Latest / Core Memory / She Survived Being Shot, Bombed And Working At Google - EP 58 Anna Prouse

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She Survived Being Shot, Bombed And Working At Google - EP 58 Anna Prouse · Core Memory

0:00
SPEAKER_03: I could also understand why the guy wanted me dead.
0:05
SPEAKER_03: Now, on the way there, he killed everyone in the car.
0:09
SPEAKER_00: So, yeah, you duck and then you get out of the car.
0:12
I duck and I figure out that they're all dead because then I
0:16
have to climb over my
0:18
SPEAKER_03: dead friend's body.
0:20
SPEAKER_03: And there's chaos around the car.
0:22
SPEAKER_03: And I'm like, oh, my God, everyone's screaming.
0:25
SPEAKER_03: And I'm like, oh, God, I don't want to be lynched.
0:28
SPEAKER_03: I mean, to die because you beat the hell out of me, please not.
0:32
SPEAKER_03: So I...
0:33
SPEAKER_03: Run into a house.
0:35
SPEAKER_03: And in Baghdad at that time, all the doors are open to let the air flow.
0:40
SPEAKER_03: And,
0:40
SPEAKER_03: you know,
0:42
SPEAKER_03: I watched probably too many movies and I ran into a corner because,
0:45
SPEAKER_03: you know,
0:46
SPEAKER_03: at least in a corner,
0:47
SPEAKER_03: your shoulders are,
0:48
SPEAKER_03: you know,
0:49
SPEAKER_03: something behind you and I'll scrutinize what's in front of me.
0:55
SPEAKER_03: And I'll wait for the Marines to come and save me.
0:58
SPEAKER_03: So my husband's like, where are the Marines?
1:00
SPEAKER_03: Where are the Marines?
1:01
SPEAKER_03: And that's when you realize, no, this is not a movie.
1:04
SPEAKER_03: I mean, time that anyone knows that this is happening on the streets.
1:07
SPEAKER_03: And I'll be dead.
1:09
SPEAKER_03: So I need to figure this out on my own.
1:11
SPEAKER_03: And instead of the Marines,
1:12
I have a bunch of women in black charters come in and do the
1:16
classic shouting.
1:17
SPEAKER_00: You're in somebody's house.
1:19
SPEAKER_00: I'm in somebody's house.
1:19
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
1:20
SPEAKER_03: In a corner with a bunch of dead people out.
1:22
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:23
And so the lady comes in with all her friends,
1:26
I guess,
1:27
and they start,
1:28
it's panic.
1:29
SPEAKER_03: So they scream, they do the panic scream.
1:32
SPEAKER_03: And I'm like,
1:33
SPEAKER_03: oh God,
1:33
SPEAKER_03: now the snipers,
1:34
SPEAKER_03: because I still think about the snipers,
1:36
SPEAKER_03: the snipers will know that I'm here.
1:39
SPEAKER_03: And then I'm saying,
1:40
SPEAKER_03: okay,
1:40
I am not getting shot at while staring at the person who's
1:45
shooting at me.
1:46
SPEAKER_03: If I'm getting killed today, I'm running for survival.
2:06
SPEAKER_00: Hello, everyone.
2:07
SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the Core Memory Podcast.
2:10
SPEAKER_00: This is Ashley Vance, as always.
2:12
SPEAKER_00: Today, we have a different sort of podcast.
2:17
There is going to be some tech and Silicon Valley-ness to this
2:22
at some point,
2:23
but we're going to tell you one of the most extraordinary
2:28
stories that I have run
2:29
SPEAKER_00: into in a long time.
2:30
SPEAKER_00: Someone who's lived just an amazing...
2:34
SPEAKER_00: life.
2:34
SPEAKER_00: Anna Prowse is this person.
2:37
SPEAKER_00: How are you?
2:37
SPEAKER_03: I'm good.
2:38
SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
2:39
SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
2:39
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for being here.
2:40
I'm going to ramble for a second just to set all this up
2:44
because it is a little bit
2:45
SPEAKER_00: different,
2:45
SPEAKER_00: but we share a hairstylist,
2:48
SPEAKER_00: I think is what they are called these days.
2:50
SPEAKER_00: And her name is...
2:53
SPEAKER_00: Jessica Miani.
2:54
SPEAKER_00: She's lovely.
2:54
SPEAKER_00: I've been going to her for 15 years.
2:57
SPEAKER_00: If you, if you live in Palo Alto and you need a hairstylist, look her up.
3:02
SPEAKER_00: And so I'm in the chair.
3:03
SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
3:03
SPEAKER_00: It was like two months ago, I think.
3:05
And she's like,
3:06
you know,
3:07
one of my other customers,
3:09
she's lived this amazing time.
3:12
SPEAKER_00: She's just written this book.
3:15
She already had a book come out in Italy about a memoir,
3:18
a biography about her life.
3:20
SPEAKER_00: And then she's translating it into English.
3:23
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, well, what's it about?
3:25
She's like,
3:25
wow,
3:25
she's this Italian and she was in Iraq and Iran and was...
3:33
SPEAKER_00: working at the Red Cross and then got involved with the U.S.
3:37
SPEAKER_00: military and General Petraeus and had all these near-death experiences.
3:42
SPEAKER_00: It was unfolding the story.
3:44
SPEAKER_00: I was like, I have to talk to this woman.
3:46
SPEAKER_00: And so we've never met before.
3:48
SPEAKER_01: No, we've not.
3:49
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I think I emailed you just a few days ago.
3:51
SPEAKER_00: I was like, please, will you come into the studio and tell your story?
3:54
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, here you are.
3:55
SPEAKER_00: So the book...
3:58
SPEAKER_00: Okay,
3:58
SPEAKER_00: there's a million places we could go because in your book,
4:01
SPEAKER_00: you lay out your life story and I want to get into it,
4:04
but I thought we would maybe not go chronologically just
4:07
because I want to give
4:08
SPEAKER_00: people a feel for this incredible career you've had,
4:11
SPEAKER_00: which is harrowing and inspiring and just extraordinary.
4:15
SPEAKER_00: Um, so...
4:16
SPEAKER_00: You're Italian.
4:18
SPEAKER_00: You've written a book called Honorary Man, which it's an amazing title.
4:22
SPEAKER_00: We're going to explain what that means.
4:25
SPEAKER_00: But I'm going to transport us to 2001 is where I thought I would start,
4:29
which is the September 11th attacks have literally just
4:33
happened as you were
4:35
SPEAKER_00: already planning to go to Iran,
4:38
SPEAKER_00: I think as a journalist.
4:41
SPEAKER_00: And you were going to cover something else.
4:44
SPEAKER_00: But in this moment when probably everybody else would have been like,
4:47
SPEAKER_00: I'm canceling my flight to Tehran.
4:49
SPEAKER_00: This is probably not the best time to go.
4:52
SPEAKER_00: You decide to go anyway.
4:54
SPEAKER_00: And this sets you up for, what is it?
4:57
SPEAKER_00: It's about like a 12-year run in the Middle East or even...
5:01
SPEAKER_03: Even more.
5:02
SPEAKER_03: I still go out in the Middle East quite a lot.
5:05
SPEAKER_03: So it's been then my career since then.
5:08
SPEAKER_00: Okay, okay.
5:09
SPEAKER_00: So WACA, take me to 2001.
5:11
SPEAKER_00: September 11th has just happened.
5:13
SPEAKER_00: And you're at home or you're at the airport.
5:16
SPEAKER_00: And what were you setting out to do?
5:18
SPEAKER_00: And then what happened next?
5:20
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so...
5:23
September 11 happened and on that same morning I had gone to
5:27
the Iranian embassy,
5:28
SPEAKER_03: Iranian consular office in Milan to pick up my visa.
5:32
Now they knew me well because I had been in Iran before to
5:35
write a book about Iran.
5:38
SPEAKER_03: And they give me my visa and then I go home and I see what happens.
5:45
SPEAKER_03: And you're right.
5:46
SPEAKER_03: I remember my family saying, well, of course you're not going.
5:49
SPEAKER_03: And my friends were like, no way.
5:53
SPEAKER_03: And I was like, no, I even more so want to go.
5:56
SPEAKER_03: Um...
5:59
SPEAKER_03: It was mainly to understand what was happening in those moments.
6:03
I already knew that the world would start saying,
6:06
oh,
6:07
find some involvement of the Iranians.
6:09
SPEAKER_03: The Iranians seem to always be involved in something.
6:13
SPEAKER_03: Whether they do it or don't do it, they're always in it.
6:16
SPEAKER_03: And I was comfortable also because I had been there before.
6:18
SPEAKER_03: I need to say that.
6:20
But when I landed in Tehran,
6:21
I was nervous because I was like,
6:23
well,
6:23
I look,
6:24
I'm Westerner.
6:25
SPEAKER_03: I clearly look Westerner.
6:28
what's next yeah and the moment i landed and i arrived at the
6:33
border control he was
6:34
like oh my god ma'am we are so sorry for what happened which
6:39
was the difference the
6:40
time before when i landed it was like welcome to iran welcome
6:42
to iran which was
6:43
always weird because in our in our mentality especially it was
6:46
1999 2000 it's like
6:49
iran is is the axis of evil and there's ahmadine you know
6:52
there's it's it's
6:54
SPEAKER_03: And so already the welcome was weird.
6:58
SPEAKER_03: And now this time it's like, my God, we are so sorry for what happened.
7:01
SPEAKER_03: So I started going out in the streets.
7:03
SPEAKER_03: And again,
7:03
SPEAKER_03: I had an assignment from La Repubblica,
7:05
SPEAKER_03: which is a newspaper I was a foreign correspondent for for a long time.
7:10
SPEAKER_03: And I had to run down,
7:13
SPEAKER_03: figure out what...
7:14
SPEAKER_03: It was a study,
7:16
SPEAKER_03: the last example of nomads that existed in that part of the world.
7:23
SPEAKER_03: So I already had someone who would take me in the middle of nowhere...
7:26
SPEAKER_03: And,
7:26
SPEAKER_03: you know,
7:27
SPEAKER_03: you don't know where nomads are,
7:28
SPEAKER_03: so you have to find them,
7:29
SPEAKER_03: run after them,
7:30
SPEAKER_03: and figure out from fireplaces.
7:32
SPEAKER_03: They were here yesterday, the day before yesterday.
7:34
SPEAKER_03: It was a fascinating topic.
7:36
SPEAKER_03: So the Qashqais and the Bakiris, and they hate each other.
7:39
SPEAKER_03: So it was a whole thing about internal Iran.
7:42
SPEAKER_03: And...
7:45
SPEAKER_03: And I still wanted to do that also because had I said,
7:48
SPEAKER_03: I want to then report about what's happening,
7:50
SPEAKER_03: I probably would not have got into the country.
7:52
SPEAKER_03: So I snuck in.
7:55
But then my focus,
7:56
my main focus was,
7:57
let's see what actually is happening on the street.
8:00
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
8:00
SPEAKER_00: And so you got to shift your reportage in the moment.
8:06
SPEAKER_00: And what did you find?
8:08
SPEAKER_03: I found zero American flags being burnt.
8:11
SPEAKER_03: Zero.
8:11
SPEAKER_00: Zero.
8:13
I found people who in the streets would stop me and say,
8:16
oh my God,
8:17
we're so sorry.
8:18
SPEAKER_03: Are you American?
8:19
SPEAKER_03: We're so sorry.
8:20
SPEAKER_03: And they all said, somehow we will get the blame.
8:23
SPEAKER_03: Although then they figured out it was Saudi and Egypt.
8:27
SPEAKER_03: And it was like, somehow Iran will get some sort of a blame.
8:31
SPEAKER_03: And again, I couldn't find a single.
8:34
SPEAKER_03: Nobody was angry.
8:35
SPEAKER_03: Nobody.
8:36
SPEAKER_03: Everyone was horrified with what had happened.
8:39
SPEAKER_03: So I went then to the stadium for a soccer game because I like to,
8:44
SPEAKER_03: when I report on countries,
8:45
SPEAKER_03: not just meet the people who,
8:48
SPEAKER_03: in brackets,
8:48
SPEAKER_03: count.
8:49
I want to see how the people react on the streets because that
8:52
is the real deal.
8:56
SPEAKER_03: And they observed a minute of silence.
8:58
SPEAKER_00: I had never heard anything like that before.
9:00
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
9:01
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
9:02
SPEAKER_03: To commemorate the deaths that took place in the U.S.
9:06
SPEAKER_03: So that was heartwarming and shocking, in a good way shocking.
9:09
SPEAKER_03: So I wrote about it, and I'm like, no burnt flags.
9:13
SPEAKER_03: This is what I'm seeing.
9:14
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
9:15
SPEAKER_00: And you mentioned that you had traveled a lot before.
9:18
I mean,
9:19
in your book,
9:20
people will see you have wanderlust from a young age.
