to Italy are not strong enough at this time." I give them a pre-printed letter of explanation, sympathize with them for a moment and their interview is over. Fortunately, refusals are relatively rare in Rome and it's much more satisfying to approve visa applications than to deny them.

Although making the final decision on whether to approve or deny rests solely with the American consular officer, the entire adjudication process is most definitely a team exercise. We are most fortunate in Rome to have a terrific team of intelligent, hard working and very knowledgeable local staff. I didn't realize before starting in the consular section, how much teamwork is involved in this area. It's definitely a part of the job that has come as a very pleasant surprise.

I briefly checked one applicant's documentation for a visa to do some research in the US. Then I asked him a few questions about his work and when he claimed to be an astrophysicist on his way to MIT I cleverly asked, "Can you please explain dark matter to me in laymen's terms?" He stared at me for a minute and said, "If I could, I'd probably get a Nobel Prize." Enjoy your time in America, Sir.

The catacombs beneath Villa Taverna.

Most of our embassies have a CLO (Community Liaison Office) to help plan various social activities for us. Sightseeing trips, buses to the Commisary in Naples, special tours of Rome's museums and movies at Villa Taverna are all examples of the kinds of things the CLO puts together and offers to the embassy community. Once a year, the CLO holds an auction to raise money to support its budget. Various goods and services are donated and the auction takes place on a Saturday night in late Spring. It's a dress up affair with an open bar. The 'dress up' part isn't as important to the story as is the 'open bar' part.

I didn't attend the auction this year because I had a friend in town and we already had plans to do something else. On Monday, my friend Dave stopped by my office and said, "Didn't see you at the auction." I told him why I couldn't make it and he said, "Doesn't matter. By the way, you won the Wine Tasting Event." "Huh?" I replied.

He explained that he and our mutual friend Stacie had decided, after planning their strategy at the aforementioned 'open bar' for an hour or two before the bidding began, to outbid all comers for the Wine Tasting Event being donated by the Ambassador. Unfortunately, once the bidding  began, it became apparent that two different syndicates had been formed with exactly the same strategy in mind. Dave and Stacie, drinks in hand, never batted an eye and simply raised every bid by ten euros until they reached 1,000 euros. Here the syndicates both blinked and, sensing blood, Stacie jumped the bid to 1,200 euros. While the syndicates were both frantically calling their absent members on cellphones for approval to exceed previously agreed limits, the hammer fell three times and Dave and Stacie had just won the Wine Tasting Event. "Great," I said. "Count me in. How many of us are there?" He explained that, including me, there were already three of us. "But," he said, "this includes dinner too!" 400 euros to spit wine into a bucket and eat fingerfood was a deal I couldn't pass up.

 The wine tasting room in the catacombs beneath Villa Taverna.

Fortunately, by the night of the event we had gathered the maximum allowed ten participants. The Wine Tasting Event was held at the Ambassador's residence, Villa Taverna, in a wine cellar designed and built by his predecessor. To get to the small elegant wine tasting room, we walked through ancient Roman catacombs that were only discovered during the construction of the wine cellar. We were served four white wines and four red wines by a sommelier who had personally chosen them from Villa Taverna's 5,000 bottle collection. He explained what we might be experiencing with each vintage and asked us to tell him what we thought of each one. I thought that one eighty euro bottle of red was just fine, and said so.

After tasting the eight wines, we took a break up by the pool while the staff cleared the table for dinner.

Each of us was asked which of the eight wines we preferred to have during dinner and everyone was given his or her choice. "Gimme that 80 euro red," I said sophisticatedly. The food was every bit as good as the wine and I barely saved room for coffee and dessert. As we were departing late in the evening, the sommelier mentioned to us that we were the first people to use the wine tasting room. I'll be more than happy to join any future groups planning to take advantage of this opportunity and our bidding strategy will begin with an open bar.