9:24
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
9:25
SPEAKER_00: And you have a propensity to go into difficult circumstances.
9:29
SPEAKER_00: And so you're not a stranger even to this part of the world.
9:33
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
9:34
SPEAKER_00: And,
9:35
SPEAKER_00: but like you said,
9:36
SPEAKER_00: going in,
9:36
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
9:37
SPEAKER_00: even you had these preconceived notions about what you would find.
9:40
SPEAKER_00: And I think as our discussion goes on,
9:43
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
9:44
SPEAKER_00: we're going to find there is no,
9:46
SPEAKER_00: there's not much black and white.
9:47
SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of gray.
9:51
SPEAKER_00: Okay,
9:52
SPEAKER_00: so this happens,
9:54
SPEAKER_00: you've been a travel writer,
9:56
SPEAKER_00: you're writing for the newspaper,
9:59
SPEAKER_00: and then I was going to cut,
10:00
SPEAKER_00: if it makes sense,
10:01
SPEAKER_00: to 2003,
10:03
SPEAKER_00: which is,
10:04
SPEAKER_00: people should also know,
10:05
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
10:05
SPEAKER_00: you had experience in your teenage years working with ambulances.
10:10
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I was a volunteer with the Red Cross, I was working on ambulances.
10:15
SPEAKER_00: And you'd have these ties to the Red Cross.
10:19
SPEAKER_00: And so 2003 comes, George Bush is up on an aircraft carrier.
10:23
SPEAKER_00: He says, mission accomplished.
10:26
And so it's right around that time that I think then now you're
10:30
going to Iraq and
10:33
SPEAKER_00: you're joining up with the Red Cross,
10:35
SPEAKER_00: I believe.
10:35
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
10:36
SPEAKER_03: Yeah,
10:36
SPEAKER_03: in the meantime,
10:37
I became a Red Cross international delegate because Iran kind
10:43
of unleashed
10:44
SPEAKER_03: something inside me.
10:47
SPEAKER_03: I still believe being a journalist is the nicest job that one can have.
10:51
SPEAKER_03: I would be the eyes of who is not lucky enough.
10:54
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
10:55
SPEAKER_03: But I need to be the eyes.
10:56
SPEAKER_03: You know, if then what I see, you still need to publish what's happening.
11:02
SPEAKER_03: And I started figuring out that journalism was kind of transitioning.
11:05
It was no longer,
11:07
it was like,
11:07
well,
11:08
you need to say what we want you to say.
11:11
And so maybe with a bit of presumption,
11:14
I just said,
11:15
you know what,
11:15
I'm quitting.
11:16
SPEAKER_03: This is not what I want to do.
11:17
SPEAKER_03: I'll freelance.
11:19
SPEAKER_03: Now, I am not really good at selling myself.
11:23
SPEAKER_03: That's a problem as a freelancer.
11:25
Freelancing was excruciatingly hard for me,
11:28
you know,
11:29
to go to dinners and pitch an idea.
11:31
SPEAKER_03: And if they say no, you have to insist.
11:34
SPEAKER_03: I'm used to if they say no, I just walk out.
11:36
SPEAKER_03: It's...
11:38
SPEAKER_03: So then I decided I'll just try another career path.
11:40
And I won this competition with International Red Cross in
11:43
Geneva and became an
11:44
SPEAKER_03: International Red Cross delegate.
11:46
SPEAKER_03: And on June 6,
11:47
SPEAKER_03: I get this call,
11:50
SPEAKER_03: 2003,
11:51
SPEAKER_03: I get this call and saying,
11:53
SPEAKER_03: listen,
11:53
SPEAKER_03: we're looking for someone to set up a field hospital in downtown Baghdad.
11:59
SPEAKER_03: We're thinking about you.
12:00
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
12:00
And so,
12:01
like,
12:01
at this point,
12:01
the Americans are supposed to be kind of,
12:03
like,
12:03
pulling back or no?
12:06
SPEAKER_00: I mean, they're sort of setting up for the Reconstruction.
12:08
SPEAKER_03: No, Americans are there, and it's full-fledged still, you know, chaos.
12:13
SPEAKER_03: Actually, I think we, or the coalition, thought that...
12:19
SPEAKER_03: Mission accomplished.
12:21
SPEAKER_03: We'll hand over to the Iraqis.
12:22
SPEAKER_03: They will figure it out.
12:24
SPEAKER_03: Sort of like World War II.
12:26
SPEAKER_03: You know, we go there and they'll do it themselves.
12:30
SPEAKER_03: And that's not what happened.
12:32
SPEAKER_03: The Iraqis, you know, people who are under dictatorships forever.
12:36
SPEAKER_03: They can't figure it out.
12:38
SPEAKER_03: And it's not because they're dumb.
12:39
SPEAKER_03: It's like they have never done it before.
12:41
SPEAKER_03: So they need coaching.
12:42
SPEAKER_03: They need help.
12:43
SPEAKER_03: Now, the Red Cross was a burnt unit.
12:46
SPEAKER_03: And,
12:46
SPEAKER_03: you know,
12:47
SPEAKER_03: bad burns was a huge issue,
12:48
SPEAKER_03: not from bombs and things,
12:50
SPEAKER_03: but from cooking with kerosene.
12:52
SPEAKER_00: I read about this in the book.
12:53
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
12:53
SPEAKER_00: yeah,
12:54
SPEAKER_00: so women there were cooking with these synthetic fabrics,
13:01
SPEAKER_03: and then with kerosene,
13:02
SPEAKER_03: which is highly inflammable,
13:04
SPEAKER_03: and they catch fire.
13:05
SPEAKER_03: These fabrics catch fire, and they burn.
13:08
Was that somehow a factor of the war,
13:12
cooking with the kerosene,
13:13
or this was just an ongoing?
13:14
No,
13:14
it was an ongoing,
13:15
and interestingly,
13:16
still very much ongoing in a lot of countries.
13:19
SPEAKER_03: It's the cheapest way to be able to cook.
13:21
SPEAKER_00: So,
13:21
SPEAKER_00: yeah,
13:22
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
13:22
SPEAKER_00: there's like right from the get-go,
13:24
there's these harrowing stories in your book about these women
13:28
with the clothes
13:29
SPEAKER_00: fused to their bodies.
13:31
SPEAKER_03: And often the kids are with them in the kitchen, so they catch fire too.
13:35
So it was maybe one of the most horrifying experiences that
13:41
I've ever had.
13:41
SPEAKER_03: I still remember when I entered the field hospital that we had to set up,
13:46
SPEAKER_03: and I saw this line of people outside.
13:50
SPEAKER_03: I thought, maybe this time, Anna, you have overdone it.
13:53
SPEAKER_03: But I do not like to go home with my tails between my legs.
13:59
SPEAKER_03: And I say, well, it's done.
14:01
SPEAKER_03: I came in on an old Russian Ilyushin.
14:03
SPEAKER_03: I'm here.
14:04
SPEAKER_03: Let's figure it out.
14:05
SPEAKER_00: And did you have a sense of going into this how long you would be there?
14:10
SPEAKER_03: I thought I would stay there for a couple months.
14:12
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
14:12
SPEAKER_00: To set up this field hospital?
14:13
SPEAKER_03: To set up the field hospital.
14:15
SPEAKER_03: And there was also the journalist in me who was like,
14:17
SPEAKER_03: this is also the best way to figure out what is actually happening here.
14:21
SPEAKER_03: Because if you're embedded with the U.S.
14:23
SPEAKER_03: military, you'll get one vision.
14:24
SPEAKER_03: If you run around,
14:25
SPEAKER_03: you know,
14:26
SPEAKER_03: so it was for me also the best way to potentially,
14:30
SPEAKER_03: when I went back to Italy,
14:31
SPEAKER_03: report.
14:32
SPEAKER_00: And so what, what ends up dragging you in longer and longer?
14:38
You know,
14:38
what ended up dragging me at first,
14:40
it was,
14:40
OK,
14:40
it's not done in a couple of months.
14:42
SPEAKER_03: You need to stay a little bit longer.
14:43
And then when I figured out we had to then move,
14:46
it was dangerous out there.
14:47
So eventually I decided we need to move under a structure so
14:52
that we don't get rocket.
14:53
SPEAKER_03: We're under tents.
14:54
SPEAKER_03: And it was, you know, for a few months, it's fine.
14:56
SPEAKER_03: But then when the war is in brackets over, it's no longer fine.
15:00
SPEAKER_03: So once I did that shift and worked a lot with the Iraqis,
15:04
SPEAKER_03: and clearly went along with the Iraqis,
15:06
SPEAKER_03: I was invited at the Italian embassy for my farewell party,
15:13
SPEAKER_03: which I discovered was not a farewell party.
15:17
SPEAKER_03: It was a job offer from the US administration.
15:22
And the job offer was,
15:23
okay,
15:24
we need to rebuild the health system in Iraq.
15:27
SPEAKER_03: We have seen you in action.
15:30
SPEAKER_03: And you are accomplishing things that we have no idea how you make it.
15:36
SPEAKER_03: Could you please come and help us?
15:38
I could be getting my timelines wrong,
15:41
but this is coming from David Petraeus.
15:43
SPEAKER_03: David Petraeus was after.
15:44
SPEAKER_00: That's later.
15:45
SPEAKER_03: This came from the senior advisor.
15:46
SPEAKER_03: This came from Ambassador Bremer and his senior advisor, Jim Haveman.
15:52
SPEAKER_03: And I couldn't believe it.
15:55
SPEAKER_03: I was my first reflection, but I'm not American.
15:57
SPEAKER_03: I can't work for the American government if I'm not American.
16:00
SPEAKER_03: They had already set it all up.
16:01
They had already asked the Italians,
16:03
you know,
16:03
to pay for my check and me to go under the U.S.
16:08
SPEAKER_03: umbrella.
16:09
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17:03
And so like throughout your book,
17:04
I mean,
17:04
you have this knack of not really taking sides.
17:08
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
17:09
SPEAKER_00: you're working for the Americans ostensibly or the Red Cross,
17:12
SPEAKER_00: but you're kind of helping whoever needs to be helped.
17:15
SPEAKER_00: You're trying to find some,
17:18
SPEAKER_00: I guess,
17:18
SPEAKER_00: peace isn't the right word,
17:19
SPEAKER_00: but some dialogue between both sides.
17:22
SPEAKER_00: So people trust you, let you do the job you need to do.
17:25
SPEAKER_00: So even in these first few months,
17:28
I guess these,
17:28
these traits of yours obviously were standing out to word.
17:33
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
17:35
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
17:36
SPEAKER_00: And like when you first get there and I mean,
17:41
SPEAKER_00: clearly I think at that point,
17:42
SPEAKER_00: you know,
17:42
SPEAKER_00: the Americans did not have the best reputation.
17:45
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
17:46
SPEAKER_00: where,
17:47
SPEAKER_00: where were you mentally on,
17:49
were you still at this point where there is no black and white
17:51
or were you going in
17:52
SPEAKER_00: and,
17:53
SPEAKER_00: Like when the Americans come to ask you to help,
17:55
SPEAKER_00: are you like,
17:56
SPEAKER_00: okay,
17:57
SPEAKER_00: you know,
17:58
SPEAKER_00: this is a good idea?
17:58
SPEAKER_00: Or were you sort of like, ah, you guys might be the bad guys.
18:02
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if this is a good idea.
18:04
SPEAKER_03: You know what?
18:05
There's a point where you can keep on pointing fingers,
18:09
but that doesn't achieve anything.
18:11
SPEAKER_03: I mean, I can keep on saying America should have never invaded Iraq.
18:15
SPEAKER_03: So what?
18:16
SPEAKER_03: There's a mess.
18:17
SPEAKER_03: Someone needs to help.
18:19
SPEAKER_03: Everyone should, you know, whoever can should pitch in.
18:22
And if they believe that I'm the right person,
18:25
and after a few months there...
18:27
SPEAKER_03: I actually started believing too.
18:29
SPEAKER_03: I actually, this is kind of my comfort zone.
18:32
SPEAKER_03: Interestingly, it was my comfort zone.
18:34
SPEAKER_03: I got along with the Americans.
18:36
SPEAKER_03: I got along with the Iraqis.
18:38
SPEAKER_03: Again, not taking sides.
18:39
SPEAKER_03: At that point, it's no longer taking sides.
18:41
SPEAKER_03: It's just helping whoever needs help.
18:43
SPEAKER_03: Whether it's the Iraqis, and in this case, it was the Americans.
18:46
SPEAKER_03: To their credit, admitting that they're not getting it right is huge.
18:52
SPEAKER_03: You know, I'm Italian, and I'm proud Italian.
18:56
SPEAKER_03: But an Italian government would have never hired someone from America,
19:00
SPEAKER_03: but not because it's America,
19:01
SPEAKER_03: or from someone from Uzbekistan or from Portugal to work,
19:06
SPEAKER_03: to rebuild.
19:06
SPEAKER_03: They would only hire Italians,
19:09
SPEAKER_03: probably someone who's part of the political group who is in charge.
19:15
SPEAKER_03: America didn't care.
19:16
I mean,
19:17
James Haveman and the whole team knew that I was against the
19:20
invasions.
19:20
SPEAKER_03: And we had a bunch of,
19:22
SPEAKER_03: I would really say,
19:24
SPEAKER_03: heated discussions,
19:25
SPEAKER_03: sometimes even intellectually stimulating,
19:27
SPEAKER_03: sometimes not intellectually stimulating.
19:29
SPEAKER_03: But that did not affect my job and didn't affect what they thought of me,
19:33
SPEAKER_03: nor would I thought of them.
19:36
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
19:39
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so this is still 2003.
19:40
SPEAKER_00: 2003, yeah.
19:40
And now you're being put in charge of trying to set up this
19:44
health infrastructure.
19:46
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
19:46
SPEAKER_00: And what is your day-to-day life?
19:50
SPEAKER_00: Are you in Baghdad?
19:51
SPEAKER_00: I'm in Baghdad.
19:52
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
19:53
SPEAKER_03: I was actually in Baghdad from 2003 to summer, autumn 2006.
19:55
SPEAKER_03: Okay.
19:56
SPEAKER_03: And I...
20:00
One of the reasons why I accepted was the fact that the health
20:03
team went out into
20:05
SPEAKER_03: Baghdad every day.
20:07
SPEAKER_03: So they truly believed.
20:09
SPEAKER_03: Now, whether they or we made a difference, that's for the others to say.
20:13
SPEAKER_03: But we truly believed in what we were doing.
20:16
SPEAKER_00: Because I remember back then,
20:17
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
20:17
SPEAKER_00: you would always hear about the green zone,
20:19
SPEAKER_00: this safety place where the American troops would be.
20:22
SPEAKER_03: So you're living with... I am living in the green zone.
20:25
SPEAKER_03: With American... With American troops and also American civilians.
20:29
SPEAKER_00: Inside of what?
20:30
SPEAKER_00: The palace.
20:31
SPEAKER_00: You were in Saddam's palace?
20:32
SPEAKER_03: I was in Saddam's palace.
20:33
SPEAKER_00: Like what?
20:33
SPEAKER_00: You have like a room in Saddam's palace?
20:35
I actually had a room at this hotel,
20:37
the Al-Rashid Hotel,
20:38
which was down the road.
20:40
SPEAKER_03: And then my office was...
20:42
SPEAKER_03: on the second floor or first floor,
20:44
SPEAKER_03: depending if you're Italian or American,
20:46
SPEAKER_03: of Saddam's palace.
20:47
SPEAKER_00: You describe it a bit in the book, and we've all seen pictures.
20:50
SPEAKER_00: But yeah, can you tell us what your palace looks like?
20:55
SPEAKER_03: You know, I still remember bathrooms everywhere.
20:58
SPEAKER_03: And with, you know, golden faucets.
21:02
SPEAKER_03: And this is a kind of funny story, bidets.
21:06
SPEAKER_03: And Americans were like, what is this obsession of Iraqis with bidets?
21:11
SPEAKER_03: And then being Italian, there was, you know, how do you use those?
21:15
SPEAKER_03: Exactly.
21:16
SPEAKER_00: Although you jerk out of it.
21:18
SPEAKER_00: Google it.
21:20
SPEAKER_00: It's like a water fountain.
21:24
So there was one part of Saddam's palace that was reserved for
21:29
high-level military,
21:29
SPEAKER_03: and the other one was for the high-level civilians.
21:32
SPEAKER_03: And there was, you know, double doors guarded by Marines.
21:35
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
21:36
SPEAKER_03: It was like being in a movie.
21:39
SPEAKER_03: You know, there was Saddam's throne.
21:41
SPEAKER_03: So it was, then you get used to it.
21:44
SPEAKER_03: Like everything in life, it becomes routine.
21:46
SPEAKER_00: What was the weirdest thing in Saddam's palace that you remember?
21:51
SPEAKER_03: I just think,
21:51
SPEAKER_03: you know,
21:52
SPEAKER_03: oh,
21:53
SPEAKER_03: in the hall that we used to go,
21:56
SPEAKER_03: you know,
21:56
SPEAKER_03: the dining facility,
21:57
SPEAKER_03: there was this massive,
21:59
SPEAKER_03: you know,
22:00
SPEAKER_03: painting of a clear attack upon the U.S.
22:04
SPEAKER_03: with rockets.
22:05
SPEAKER_03: And, you know, it was up there.
22:06
SPEAKER_02: They left it out?
22:07
SPEAKER_03: Oh, yeah.
22:08
SPEAKER_02: Why?
22:08
SPEAKER_03: I don't know.
22:09
SPEAKER_03: I think it was, again, the symbol of Saddam Hussein.
22:13
SPEAKER_03: I think also to remind who he was.
22:16
SPEAKER_03: The busts of Saddam Hussein were on the top of the presidential palace.
22:23
SPEAKER_03: I remember when they...
22:24
SPEAKER_03: Took them down.
22:25
And I also remember when there were American soldiers urinating
22:30
on Saddam Hussein,
22:31
which I thought was not understanding that this guy was not a
22:37
knucklehead.
22:38
SPEAKER_03: Yes, this guy was a monster.
22:40
SPEAKER_03: I actually met him.
22:43
SPEAKER_03: This guy was smart.
22:45
SPEAKER_03: He stayed in power against all odds for decades.
22:49
SPEAKER_03: He was not dumb.
22:50
SPEAKER_03: He was very intelligent.
22:52
SPEAKER_03: Now,
22:53
one would prefer intelligence to divert it into other areas
22:56
rather than murdering
22:56
SPEAKER_03: your own people if they disagree.
23:00
SPEAKER_03: But all in all, it was a very interesting experience for me.
23:05
SPEAKER_03: Also, I'm civilian, I'm Italian, and I'm a woman.
23:10
SPEAKER_03: I stood out like there's no tomorrow.
23:14
SPEAKER_00: I mean, if people aren't watching, you've got blonde hair.
23:18
SPEAKER_00: You look Italian.
23:20
SPEAKER_03: I did not wear combat boots on purpose.
23:22
SPEAKER_03: I mean, we all have roles.
23:25
SPEAKER_03: And my role is not to pretend that I am Rambo.
23:28
SPEAKER_03: I am a civilian.
23:29
SPEAKER_03: I'm trying to rebuild the country.
23:33
SPEAKER_03: But to be surrounded by military people and,
23:35
SPEAKER_03: you know,
23:36
SPEAKER_03: when my room eventually got blown up,
23:38
SPEAKER_03: stay with them,
23:40
SPEAKER_03: live with them.
23:41
I specifically when the senior advisor,
23:45
Haveman,
23:45
gave me office space in his office.
23:47
SPEAKER_03: Well, that was the elite office.
23:49
SPEAKER_03: It was all, you know, four or five civilians.
23:52
SPEAKER_03: And I was like, no, I need to be with them.
23:55
SPEAKER_03: And then was the military because they need to respect me.
23:59
SPEAKER_03: They need to understand who I am.
24:01
SPEAKER_03: Again,
24:02
SPEAKER_03: not because you're dumb,
24:03
SPEAKER_03: but it's kind of weird to have an Italian disembark and say,
24:05
SPEAKER_03: what on earth is this one doing?
24:08
SPEAKER_00: Okay,
24:09
SPEAKER_00: so like in the mornings,
24:10
SPEAKER_00: you're going out with this military personnel,
24:13
SPEAKER_00: and they're escorting you to health facilities?
24:16
SPEAKER_00: To the Ministry of Health.
24:17
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
24:18
SPEAKER_03: Every day.
24:18
SPEAKER_03: And there had been attacks on the team.
24:21
SPEAKER_03: I still remember,
24:22
SPEAKER_03: you know,
24:22
SPEAKER_03: we didn't have private security yet,
24:24
SPEAKER_03: and it was the health team providing for its own security.
24:29
And most of them were military in the reserves,
24:33
so not full-fledged military.
24:36
SPEAKER_03: Exactly.
24:37
SPEAKER_03: You know, I know how to drive.
24:40
SPEAKER_03: Again, from where I come from, you better know how to drive.
24:43
SPEAKER_03: And I never had done stick shift before.
24:46
SPEAKER_03: And in Baghdad, no one does stick shift.
24:49
SPEAKER_03: It was all, you know, they do gears.
24:52
SPEAKER_00: So the Americans were used to automatic cars.
24:55
SPEAKER_00: But you had to do manual.
24:57
SPEAKER_03: And Iraq has only manual cars.
24:59
SPEAKER_03: And I hadn't realized that Americans do not know how to drive manual.
25:03
SPEAKER_03: So I'm sitting with these Rambos with,
25:06
SPEAKER_03: you know,
25:06
guns on their laps and the driver with a gun and looking out
25:10
and in full battle
25:11
SPEAKER_03: rattle.
25:12
SPEAKER_03: And it was a constant up and down and up and down.
25:15
SPEAKER_03: I hope they shoot better than they drive because this is awful.
25:21
SPEAKER_03: And that's where I figured they just don't know how to use the clutch.
25:25
And at the end of the day,
25:27
I went up to Colonel Gerber,
25:29
who was in charge of the operations.
25:32
SPEAKER_03: And I said, you know what, Colonel, maybe I should drive.
25:35
SPEAKER_03: And he looked at me and said, really, Anna?
25:36
SPEAKER_03: And I was like, yes.
25:37
First of all,
25:37
I know how to deal with chaos because Baghdad is chaos and I'm
25:40
used to chaos.
25:41
SPEAKER_03: And second, I know how to drive.
25:43
SPEAKER_03: So then I became the official driver,
25:46
SPEAKER_03: looking in the way I look,
25:49
SPEAKER_03: of a whole,
25:50
SPEAKER_03: you know,
25:50
SPEAKER_03: convoy of people who are going to the Ministry of Health.
25:54
SPEAKER_00: What do the people on the street do when you drive up?
25:56
SPEAKER_00: Well, they've been staring, you know.
26:00
SPEAKER_00: They must have been, right?
26:01
I mean,
26:01
you've got all these dudes with guns in the back and there's
26:04
this blonde drunk around.
26:06
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
26:07
SPEAKER_00: Amazing.
26:07
SPEAKER_00: And so, okay.
26:09
And then,
26:09
and like,
26:10
I would imagine every day was probably quite different.
26:13
SPEAKER_00: So maybe there isn't,
26:15
SPEAKER_00: you know,
26:15
SPEAKER_00: something really to grab onto for what a normal day looks like,
26:19
SPEAKER_00: but I can't even wrap my head around that.
26:21
You're trying to add some sort of order and infrastructure in
26:24
the middle of chaos.
26:26
How do you...
26:27
What did you do on a daily basis to even approach the problem?
26:30
SPEAKER_03: Well, the first thing, there was an interim Iraqi minister.
26:35
SPEAKER_03: So, interact with him and his staff...
26:39
SPEAKER_03: To,
26:39
SPEAKER_03: you know,
26:40
SPEAKER_03: what I always did and also later in my life,
26:43
SPEAKER_03: you already need to think about how do we make them walk on their own?
26:48
SPEAKER_03: So,
26:48
SPEAKER_03: yes,
26:48
SPEAKER_03: we can rebuild the whole ministry for them,
26:50
SPEAKER_03: which we did because it had been completely looted.
26:54
SPEAKER_03: But then how is this going to be sustainable in the long run?
26:59
SPEAKER_03: How do they understand the health system?
27:00
SPEAKER_03: What medicines are there on the ground?
27:02
SPEAKER_03: What are not?
27:03
SPEAKER_03: What do we need to bring in?
27:05
SPEAKER_03: So figuring out what are the priorities.
27:09
SPEAKER_03: One thing that the Iraqis were completely unable of doing,
27:13
SPEAKER_03: and again,
27:13
SPEAKER_03: not because they were dumb,
27:15
SPEAKER_03: but because they had never done it before,
27:17
SPEAKER_03: prioritize.
27:19
If you ask a minister or later in my life,
27:22
a governor,
27:23
what are your priorities?
27:24
SPEAKER_03: They don't know.
27:26
SPEAKER_03: And they come up,
27:27
SPEAKER_03: and I will speak about it,
27:28
SPEAKER_03: with the most extravagant ideas where you're like,
27:31
SPEAKER_03: yes,
27:31
SPEAKER_03: but what about electricity?
27:33
SPEAKER_03: I mean,
27:33
SPEAKER_03: you want a floating restaurant in the middle of the marshes,
27:37
SPEAKER_03: but you don't have electricity.
27:38
SPEAKER_03: You don't have running water.