CinqueTerre is a group of five small villages up on Italy's Ligurian Coast. They are connected to one another by a hiking trail, a railroad and a ferry, making it possible to move from one to the next in several different ways. The five towns have been designated a National Park by the Italian government and a 'must see' destination by most guidebooks. It shouldn't be a surprise, therefore, to learn that I was not completely alone in CinqueTerre. There couldn't have been more than 900,000 people, divided about equally into three main groups, wandering back and forth between the five villages while I was trying to enjoy the sights.

The town of Vernazza, seen from the hiking trail.

The first group was the American college students. A huge number of Americans attend college in Italy every year and most of them went to CinqueTerre the same weekend I chose to visit. They were, for the most part, clean cut and energetic. They moved up and down the hiking trail without apparent effort and spent their evenings in the many bars soaking up great quantities of beer, wine, grappa and limoncello. The second group was the Italian contingent. They seemed to travel in tour groups of thirty to fifty people invariably led by a loud woman with an umbrella or pennant held over her head. The majority of them appeared to be in their 30's and 40's. They positioned themselves on the train platforms to take advantage of their mass and charged the opening doors of the train with martial enthusiasm. The third group was the Germans. They were robust and hardy and never took the train or boat. They wore shorts and sturdy hiking boots with heavy socks. They all had backpacks, two lethal looking hiking poles and very determined expressions as they marched along the trail. They were all probably in their fifties and I always moved politely aside as they and their hiking poles came swinging by. I tried to represent a fourth group, the sophisticated, erudite man-of-the-world type of traveller but failed when I managed to get lost on a well-marked trail between two of the villages. Thankfully, a couple of German tourists pointed me in the right direction with their poles or I'd be wandering among the grapevines even still. So that's what this path with all the red and white signs is, it's the trail. Danke!

Corniglia is the only town without its own beach.

In search of a decent lunch in one of the picturesque little towns I made a fatal mistake and ate in a waterfront restaurant with menus printed in five languages. Chef Boyardee would have been ashamed of the spaghetti I was served and I can honestly claim it as the worst meal I've had in Italy. That night, however, I ate in a small place down an alley that had its menu written in Italian in chalk on a board and that meal of stuffed anchovies and calamari more than made up for lunch.

I stayed here in the first town in line, Riomaggiore.

The five towns are very special and well deserve their reputation for having some of the most beautiful scenery in Italy. A two-day pass for the hiking trail also allows you to hop on and off the train, but the boat requires a separate ticket. You'll come into intimate contact with hordes of strangers on either the boat or train. Success has probably spoiled CinqueTerre somewhat in the last few years but the scenery is still magnificent and well worth the visit.

However, just south of CinqueTerre, along the Bay of Poets, are three small towns that have not yet been overrun by tourists. San Terenzo, Lerici and Telaro are also very picturesque and beautiful and only seem to be visited by Italian families on vacation. The three small towns line the shores of the Bay of Poets (named for Percy Bysshe Shelley who seems to have drowned while boating right off shore from San Terenzo) and can be hiked from top to bottom in about an hour and a half. I had one of the very best meals I've eaten in Italy in San Terenzo and two of the most relaxing days. If you decide to go to CinqueTerre but can't get reservations in any of the hotels or BandB's, I'd recommend that you try San Terenzo or Lerici instead. However, if you're a poet I'd suggest you skip a sunset cruise on the bay.

Picturesque and quiet, San Terenzo!

I still want to get down to Puglia and see the towns of Otranto and Lecce. They're on the heel of the boot and are said to have some of the most beautiful sea views in Italy. Actually, I really need to explore the entire Italian coastline, down one side and up the other to be able to make an informed judgement. I only have a little more than a year to do it, so I'd better not waste too much time working!

I was walking home from work the other day when I saw an attractive young woman (a not uncommon sight on the streets of Rome) walking towards me arm-in-arm with her mother. When she was about five feet from me she stopped, pointed to me and said, "Ciao!" I said, "Hello?," but because it was pretty clear that I didn't know who she was she said, "You gave me a visa last week! Thank you soooo much!" Ooops, enjoy your stay at Disney World, miss, and avoid the restaurants with menus printed in five languages.