27:39
SPEAKER_03: And then they're like, yes, but I saw a movie about Venice last night.
27:44
And if I built things correctly,
27:46
the marshes could look like Venice and true tourism comes.
27:51
SPEAKER_03: And you're like, but you're shooting still at people.
27:53
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
27:54
Yeah,
27:54
and this is mostly kind of like Iraqis shooting at each other
27:58
and the U.S.
28:00
SPEAKER_00: Yes,
28:00
SPEAKER_03: but it was also a lot of,
28:01
SPEAKER_03: again,
28:02
we always focused on how many Americans lost their lives or how
28:05
many Italians got
28:05
SPEAKER_03: killed.
28:07
SPEAKER_03: It was at a certain point in 2004, so it became a civil war.
28:11
SPEAKER_03: It was Iraqis on Iraqis.
28:12
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
28:13
SPEAKER_03: You know,
28:14
SPEAKER_03: because we,
28:15
SPEAKER_03: and I say we,
28:16
SPEAKER_03: I didn't,
28:16
but we made the mistake of disempowering the ones who had been
28:19
in charge until
28:20
SPEAKER_03: then.
28:21
SPEAKER_03: So taking power out of the Sunnis,
28:24
SPEAKER_03: who were the only ones who could run a country,
28:26
SPEAKER_03: right or wrong,
28:27
SPEAKER_03: we disempowered them.
28:29
SPEAKER_03: And we gave power to others who had never had a role,
28:34
SPEAKER_03: had been massacred throughout decades,
28:37
SPEAKER_03: and were even afraid of airing their opinions.
28:41
SPEAKER_03: At the beginning, I was like, well, what do you think of this?
28:44
SPEAKER_03: And you could see them all were like, what do you think?
28:47
SPEAKER_03: Well, it's not really important what I think.
28:49
It's what you think so that I can build upon what you think and
28:53
your priorities are.
28:54
SPEAKER_03: They were not capable.
28:55
SPEAKER_03: They were so afraid of coming up.
28:59
SPEAKER_03: And the brain was not trained.
29:00
SPEAKER_03: You know, Saddam Hussein had just flattened.
29:03
SPEAKER_03: You were not allowed to think with your own brain.
29:06
SPEAKER_03: Well, they did not know how to think with their own brains.
29:08
SPEAKER_02: Okay.
29:09
SPEAKER_02: Okay.
29:09
SPEAKER_03: And that was something that I discovered, which was fascinating.
29:13
SPEAKER_03: It's a muscle.
29:14
SPEAKER_03: You need to train it and you need to gain confidence.
29:17
SPEAKER_03: You need to also trust your interlocutor.
29:21
SPEAKER_03: Trust is the key word here.
29:23
SPEAKER_03: And that is something that the Western world often forgets.
29:28
SPEAKER_03: We tend to go in a place,
29:30
SPEAKER_03: and it's not just about Iraq,
29:31
SPEAKER_03: and we'll speak later about my experience with Google,
29:34
SPEAKER_03: and it takes time to build trust.
29:36
SPEAKER_03: You can't just parachute or be parachuted in a country and say,
29:39
SPEAKER_03: oh,
29:39
SPEAKER_03: here I am,
29:40
SPEAKER_03: and this is how it's done.
29:41
No,
29:42
you've got to build a rapport,
29:44
and then slowly together you do things.
29:46
SPEAKER_03: So I spent a lot of time sitting down with Iraqis at every level saying,
29:51
SPEAKER_03: just to figure out how can we actually rebuild this system.
29:56
SPEAKER_03: And then there was the issue with the internally displaced people.
30:00
SPEAKER_03: And that came up after a couple of years that I was there.
30:04
SPEAKER_03: And that is where my experience also as a journalist came in,
30:08
SPEAKER_03: because as a journalist,
30:09
I knew that usually Arabic cultures prefer to go to family
30:15
members rather than into
30:17
SPEAKER_03: internally displaced camps,
30:19
SPEAKER_03: if they have the possibility.
30:21
SPEAKER_03: And all of a sudden,
30:22
the international community is donning a hell of a lot of money
30:25
to the Red Cross
30:27
SPEAKER_03: Crescent.
30:29
SPEAKER_03: And they're...
30:30
telling us stories about thousands of people and we don't have
30:34
enough equipment we
30:35
don't have enough tents etc etc and no one went out to check
30:40
because by then it was
30:42
also it was civil war no one did go out so i decided if we
30:47
really want to know
30:48
what's happening we need to have eyes on there and that's where
30:51
i you know i went
30:52
SPEAKER_03: out on black hawks with the military
30:55
SPEAKER_03: It must have been,
30:55
SPEAKER_03: you know,
30:56
SPEAKER_03: in the middle of nowhere,
30:57
SPEAKER_03: whether it was Fallujah or Karbala,
30:59
SPEAKER_03: because that's where they claimed all the displaced people were.
31:02
SPEAKER_03: And so I would hitch hikes on these helicopters and then on the ground,
31:06
SPEAKER_03: figure out who could take me there.
31:08
SPEAKER_03: And I would take pictures.
31:09
SPEAKER_00: Did people think you were crazy?
31:10
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I guess.
31:11
SPEAKER_03: But they were intrigued.
31:12
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
31:13
Because I think also there was this perception,
31:16
which is not a perception.
31:17
SPEAKER_03: It's true.
31:18
SPEAKER_03: Soldiers are allowed to die.
31:21
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
31:23
SPEAKER_03: God forbid if something happens to a civilian.
31:27
SPEAKER_03: Hell is unleashed.
31:29
SPEAKER_03: And my point was always, I signed up for this.
31:34
SPEAKER_03: I need to be as exposed as anyone as a soldier.
31:38
SPEAKER_03: My job is to rebuild.
31:39
And if to rebuild,
31:40
I need to go out to the Ministry of Health or I need to go out
31:43
to IDP camps.
31:45
SPEAKER_03: That's what I have to do.
31:47
I can't just sit back and trust reports who usually come in
31:52
from people who,
31:52
SPEAKER_03: yes,
31:53
SPEAKER_03: they do take pictures and who knows where those pictures are taken.
31:56
SPEAKER_00: Hello, geniuses.
31:58
SPEAKER_00: Let me tell you about E1 Ventures.
32:00
SPEAKER_00: They are a venture capital firm in Silicon Valley,
32:03
SPEAKER_00: a longtime supporter of this podcast,
32:06
SPEAKER_00: and a longtime supporter of big,
32:09
SPEAKER_00: fantastic,
32:10
SPEAKER_00: world-changing ideas.
32:13
SPEAKER_00: If you have such an idea,
32:14
SPEAKER_00: hit up E1 Ventures or send me a note,
32:17
SPEAKER_00: and I'll put you in touch with E1 Ventures.
32:20
SPEAKER_00: It's quite a deal for listening to this podcast.
32:24
SPEAKER_00: Thank you again, as always, to you on Ventures for their support.
32:28
SPEAKER_00: I don't want this to be sensationalistic.
32:31
SPEAKER_00: I mean, there's some incredible moments you go through.
32:34
SPEAKER_00: So I'm not doing this as kind of like disaster porn or life-risking porn.
32:38
I want people to have a sense of the stakes of what you're
32:41
talking about that you went through.
32:43
And I know you write about it,
32:45
so I feel like it's okay to ask about something.
32:48
SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
32:49
SPEAKER_00: It's quite difficult stuff.
32:51
SPEAKER_00: I mean, some of them...
32:53
SPEAKER_00: Very difficult.
32:54
SPEAKER_00: It feels a little bit lighter with time or something.
32:58
I mean,
32:59
you wrote about this one incident where Saddam's sons are—I'm
33:03
trying to remember now.
33:04
SPEAKER_00: I mean, they're captured and they're killed.
33:05
SPEAKER_03: They were captured and killed right there.
33:08
SPEAKER_00: And the people are celebrating.
33:11
SPEAKER_00: I mean, tell me the story.
33:12
SPEAKER_00: What?
33:13
SPEAKER_03: Well, at that point, I was still kind of cut out from the world.
33:17
SPEAKER_03: You need to imagine Baghdad, the summer heat.
33:22
SPEAKER_00: This is mid-2003.
33:23
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
33:25
SPEAKER_03: And we don't have, there's no cell phones.
33:29
SPEAKER_03: We have these Thuraya satellite phones.
33:33
SPEAKER_03: I always joke,
33:34
you had to point the antenna towards Mecca to figure out if you
33:37
could get a signal
33:38
SPEAKER_03: or not.
33:39
SPEAKER_03: So we're cut out.
33:40
SPEAKER_03: We're just dealing with a constant drama, night and day.
33:44
SPEAKER_03: You know,
33:44
SPEAKER_03: during the day it was a birth unit,
33:46
at night it was a take out bullets out of people's bodies
33:50
because that people who
33:52
couldn't go into hospitals because they would have got arrested
33:55
or got in trouble
33:56
SPEAKER_03: would come to us.
33:57
SPEAKER_03: And being super parties, we just took care of everyone.
34:01
And so you need to imagine this chaos where you're,
34:03
you know,
34:04
and you're in the middle of town.
34:05
SPEAKER_03: Yes, you have T-walls and barbed wire.
34:07
And we had the carabinieri,
34:09
which were the equivalent of the Marines,
34:12
guarding us.
34:13
SPEAKER_03: But that's it.
34:15
SPEAKER_03: And so all of a sudden,
34:16
SPEAKER_03: one afternoon,
34:17
SPEAKER_03: I started,
34:18
SPEAKER_03: we started all hearing shooting,
34:20
SPEAKER_03: but not a couple of shots,
34:21
SPEAKER_03: like massive shooting.
34:23
And I was like,
34:23
OK,
34:23
they're attacking,
34:24
which is something that I remember the UN told us.
34:27
SPEAKER_03: You'll eventually get attacked.
34:29
Interestingly,
34:29
the UN got attacked a few months later and we hadn't got
34:32
attacked.
34:33
SPEAKER_03: You'll get attacked.
34:34
SPEAKER_03: So it was in my mind.
34:35
SPEAKER_03: Oh, my God.
34:35
SPEAKER_03: And this was on my shoulders.
34:37
SPEAKER_03: I was taking the decisions.
34:38
SPEAKER_03: So I'm like, oh, my God, we're getting attacked.
34:40
SPEAKER_03: So immediately the first the first thing is like we need to take cover.
34:45
SPEAKER_03: And the first thing you run into the tents.
34:46
SPEAKER_00: It's like a field hospital.
34:48
SPEAKER_00: It's a field hospital.
34:48
SPEAKER_03: There's tents.
34:49
SPEAKER_03: And there's the carabinieri on the loudspeakers.
34:52
They do not run in the tents because then you'll get a bullet
34:55
and some plastic in
34:57
SPEAKER_03: you,
34:58
SPEAKER_03: not only the bullets.
34:59
SPEAKER_03: So it's like dangerous.
35:00
SPEAKER_03: Do not.
35:01
SPEAKER_03: So go under the trucks.
35:03
So we had to all run under trucks and everyone was like,
35:06
and it got worse and worse.
35:07
SPEAKER_03: You could hear screaming.
35:08
SPEAKER_03: You could hear the gunfire was worse.
35:09
SPEAKER_03: And you started hearing the bullets.
35:11
SPEAKER_03: Because bullets were flying in.
35:14
So...
35:15
So then they were all like,
35:16
call the ambassador,
35:17
figure out,
35:18
tell him to come and rescue us.
35:20
SPEAKER_03: And so I tried to call, nothing happens.
35:22
SPEAKER_03: And finally, I managed to get hold of an Iraqi who's a friend of mine.
35:25
SPEAKER_03: And I say, they're attacking us.
35:27
SPEAKER_03: Could you please help?
35:28
SPEAKER_03: But while I'm on the phone, I hear from the phone, I hear gunfire.
35:33
SPEAKER_03: And I was like, but it seems like you're being attacked.
35:36
SPEAKER_03: What's going on?
35:37
SPEAKER_03: And he's like, oh, no, doctora, it's friendly fire.
35:41
SPEAKER_03: It's celebratory fire.
35:42
SPEAKER_03: We're celebrating the killing of Uday and Kusai.
35:45
SPEAKER_00: Since everybody's shooting their guns.
35:46
SPEAKER_03: And everyone's shooting.
35:48
SPEAKER_03: And it seemed like a full-fledged battle out there.
35:52
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
35:53
SPEAKER_00: And then not too long after that,
35:55
SPEAKER_00: if my notes are right,
35:57
SPEAKER_00: still in 2003,
35:59
SPEAKER_00: you have this ambush directly on you.
36:03
SPEAKER_00: I was reading about this in the book.
36:06
SPEAKER_00: I mean, please tell the story.
36:10
SPEAKER_00: It sounded like your bodyguard sold you out.
36:12
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
36:15
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
36:16
SPEAKER_03: Well, and that was right at the beginning.
36:19
SPEAKER_03: I remember it was in September, October.
36:21
Right at the beginning when I had moved away from the Red Cross
36:24
and started working.
36:25
SPEAKER_00: With the U.S.
36:26
SPEAKER_00: With the U.S.
36:27
SPEAKER_03: And I had to go.
36:29
SPEAKER_03: And that's where things had started also getting worse.
36:33
SPEAKER_03: The word started coming out, civil war, civil war.
36:35
SPEAKER_03: No one pronounced it.
36:36
SPEAKER_03: And to me, it was like, why aren't we discussing this?
36:39
SPEAKER_03: Because this is bad.
36:41
SPEAKER_03: More and more civilians stopped going out into the red zone.
36:44
SPEAKER_03: And we kept on going out in the red zone.
36:47
SPEAKER_03: And I had to go to Medical City.
36:49
SPEAKER_03: I was at the Ministry of Health and had to go to Medical City.
36:53
SPEAKER_03: And again, we are Westerners.
36:56
SPEAKER_03: We're always in a rush.
36:57
SPEAKER_03: And I had, you know, waited a day, two days, three days.
37:00
SPEAKER_03: And I said, we really need to go.
37:03
SPEAKER_03: And so they set up a mission for me.
37:05
SPEAKER_03: At that point, the message was still, we trust the Iraqis.
37:10
SPEAKER_03: So we'll give Anna a Iraqi bodyguard.
37:15
SPEAKER_03: How on earth they picked them, who knows?
37:17
Because you make an interview and you do not know what
37:20
allegiances they have.
37:23
SPEAKER_03: And so I get into this pickup and...
37:29
I have my good friend from the Red Cross that I had brought
37:32
over,
37:32
Ahmed,
37:33
was driving.
37:33
SPEAKER_03: An Iraqi medical doctor lady was the passenger in the back.
37:38
SPEAKER_03: There was another one, a doctor.
37:40
SPEAKER_03: And between me and the doctor in the back was this Iraqi bodyguard.
37:44
And I still remember he was sitting and he had his kalashnikov
37:48
between his legs and
37:49
SPEAKER_03: he was nervous.
37:52
And I remember saying,
37:53
oh my God,
37:54
if he's that nervous,
37:56
how nervous should we be?
37:59
SPEAKER_03: And we pulled jokes and so eventually we took off.
38:04
And when we arrived at Medical City,
38:07
I saw an opening,
38:08
a parking space opened.
38:11
SPEAKER_03: And I tap on the shoulder of Ahmed and say, hey, you know, Italian, park!
38:17
SPEAKER_03: You want some help, you know?
38:18
SPEAKER_03: And that's where the bodyguard got out.
38:21
We stopped and the bodyguard climbed out of the car,
38:25
climbed over the doctor.
38:26
SPEAKER_03: And I said, well, maybe he's not as weird as I thought.
38:30
SPEAKER_03: I thought he's trying to help us park.
38:34
SPEAKER_03: That's not what he was doing.
38:35
SPEAKER_03: Now, I did not know what he was doing.
38:37
SPEAKER_03: I figured it out.
38:38
SPEAKER_03: They told me afterwards.
38:40
SPEAKER_03: But the next thing I know, there's a full-fledged gunfire.
38:44
SPEAKER_00: So he turns on you.
38:45
SPEAKER_03: He got out, got behind the car, and from half a meter, unloaded his AK.
38:54
SPEAKER_00: On me, because the shots then were against my headrest.
38:56
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
39:00
SPEAKER_03: And I heard a click.
39:01
SPEAKER_03: You know, you can call it luck.
39:04
SPEAKER_03: You can call it fate.
39:05
SPEAKER_03: You can call it God.
39:06
SPEAKER_03: We all call it in a different way.
39:07
SPEAKER_03: But it's clear that it was not in my cards to die that day.
39:12
SPEAKER_00: But you're sitting in the car.
39:13
SPEAKER_00: He's behind you.
39:14
SPEAKER_00: He's behind me.
39:14
SPEAKER_00: And you're his target.
39:15
SPEAKER_03: And I'm his target.
39:17
SPEAKER_00: And he starts unloading.
39:19
SPEAKER_00: You hear this click.
39:20
SPEAKER_00: I hear a click.
39:21
SPEAKER_00: And I duck.
39:22
SPEAKER_00: You just had this instinct.
39:23
SPEAKER_03: I had this instinct.
39:24
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
39:24
SPEAKER_03: I duck down.
39:26
SPEAKER_03: And I remember...
39:29
SPEAKER_03: Apologizing with my family.
39:31
SPEAKER_00: Like in that moment.
39:32
SPEAKER_03: In that moment.
39:33
I was,
39:33
especially with my dad,
39:34
who had always been worried about my extravagant ideas.
39:37
SPEAKER_00: We'll talk about your mom later.
39:40
SPEAKER_03: And, you know, and there I was like, oh God, I'm dying.
39:44
SPEAKER_03: This is it.
39:44
SPEAKER_03: And then I thought, how did they know that we were coming?
39:47
SPEAKER_03: This was a last minute mission.
39:50
SPEAKER_03: And I thought these are snipers on this side because the shots,
39:52
SPEAKER_03: I knew that much,
39:54
SPEAKER_03: they're on my side.
39:55
And so it's snipers on this side who are waiting for us and
39:59
just waited for us to
40:00
SPEAKER_03: park and started shooting.
40:03
SPEAKER_00: But it was the bodyguard.
40:04
SPEAKER_00: It was the bodyguard.
40:05
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
40:05
SPEAKER_00: And then... Why did he want to kill you?
40:07
SPEAKER_03: Listen, I even understand why.
40:10
SPEAKER_03: Here comes the invader.
40:13
SPEAKER_03: Now, again, I want to point out, it's not all... Most Iraqis welcomed...
40:17
SPEAKER_03: the American invasion, because most of them were Shia.
40:22
SPEAKER_03: The minority was Sunni, and they were the elite.
40:25
SPEAKER_03: So they, of course, were against it.
40:27
SPEAKER_03: A lot fled, a lot joined the Islamic State later in life.
40:32
SPEAKER_03: But the Shia were like, hallelujah, we're liberated.
40:35
SPEAKER_03: We are now in charge.
40:38
SPEAKER_03: But this guy, who knows who he was?
40:40
SPEAKER_03: Who knows?
40:42
SPEAKER_03: And I am a woman.
40:44
SPEAKER_03: I look the way I look.
40:46
SPEAKER_03: I was in charge in the car.
40:48
SPEAKER_03: I was also being very warm with Ahmed.
40:53
SPEAKER_03: I was European.
40:54
SPEAKER_03: I was American.
40:55
SPEAKER_03: I'm sure he thought I was American.
40:57
SPEAKER_03: Doesn't matter.
40:58
SPEAKER_03: I was something that he didn't want in his country, most likely.
41:02
SPEAKER_03: And, you know, what I learned is...
41:06
SPEAKER_03: We need to stop judging people who...
41:09
SPEAKER_03: I don't need to stop judging,
41:13
but often people who are violent are violent because they have
41:18
only known violence
41:19
SPEAKER_03: in life.
41:21
SPEAKER_03: And I learned it throughout the years.
41:26
SPEAKER_03: If you have never learned compassion,
41:28
SPEAKER_03: you have never learned love,
41:29
SPEAKER_03: you have never learned trust,
41:32
SPEAKER_03: you solve your problems,
41:34
SPEAKER_03: I disagree with you,
41:35
SPEAKER_03: bang,
41:35
SPEAKER_03: you're dead.
41:37
There's no debate,
41:38
there's no...
41:39
So I could also understand why the guy wanted me dead.
41:45
SPEAKER_03: Now, on the way there, he killed everyone in the car...
41:49
SPEAKER_00: So you duck and then you get out of the car.
41:53
I duck and I figure out that they're all dead because then I
41:57
have to climb over my
41:58
SPEAKER_03: dead friend's body.
42:00
SPEAKER_03: And there's chaos around the car.
42:02
SPEAKER_03: And I'm like, oh, my God, everyone's screaming.
42:05
SPEAKER_03: And I'm like, oh, God, I don't want to be lynched.
42:08
SPEAKER_03: I mean, to die because you beat the hell out of me, please not.
42:12
SPEAKER_03: So I run into a house.
42:15
SPEAKER_03: And in Baghdad at that time, all the doors are open to let the air flow.
42:20
SPEAKER_03: And,
42:21
SPEAKER_03: you know,
42:23
SPEAKER_03: I watched probably too many movies and I ran into a corner because,
42:26
SPEAKER_03: you know,
42:26
SPEAKER_03: at least in a corner,
42:27
SPEAKER_03: your shoulders are,
42:29
SPEAKER_03: you know,
42:29
SPEAKER_03: something behind you and I'll scrutinize what's in front of me.
42:35
SPEAKER_03: And I'll wait for the Marines to come and save me.
42:38
SPEAKER_03: So my altar is like, where are the Marines?
42:40
SPEAKER_03: Where are the Marines?
42:41
SPEAKER_03: And that's when you realize, no, this is not a movie.
42:44
SPEAKER_03: I mean, time that anyone knows that this is happening on the streets.
42:48
SPEAKER_03: And I'll be dead.
42:50
SPEAKER_03: So I need to figure this out on my own.
42:52
SPEAKER_03: And instead of the Marines,
42:53
I have a bunch of women in black charters come in and do the
42:56
classic shouting.
42:58
SPEAKER_00: You're in somebody's house.
42:59
SPEAKER_00: I'm in somebody's house.
43:00
SPEAKER_03: In a corner with a bunch of dead people out.
43:02
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
43:03
And so the lady comes in with all her friends,
43:07
I guess,
43:07
and they start,
43:08
it's panic.
43:09
SPEAKER_03: So they scream, they do the panic scream.
43:12
SPEAKER_03: And I'm like,
43:13
SPEAKER_03: oh God,
43:13
SPEAKER_03: now the snipers,
43:14
SPEAKER_03: because I still think about the snipers,
43:16
SPEAKER_03: the snipers will know that I'm here.
43:20
SPEAKER_03: And then I'm saying,
43:20
SPEAKER_03: okay,
43:21
I am not getting shot at while staring at the person who's
43:25
shooting at me.
43:26
SPEAKER_03: If I'm getting killed today, I'm running for survival.
43:31
SPEAKER_03: And that's where I got out of the house.
43:33
And at that point,
43:34
they were beating the hell out of someone right behind the car.
43:38
SPEAKER_03: Of course, I didn't stop and check.
43:40
SPEAKER_03: And I'm like, oh my God, what's going on here?
43:42
And I managed to,
43:44
I got,
43:44
and I thought if I run away looking the way I look,
43:49
SPEAKER_03: It won't be a long run for me.
43:51
SPEAKER_03: So I thought the only way to get out of here is in the same car.
43:55
SPEAKER_03: And Ahmed was the driver.
43:57
SPEAKER_03: And I still wonder how I could be so cold-blooded.
44:01
SPEAKER_03: He was dead.
44:02
SPEAKER_03: I pulled him off the car, left him on the road.
44:07
SPEAKER_03: And I drove off.
44:07
SPEAKER_00: So you're like sitting in a pool of blood of your friends.
44:10
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, where the two dead bodies are next to me.
44:12
SPEAKER_00: Try to drive back to the greed zone.
44:14
SPEAKER_03: Drive back to the Ministry of Health.
44:16
SPEAKER_00: While you're pumping full of adrenaline and shock.
44:19
Yeah,
44:19
and checking if the snipers from the rear mirror,
44:22
if the snipers are following.
44:23
And like no cheap,
44:25
no real idea of how you're going to get to where you're going.
44:28
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it must be.
44:30
I mean,
44:31
you write about it in the book a bit,
44:33
but so you were able to be clear headed.
44:36
SPEAKER_03: I was extremely clear headed.
44:37
SPEAKER_00: Because you had no choice.
44:39
SPEAKER_03: And I had no training.
44:40
SPEAKER_03: A lot of people say, well, will you train?
44:42
SPEAKER_03: I don't think you can really.
44:43
SPEAKER_03: Of course, you can train.
44:44
SPEAKER_03: But everyone reacts in different ways.
44:49
SPEAKER_03: And I was as cold-blooded as it gets.
44:53
SPEAKER_03: I was calm.
44:54
SPEAKER_03: And it was shocking to me to realize how I had reacted.
45:00
And you kind of instinctually get back to the Ministry of
45:03
Health and everybody
45:05
SPEAKER_00: wants to question you about,
45:08
SPEAKER_00: I'm sure they want to know what had happened,
45:10
SPEAKER_00: but you're like,
45:11
SPEAKER_00: look,
45:12
SPEAKER_00: I need to be alone.
45:14
SPEAKER_03: And it was also then they wanted to,
45:16
SPEAKER_03: you know,
45:17
I had then to drive from the Ministry of Health to the Green
45:20
Zone in the afternoon.
45:22
SPEAKER_03: And so they had set up a new car for me and I was like, no, no.
45:26
If I didn't die in this car today,
45:28
I'm not supposed to die in this car today.
45:32
SPEAKER_03: So I insisted that I drive in the same vehicle that I had been shot at.
45:38
SPEAKER_03: And what was shocking was when I went back into the garage,
45:43
SPEAKER_03: you know,
45:43
SPEAKER_03: the truck from the morgue had already arrived,
45:46
SPEAKER_03: had taken away my two friends,
45:48
SPEAKER_03: and the gardener was already hosing down the car.
45:53
SPEAKER_03: So to me, it was...
45:56
If I had died or someone of us had died,
45:59
it would have been a huge drama.
46:03
SPEAKER_03: And now two Iraqis die.
46:06
SPEAKER_03: It's normal.
46:09
SPEAKER_03: And it was mainly the Iraqis.
46:12
SPEAKER_03: Let's go to the morgue and let's move on.
46:14
SPEAKER_03: They were so used to, and it wasn't because of the invasion.
46:17
SPEAKER_03: They were just so used to the concept of death that there was like,
46:22
SPEAKER_03: oh,
46:22
SPEAKER_03: let's just hose it down,
46:23
SPEAKER_03: prepare the car for Anna,
46:24
SPEAKER_03: and let's get going.
46:26
SPEAKER_00: So this is just a few months into your new job.
46:29
SPEAKER_00: Certainly at this point, you must be like, okay, maybe now that's enough.
46:35
SPEAKER_03: No,
46:35
SPEAKER_03: I,
46:36
SPEAKER_03: again,
46:36
SPEAKER_03: a lot,
46:38
SPEAKER_03: especially in the group that I was with all military guys,
46:41
SPEAKER_03: they all thought this one won't make it.
46:44
SPEAKER_03: The same day I went out.
46:46
Because I had seen people for way less decide to go home,
46:51
which,
46:51
by the way,
46:52
is fine.
46:52
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
46:54
If you do not feel like it,
46:56
it's not like you don't make a hero statement.
46:59
SPEAKER_03: Actually, you're dumb if you stay, if you're scared.
47:03
SPEAKER_03: So I said,
47:03
SPEAKER_03: if I want to have a chance to get out again,
47:06
SPEAKER_03: I need to get out immediately and see what happens.
47:10
SPEAKER_03: And that evening I had an invitation at the Italian ambassador's house.
47:16
SPEAKER_03: And the Carabinieri came and picked me up.
47:18
SPEAKER_03: And that's where I also learned that there was a journalist at the place.
47:22
SPEAKER_03: And I was like, no, I am not speaking about this.
47:27
SPEAKER_03: This needs to stay in-house.
47:30
And it's interesting how it took me years actually to speak
47:32
about it and to write about it.
47:34
SPEAKER_03: Because when you write about it, it goes even deeper in the bones.
47:39
SPEAKER_03: And there were a lot of people who wanted me to tell the story,
47:42
SPEAKER_03: and I just started sweating,
47:45
SPEAKER_03: and I just decided I won't tell the story.
47:47
Yeah,
47:47
because we went kind of quick,
47:48
but I mean,
47:49
Ahmed,
47:50
he was a friend of yours.
47:51
SPEAKER_00: Very good friend of mine.
47:52
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, dear friend.
47:54
SPEAKER_03: And also from there,
47:55
SPEAKER_03: you know,
47:55
SPEAKER_03: before I heard the gunfires,
47:57
SPEAKER_03: I heard,
47:58
SPEAKER_03: and at night when they went off,
47:59
SPEAKER_03: because it was,
48:00
SPEAKER_03: you know,
48:01
people who had to kill their neighbor who had pissed them off
48:05
for decades,
48:05
SPEAKER_03: or who knows what.
48:06
SPEAKER_03: And...
48:09
Then when I started hearing gunfires,
48:12
I started panicking because I would relive the moment.
48:16
SPEAKER_03: That's where I was forced to go through PTSD.
48:20
It's a pretty funny part of the book with this therapist trying
48:26
to crack you open.
48:31
SPEAKER_00: You're resistant.
48:33
Okay,
48:33
I mean,
48:35
honestly,
48:35
there's so many incidents,
48:37
it's hard to even know which ones to pick.
48:39
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
48:40
SPEAKER_00: in the middle of this,
48:41
SPEAKER_00: I'm not going to spend a ton of time on this,
48:43
SPEAKER_00: because I want the ones where you're directly in it,
48:47
SPEAKER_00: but I mean,
48:48
SPEAKER_00: you leave your hotel for a few days,
48:51
SPEAKER_00: and your room is...
48:52
SPEAKER_00: My room gets blown up.
48:54
SPEAKER_00: A rocket.
48:55
SPEAKER_00: A rocket, yeah.
48:56
SPEAKER_03: And it was this time I was on the target, they just...
48:59
SPEAKER_03: It was like Wolfowitz of Sunday, wasn't it?
49:01
SPEAKER_03: Wolfowitz was in that hotel.
49:02
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
49:03
And so they just decided,
49:04
let's just hit the hotel with a bunch of rockets.
49:07
SPEAKER_03: And of course, one hit my room.
49:10
And the night before,
49:10
I had decided to go and check on the stage of the clinics in
49:15
prisons.
49:17
SPEAKER_03: And I said, let's start with Kurdish Iraq, which is the Kama part.
49:21
So I just jumped on a flight and went to Kurdish Iraq with no,
49:25
there was no task.
49:27
SPEAKER_03: It was just like, I'm going.
49:28
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
49:30
SPEAKER_03: destiny.
49:30
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
49:31
SPEAKER_03: Whatever.
49:32
SPEAKER_00: Do you end up staying back in that hotel?
49:34
SPEAKER_03: No, it was blown up.
49:35
SPEAKER_03: So we had to,
49:36
SPEAKER_03: when I,
49:36
SPEAKER_03: and there was another,
49:37
SPEAKER_03: you know,
49:38
SPEAKER_03: when I came back,
49:38
SPEAKER_03: we were all put into,
49:41
SPEAKER_03: everyone went to what we call the chapel,
49:43
SPEAKER_03: which was inside the palace,
49:46
a huge room that was used as a chapel and being a woman and
49:50
being very few women,
49:51
SPEAKER_03: um,
49:52
SPEAKER_03: they reserved like a special treatment.
49:54
SPEAKER_03: The women could get a trailer and
49:57
SPEAKER_03: And by then I've always been a team player.
50:00
SPEAKER_03: I thought,
50:01
SPEAKER_03: you know,
50:02
if my whole team is in the chapel and stays up at night because
50:06
they can't sleep,
50:07
SPEAKER_03: because there's hundreds of people in there,
50:10
SPEAKER_03: I'm with them.
50:11
SPEAKER_00: You're sleeping like what?
50:11
SPEAKER_00: On a concert?
50:12
SPEAKER_00: We were sleeping.
50:13
SPEAKER_03: They put bunk beds everywhere.
50:15
SPEAKER_03: We're talking about hundreds of people in bunk beds.
50:18
SPEAKER_00: And that's where you slept.
50:19
SPEAKER_03: And that's where I slept for quite a long time.
50:21
SPEAKER_03: And I still remember I like bunk beds.
50:23
SPEAKER_03: I like to be on top.
50:24
SPEAKER_03: But then I realized being a woman,
50:27
SPEAKER_03: if I want to have a little bit of privacy when I change my shirt,
50:30
SPEAKER_03: I better be on the bottom and put towels all over.
50:33
SPEAKER_03: Yes.
50:34
SPEAKER_03: So that I can have,
50:35
SPEAKER_03: you know,
50:36
20 seconds of privacy where I can change clothes without having
50:40
too much attention.
50:41
SPEAKER_00: You mentioned meeting Saddam.
50:44
SPEAKER_00: You're at his trial after he's captured.
50:48
SPEAKER_00: You talked about the celebration when his sons were killed,
50:51
SPEAKER_00: but it's more muted when Saddam is captured.
50:56
SPEAKER_00: And I guess intuitively you might think,
50:57
SPEAKER_00: oh,
50:57
SPEAKER_00: well,
50:58
SPEAKER_00: the celebration is going to be even bigger because Saddam.
51:01
SPEAKER_00: Tell me about meeting Saddam.
51:03
Tell me why,
51:05
how people reacted when he was captured and what it was like in
51:08
his trial.
51:09
You know,
51:10
I think we foreigners tend to categorize these dictators as
51:14
like,
51:15
oh,
51:15
they're crazy.
51:20
SPEAKER_03: Meeting him, I had heard a lot of stories about Saddam Hussein.
51:25
SPEAKER_03: And a lot of these stories were so gruesome.
51:28
SPEAKER_03: I mean, I'm talking about, you know, Ahmed Hussein.
51:32
SPEAKER_00: Like, maybe one of the worst stories I've ever heard in my life.
51:35
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
51:35
SPEAKER_00: Do you want to tell it?
51:38
SPEAKER_03: It's up to you,
51:39
SPEAKER_03: but I can also...
51:41
You tell me that you tell in the book about you learn some of
51:45
these stories that
51:46
SPEAKER_00: take place during these poker nights and things like that.
51:48
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so Ahmed is...
51:51
SPEAKER_00: A very good friend of yours.
51:52
SPEAKER_00: You're spending all this time with him.
51:54
SPEAKER_00: And so one night,
51:55
he's recounting the story of what happens to him at one of
51:59
these poker games,
52:00
SPEAKER_00: right?
52:00
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
52:01
SPEAKER_03: And they were...
52:02
SPEAKER_03: You couldn't...
52:03
SPEAKER_03: Like,
52:04
SPEAKER_03: in every dictatorship,
52:05
SPEAKER_03: more than three,
52:05
SPEAKER_03: four people cannot gather,
52:06
SPEAKER_03: especially after a certain time.
52:08
And they knew that sooner or later,
52:10
you know,
52:10
the Republican guards would hunt them down.
52:14
SPEAKER_03: And...
52:17
SPEAKER_03: One night, someone knocks at the door.
52:19
SPEAKER_03: So they say, okay, that's it.
52:22
So one poker player gets up and decides I'll be the first one
52:25
who dies in this endeavor.
52:27
So he gets up,
52:28
opens the door,
52:29
and Saddam's guys walk in,
52:33
you know,
52:33
all in black.
52:35
SPEAKER_03: And they don't shoot.
52:36
SPEAKER_03: They have, Ahmed recounted this vividly,
52:41
SPEAKER_03: A large yellow plastic bag.
52:45
SPEAKER_03: And they walk in and they set it right in front of Ahmed.
52:49
SPEAKER_03: And they tell him, open it.
52:51
SPEAKER_03: So Ahmed opens it and it's pretty dark in there.
52:53
So he starts putting a hand in the plastic bag and feels like
52:56
there's other plastic
52:57
SPEAKER_03: bags in there.
52:58
SPEAKER_03: And he has no idea.
53:00
It's kind of mushy until he bumps into something that he
53:05
clearly recognizes.
53:06
SPEAKER_03: And it's an ear.
53:08
SPEAKER_03: A human's ear.
53:11
SPEAKER_03: He,
53:12
SPEAKER_03: his 16-year-old son,
53:13
SPEAKER_03: had been arrested for plotting against,
53:16
SPEAKER_03: I mean,
53:17
SPEAKER_03: seriously,
53:17
SPEAKER_03: 16 years old,
53:19
SPEAKER_03: thrown into jail.
53:21
SPEAKER_03: He hadn't seen his son in a very long time,
53:24
SPEAKER_03: kept on asking,
53:25
SPEAKER_03: Saddam,
53:25
SPEAKER_03: please bring my son back,
53:28
SPEAKER_03: give me my son back.
53:30
SPEAKER_03: And Saddam gave him his son back.
53:31
SPEAKER_00: He led.
53:32
bag um unbelievable and so when you listen to all these stories
53:37
you start having
53:38
you start understanding the greys you start like this guy was
53:43
actually a monster
53:44
now a smart monster so when i met him when i saw him at the
53:48
trial i've met a lot of
53:51
SPEAKER_03: monsters in my life i will never forget those eyes
53:57
He was in charge of the room,
53:59
although he was handcuffed,
54:00
although he had the Koran.
54:02
I mean,
54:03
he had never been religious,
54:04
and he was commanding,
54:06
still commanding the room.
54:10
SPEAKER_00: So what kind of eyes?
54:12
SPEAKER_03: Dark.
54:12
SPEAKER_00: Yeah?
54:14
SPEAKER_03: Dark.
54:14
SPEAKER_03: In Iraq, they always talked about him like Satan.
54:18
And in spite of me being someone who's against the death
54:22
penalty,
54:24
they needed to kill Saddam.
54:26
Because he had super...
54:30
In the eyes of the Iraqis,
54:31
he had supernatural powers.
54:33
SPEAKER_03: And they were convinced he'll come back.
54:36
SPEAKER_03: And the Americans will eventually free him and he'll come back.
54:39
SPEAKER_03: So if I work with you, if I do anything...
54:42
SPEAKER_00: He'll hunt me down.
54:44
Which is why when he was captured there was not celebration
54:46
because you might be
54:47
SPEAKER_00: caught celebrating and then he comes back to you.
54:49
SPEAKER_03: And then he gets back to you.
54:52
SPEAKER_03: And I made a huge mistake at the...
54:55
SPEAKER_03: at the trial.
54:57
SPEAKER_03: And in Iraq, you are not allowed to show your shoe soles.
55:02
SPEAKER_03: So you say, well, of course not.
55:03
SPEAKER_03: Well,
55:03
we Westerners always sit down in a way that we put one leg on
55:08
top of the other and
55:10
SPEAKER_03: one shoe sole is pretty visible.
55:12
Now,
55:12
if you look at me now,
55:13
you will notice both shoe soles are looking down.
55:15
It's so engraved in me that I sit down and manage to keep both
55:18
feet looking downwards.
55:21
SPEAKER_03: But at some point,
55:21
SPEAKER_03: the trial went on and on and on,
55:23
SPEAKER_03: and I was on the upper floor,
55:26
SPEAKER_03: and I just laid back and showed my shoe sole.
55:31
SPEAKER_00: You crossed your legs.
55:32
SPEAKER_03: I crossed my legs.
55:33
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
55:34
SPEAKER_03: And they stopped the trial.
55:36
SPEAKER_03: The judge started screaming.
55:38
SPEAKER_03: Saddam was staring at me.
55:39
SPEAKER_03: That's where the eyes were like, it's Saddam.
55:42
SPEAKER_03: Had this scornful look on him.
55:45
SPEAKER_03: And you know when you would like to disappear and say, I was wrong.
55:48
SPEAKER_03: I made a huge mistake.
55:50
SPEAKER_03: And then at the end, I think I got up.
55:52
SPEAKER_03: They came to get me.
55:53
SPEAKER_03: And they must have seen that I was sorry.
55:56
I hadn't done it in any attempt to be insulting of any culture
56:00
or anything.
56:02
SPEAKER_03: I was just really sorry.
56:03
SPEAKER_03: So they eventually had me stay there.
56:05
SPEAKER_03: But that's where I kept on having Saddam keep on staring at me.
56:08
SPEAKER_03: And,
56:10
SPEAKER_03: you know,
56:10
SPEAKER_03: so people who underestimate that kind of smart evil have difficulties in
56:17
SPEAKER_03: understanding the world.
56:18
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
56:19
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
56:21
SPEAKER_00: do you think his brand of control over the people,
56:24
SPEAKER_00: I guess it's probably on some level similar to other dictators over time,
56:30
SPEAKER_00: or was there something really unique about?
56:34
SPEAKER_03: He was, because I, you know, I was in all these countries.
56:37
SPEAKER_03: I was in Libya.
56:38
I was,
56:38
you know,
56:39
and his level,
56:41
he had stepped it up a notch compared to all the others.
56:44
SPEAKER_03: Now there's a lot of dictators in the area,
56:47
SPEAKER_03: and we'll get there probably,
56:50
SPEAKER_03: but it's also an area who understands strength,
56:56
SPEAKER_03: courage,
56:58
SPEAKER_03: violence.
56:59
SPEAKER_03: So having a leader who is...
57:03
SPEAKER_03: pleasant and kind and a listener who doesn't kill people,
57:09
SPEAKER_03: that's not in the DNA of the people on the ground.
57:13
SPEAKER_03: So I remember once telling to down the road when I was in charge of the
57:17
SPEAKER_03: reconstruction of southern Iraq,
57:19
SPEAKER_03: telling to my U.S.
57:20
SPEAKER_03: State Department deputy saying, Iraq needed a smoother dictator.
57:28
SPEAKER_03: In those countries,
57:29
SPEAKER_03: you go from there's Saddam and just a little smoother,
57:32
SPEAKER_03: a little smoother,
57:33
SPEAKER_03: a little smoother so that people get used to it.
57:37
SPEAKER_03: And instead, you can't go from a full-fledged dictator to smoothness.
57:42
SPEAKER_03: The smoothness will never survive.
57:43
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
57:46
SPEAKER_00: We talked about this a little bit,
57:47
SPEAKER_00: but let's...
57:47
SPEAKER_00: So as the years are going by,
57:48
SPEAKER_00: you're doing this work.
57:49
SPEAKER_00: Eventually,
57:50
SPEAKER_00: just as you mentioned,
57:51
you're going to end up in the southern part of the country
57:54
after David Petraeus
57:56
SPEAKER_00: asks you to take on your next mission.
57:58
SPEAKER_00: But as all this is playing out, I know you said it's not black and white.
58:03
SPEAKER_00: The U.S.
58:03
SPEAKER_00: was trying to do some things apparently right.
58:06
SPEAKER_00: But I mean,
58:06
SPEAKER_00: God,
58:07
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
58:07
SPEAKER_00: like,
58:08
SPEAKER_00: as you're watching the way this is getting reported around the world...
58:13
SPEAKER_00: Um,
58:14
SPEAKER_00: I suppose on some level by this part,
58:16
SPEAKER_00: the rest of the world isn't paying as much attention as they used to,
58:20
SPEAKER_00: and they've kind of lost interest in the story.
58:22
SPEAKER_00: Um, but like, what's your, what's your reaction?
58:27
SPEAKER_00: What's going through your mind as to same thing?
58:30
SPEAKER_00: It's like, there is no right side.
58:31
SPEAKER_00: We just have to fix this thing.
58:33
Or was it obvious to you that some people were really fucking
58:35
up and some weren't
58:36
SPEAKER_00: and,
58:36
SPEAKER_00: um,
58:37
SPEAKER_00: or it's just chaos and.
58:38
SPEAKER_03: It was utter chaos.
58:39
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
58:41
SPEAKER_03: It was very clear that we were going around it in the wrong way.
58:46
And so when Petraeus,
58:48
the idea of the surge came up,
58:51
I didn't believe in it.
58:52
SPEAKER_03: I wanted to go home.
58:53
SPEAKER_03: I have never had a death wish.
58:57
SPEAKER_03: I stayed there forever.
58:59
SPEAKER_03: Not because I get my adrenaline from getting blown up or shot at.
59:03
SPEAKER_03: I get my adrenaline from thinking creatively.
59:05
SPEAKER_03: Let's figure this out.
59:07
SPEAKER_03: Let's figure this out.
59:09
SPEAKER_03: And after a couple of years, I was like, there's nothing to figure out.
59:12
We civilians need to get out of here because the ones who
59:17
stayed were all locked up
59:18
SPEAKER_03: in the green zone.
59:18
SPEAKER_03: So I'm not one of those.
59:19
SPEAKER_03: I don't want to stay locked up.
59:21
SPEAKER_03: And if I keep on going out, I'll get killed.
59:24
SPEAKER_03: And it's not my country.
59:26
SPEAKER_03: Now I'm also American.
59:27
SPEAKER_03: I'm happy to get killed for either Italy or America.
59:31
SPEAKER_03: But Iraq is not my country.
59:33
SPEAKER_03: So I was like, I'm out.
59:35
SPEAKER_03: This is it.
59:36
SPEAKER_03: And when I first was offered the job, I declined.
59:40
SPEAKER_03: It was a huge honor.
59:42
SPEAKER_00: So this is a couple of years later.
59:44
SPEAKER_03: It's kind of like 2005.
59:45
SPEAKER_00: 2006.
59:45
SPEAKER_00: 2006.
59:45
SPEAKER_00: So like three years.
59:46
SPEAKER_00: And so, okay, so you've kind of had enough.
59:48
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
59:50
SPEAKER_00: And you're ready to go.
59:51
SPEAKER_00: And then...
59:53
SPEAKER_00: Petraeus comes and he's heard about your skills.
59:56
SPEAKER_00: So you're like a victim of your own success in a lot of ways.
1:00:01
SPEAKER_00: And he's saying,
1:00:04
SPEAKER_00: so the southern part of Iraq,
1:00:05
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
1:00:06
SPEAKER_00: and I learned all this from your book,
1:00:07
SPEAKER_00: so please correct me.
1:00:08
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's controlled by Iran to some degree at this moment in time.
1:00:14
SPEAKER_00: So there's like a whole bunch of extra complexity.
1:00:17
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
1:00:18
SPEAKER_00: And the U.S.
1:00:19
knows that it's pretty much sucked at doing the kind of
1:00:25
on-the-ground work you
1:00:26
SPEAKER_00: would need to do to build trust,
1:00:28
SPEAKER_00: to sort of maneuver.
1:00:30
And you've developed this reputation as someone who's uniquely
1:00:33
good at these types of things.
1:00:34
SPEAKER_00: And so Petraeus is coming and saying, can you come add some what?
1:00:38
SPEAKER_00: Some order to Southern Oroximate?
1:00:40
SPEAKER_03: No, it was...
1:00:42
SPEAKER_03: You know, the surge, everyone thinks it's a surge of troops.
1:00:45
Yeah,
1:00:45
there was a surge of troops,
1:00:46
but it was also a surge of creative ideas.
1:00:50
SPEAKER_03: And that's where I got picked.
1:00:52
SPEAKER_03: It's like,
1:00:52
we need to start thinking creatively because if we keep on
1:00:56
building the brick and
1:00:57
SPEAKER_03: mortar,
1:00:57
SPEAKER_03: okay,
1:00:58
SPEAKER_03: you need a hospital.
1:00:59
SPEAKER_03: Oh, we'll build it for you.
1:01:00
SPEAKER_03: We're not going anywhere.
1:01:01
SPEAKER_03: They're just using us,
1:01:03
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:01:04
SPEAKER_03: for our money,
1:01:05
SPEAKER_03: but we're not creating a society that will eventually change in the right
1:01:11
SPEAKER_03: direction.
1:01:12
SPEAKER_03: But to do that, you need to, I had no idea.
1:01:15
SPEAKER_03: I still remember I was on this flight and I had these bullet points.
1:01:20
SPEAKER_03: You need to tap into rule of law.
1:01:21
I mean,
1:01:23
go out there and say,
1:01:24
oh,
1:01:24
please,
1:01:24
could you just chill out torturing people?
1:01:26
SPEAKER_03: I mean, it was such an abstract concept.
1:01:30
SPEAKER_03: It's like, where do I even start?
1:01:32
SPEAKER_03: And then agriculture.
1:01:33
SPEAKER_03: I said, well, agriculture, I can figure something out there.
1:01:35
SPEAKER_03: And interestingly, there was no health on there.
1:01:39
SPEAKER_03: And I was like, you're talking about the hearts and minds.
1:01:43
I am not gaining the people's hearts and minds if I am tapping
1:01:47
into rule of law right away.
1:01:50
SPEAKER_03: I need to figure out a way on how to get the population to like me.
1:01:56
SPEAKER_03: And then the population will probably also take care of me.
1:02:01
SPEAKER_03: which is then what actually happened.
1:02:03
SPEAKER_03: Now, this is not a thing that happens in one day or two.
1:02:07
SPEAKER_03: I at first said, no, I don't believe in any effort anymore.
1:02:10
SPEAKER_03: We need to get out and you do whatever sort you're doing,
1:02:13
SPEAKER_03: but I'm out and I might come back when you figure this shit out.
1:02:18
SPEAKER_03: And then I was convinced, okay,
1:02:21
SPEAKER_03: Do it.
1:02:21
SPEAKER_03: And then, and I said, figure out, find someone who can do it.
1:02:25
SPEAKER_03: I'll set it up.
1:02:26
SPEAKER_03: I'm good with setting up teams.
1:02:28
SPEAKER_03: I'll set up the team.
1:02:29
SPEAKER_03: But also my main point was, I'm a woman.
1:02:33
SPEAKER_03: And you're sending me in deep Shia land,
1:02:36
SPEAKER_03: where they're all voting for Muqtad al-Sadr,
1:02:38
SPEAKER_03: who is the famous clergy that we all know,
1:02:40
SPEAKER_03: who had started the Sadrist movement.
1:02:43
SPEAKER_03: And in the hands of Iran...
1:02:46
SPEAKER_03: Women, you know, in Baghdad went a lot without scarf.
1:02:50
SPEAKER_03: If they did, they had one.
1:02:51
SPEAKER_03: A few in some parts of the town had the black gown.
1:02:55
SPEAKER_03: In the south, they all had the whole battle rattle black thing.
1:03:00
SPEAKER_03: So it was like,
1:03:01
you need a man because a woman won't manage to get where you
1:03:06
need the team lead to
1:03:08
SPEAKER_03: go.
1:03:09
SPEAKER_00: Right.
1:03:09
SPEAKER_00: So it's like an impossible situation to begin with.
1:03:11
SPEAKER_00: Plus.
1:03:12
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:03:13
SPEAKER_00: With all this extra baggage, impossible baggage on top of it.
1:03:17
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:03:19
SPEAKER_03: And,
1:03:19
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:03:19
SPEAKER_03: I said,
1:03:19
I'll do it a couple months and then you figure out who else can
1:03:23
take over.
1:03:24
SPEAKER_03: And then I want to go home.
1:03:26
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
1:03:27
SPEAKER_03: And...
1:03:29
SPEAKER_03: And that's where I started seeing how things started working.
1:03:32
SPEAKER_03: It took a while,
1:03:34
SPEAKER_03: but just the fact that I could pick my team and,
1:03:38
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:03:40
SPEAKER_03: do things the way I wanted to do them.
1:03:43
SPEAKER_03: And I did stuff that was, frankly, quite dangerous, you know.
1:03:48
SPEAKER_03: reach out the way I want to reach out.
1:03:50
SPEAKER_03: What does that mean?
1:03:53
I mean,
1:03:54
to paint a picture,
1:03:55
like,
1:03:55
what are your techniques for doing this?
1:03:57
SPEAKER_03: The first biggest issue was the governor.
1:04:00
I needed to become kind of the trusted advisor to the man who
1:04:06
is in charge.
1:04:06
SPEAKER_03: And the man who is in charge
1:04:09
SPEAKER_03: is philo-Iranian.
1:04:11
SPEAKER_03: He fled during Saddam's time, the south, and fled to Iran.
1:04:17
SPEAKER_03: Like,
1:04:18
SPEAKER_03: a lot of people know about how much the Kurds,
1:04:20
SPEAKER_03: what the Kurds went through caused by Saddam.
1:04:25
Not a lot of people know that the marshes used to be called the
1:04:30
Garden of Eden.
1:04:33
SPEAKER_03: The marshes...
1:04:35
SPEAKER_03: when I was there, and still nowadays, slowly coming back, was desert.
1:04:40
SPEAKER_00: In southern Iraq?
1:04:42
SPEAKER_00: Southern Iraq.
1:04:42
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
1:04:43
Because Saddam Hussein,
1:04:45
the marshland Arabs,
1:04:47
had rioted against Saddam Hussein.
1:04:52
SPEAKER_03: And...
1:04:54
SPEAKER_03: President Bush had promised air support if they did so.
1:05:01
SPEAKER_03: For some reason, that air support did not take place.
1:05:05
SPEAKER_03: So, Saddam crushed the riot.
1:05:08
SPEAKER_03: And not only he wasn't happy to just kill the guys who had,
1:05:12
SPEAKER_03: but he decided,
1:05:13
SPEAKER_03: I'm just exterminating the entire population.
1:05:16
And to do so,
1:05:18
they have to stop being able to hide in the marshes behind the
1:05:21
reeds.
1:05:22
SPEAKER_03: So he had his engineers divert the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers.
1:05:29
SPEAKER_03: And made the marshes a complete desert.
1:05:33
SPEAKER_03: So that he could spot people and kill them.
1:05:35
SPEAKER_03: So your option was either I stay here and get killed or I run to Iran.
1:05:40
And the governor of the southern province that I had been
1:05:44
appointed to was one of
1:05:46
SPEAKER_03: those who ran to Iran.
1:05:48
SPEAKER_03: So he hated Iraqis and he hated Saddam Hussein with a vengeance.
1:05:52
SPEAKER_03: Now, but then when Saddam was toppled, his second priority was America.
1:05:59
SPEAKER_03: And no one had ever met him before.
1:06:01
SPEAKER_03: He refused to meet with Americans.
1:06:03
SPEAKER_03: And what I was seeing was the civil affairs people,
1:06:06
SPEAKER_03: Americans,
1:06:07
SPEAKER_03: were doing a great job,
1:06:08
SPEAKER_03: but they were catering to someone.
1:06:14
SPEAKER_03: They weren't forcing someone to think differently.
1:06:18
SPEAKER_03: And so they had promised this big hospital in downtown Nasiriyah.
1:06:22
SPEAKER_03: Nasiriyah is the fourth town in Iraq, so it's a major city.
1:06:25
SPEAKER_03: And I was like, well, this with, again, with U.S.
1:06:28
SPEAKER_03: taxpayers' money,
1:06:29
SPEAKER_03: you're building something which has no future because there's no doctors,
1:06:33
SPEAKER_03: there's no nurses,
1:06:34
SPEAKER_03: there's nothing.
1:06:35
SPEAKER_03: And so I had the luck also that Petraeus and his team said,
1:06:42
SPEAKER_03: no,
1:06:43
SPEAKER_03: no project will get implemented unless Anna Prowse signs on it.
1:06:50
SPEAKER_03: So I get the whole list of projects,
1:06:52
SPEAKER_03: and the first one I say,
1:06:53
SPEAKER_03: this needs to be canceled,
1:06:55
SPEAKER_03: is the hospital.
1:06:55
SPEAKER_00: And I remember that... You're like a personal doge.
1:06:59
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:07:00
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:07:02
SPEAKER_03: And so the American's like, he'll kill you.
1:07:03
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:07:04
SPEAKER_03: And I knew it.
1:07:05
SPEAKER_03: I said, I will.
1:07:06
SPEAKER_03: But I need to start...
1:07:06
SPEAKER_03: I'm not down here...
1:07:07
SPEAKER_03: I have not been,
1:07:09
SPEAKER_03: frankly,
1:07:09
SPEAKER_03: a huge honor,
1:07:10
SPEAKER_03: because I take it very seriously,
1:07:12
SPEAKER_03: to be in charge of rebuilding something,
1:07:14
SPEAKER_03: and then I...
1:07:16
SPEAKER_03: Don't do something which is, frankly, the right thing to do.
1:07:20
SPEAKER_03: And so I met with the governor.
1:07:22
SPEAKER_00: Sorry, that was a terrible joke.
1:07:25
SPEAKER_00: No, it was great.
1:07:29
SPEAKER_03: I met with the governor.
1:07:30
SPEAKER_03: All military was there because they had never met him before.
1:07:33
SPEAKER_03: And, you know, they were scared.
1:07:36
SPEAKER_03: It was like this one.
1:07:36
SPEAKER_03: And the governor could not believe that.
1:07:38
SPEAKER_03: I just...
1:07:39
stood up and said,
1:07:40
I will build it for you,
1:07:42
but after we trained a bunch of people.
1:07:45
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you're trying to curry favor with this guy, but you're being tough.
1:07:49
SPEAKER_03: I'm tough.
1:07:49
SPEAKER_03: And he marched out,
1:07:51
SPEAKER_03: slammed the door,
1:07:52
SPEAKER_03: and he looked like Saddam,
1:07:56
SPEAKER_03: miniature Saddam,
1:07:58
SPEAKER_03: the black mustache,
1:07:59
SPEAKER_03: the Kalashnikov,
1:08:00
SPEAKER_03: the black dyed hair,
1:08:01
SPEAKER_03: and he played the role really well.
1:08:06
SPEAKER_03: And so,
1:08:07
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:08:07
SPEAKER_03: a couple of days later,
1:08:08
he invited me at a ribbon cutting ceremony of one of the
1:08:13
gazillion schools we were
1:08:14
SPEAKER_03: building for him.
1:08:16
SPEAKER_03: And we were never allowed to go to ribbon cuttings.
1:08:19
SPEAKER_03: This time he invites me,
1:08:20
SPEAKER_03: but it's in Suchasyuk,
1:08:22
SPEAKER_03: which was one of the most dangerous places in the world.
1:08:27
SPEAKER_03: And no military had even been to Sukhesiuk.
1:08:30
SPEAKER_03: And they tell me, you've got to go.
1:08:32
SPEAKER_03: And I'm sorry, I'm not going.
1:08:34
And so at that point,
1:08:36
there was also the Australians were also present in southern
1:08:39
Iraq.
1:08:39
So it was the Italians,
1:08:40
Australians,
1:08:41
the Romanians,
1:08:42
and the Italians had actually pulled out.
1:08:45
SPEAKER_03: And so I go in this huge convoy, half American and half Australian,
1:08:49
SPEAKER_03: With them telling me they won't know in which,
1:08:53
SPEAKER_03: if you are in which Humvee or which,
1:08:56
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:08:56
SPEAKER_03: MRAP you're in.
1:08:58
SPEAKER_03: And that's, again, underestimating the people on the other side.
1:09:01
SPEAKER_03: Of course, they have people on base who watch.
1:09:05
SPEAKER_03: And, of course, they knew in which convoy I went in.
1:09:08
SPEAKER_03: So when I entered Sukhashiuk, bam!
1:09:11
SPEAKER_00: Your car was hit with an ID?
1:09:12
SPEAKER_03: My car was hit by an ID.
1:09:14
SPEAKER_03: I can't hear from an ear, thanks to Governor Aziz Alwan.
1:09:20
SPEAKER_03: Never made it to the ribbon cutting, made it to the hospital.
1:09:25
SPEAKER_03: And a couple of days later, he calls me.
1:09:27
SPEAKER_03: He has his man call me to invite me for a hunting trip.
1:09:35
SPEAKER_03: And Friday was coming up.
1:09:36
SPEAKER_03: Actually, the next day was Friday.
1:09:38
SPEAKER_03: And he said, I'm going hunting.
1:09:40
SPEAKER_03: Do you want to come with me?
1:09:44
SPEAKER_00: And you know that he's just trying to kill you.
1:09:46
SPEAKER_03: And, yeah.
1:09:47
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:09:49
SPEAKER_03: And I say, yes.
1:09:51
SPEAKER_03: And I think that he, they stopped there because they expected a no.
1:09:55
SPEAKER_03: So I had to probably blame it all.
1:09:57
SPEAKER_03: They don't have the courage that's needed.
1:09:59
SPEAKER_03: They don't have.
1:10:00
SPEAKER_03: And I said, yes.
1:10:01
SPEAKER_03: And then like, okay, tell me where and when.
1:10:04
SPEAKER_03: And that was like, well, I need to call you back later.
1:10:07
Because they were just being,
1:10:10
you know,
1:10:10
being aggressive as they are always.
1:10:13
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:10:13
And I set up a whole plan without involving direct the military
1:10:17
because they could not.
1:10:18
SPEAKER_03: He also made it clear you're coming alone.
1:10:20
SPEAKER_03: You're not coming with that whole convoy and everything.
1:10:22
So I walked out of a military base in a black chador,
1:10:26
no one knowing that he was on a prowse.
1:10:29
SPEAKER_00: You like drove yourself?
1:10:30
SPEAKER_03: He picked me up with his man, took me out there.
1:10:35
And I had no idea whether he was just finishing the job mission
1:10:40
or testing me.
1:10:42
And when he took out the rifle from the booth of his car,
1:10:45
he pointed it at me,
1:10:46
knowing exactly.
1:10:47
SPEAKER_03: He was the cat playing with the mouse.
1:10:49
SPEAKER_03: And I just stood up and looked at him.
1:10:52
SPEAKER_03: And then he said, let's go.
1:10:53
SPEAKER_03: Let's go.
1:10:53
SPEAKER_03: I'll teach you how to shoot.
1:10:56
SPEAKER_03: And...
1:10:57
SPEAKER_03: Of course, it was wild boar hunting.
1:10:59
SPEAKER_03: We didn't even see a wild boar even close.
1:11:01
SPEAKER_03: I think there was nothing happening.
1:11:03
SPEAKER_03: And then he said, okay, it's time for lunch.
1:11:05
SPEAKER_03: And that's where I see a bunch of pickup trucks come from the desert.
1:11:09
And I was like,
1:11:09
okay,
1:11:10
now maybe he's having someone else do the dirty job for him.
1:11:13
SPEAKER_03: And that was his private militia.
1:11:16
SPEAKER_03: And they laid out blankets on the floor and pillows and a somptuous...
1:11:23
SPEAKER_01: Very nice.
1:11:24
SPEAKER_03: Lunch.
1:11:25
SPEAKER_03: And I sat there for a couple of hours.
1:11:28
SPEAKER_03: And that's where he started trusting me.
1:11:30
SPEAKER_03: He told me about himself, things that no one knew about.
1:11:34
SPEAKER_03: And that's how I got into his graces.
1:11:37
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:11:38
SPEAKER_00: So, I mean, you do a lot of things I would not do.
1:11:43
SPEAKER_00: I actually wish I had some of the,
1:11:45
SPEAKER_00: as a reporter,
1:11:46
SPEAKER_00: some of the courage to do many of the things you did.
1:11:50
SPEAKER_00: But like in that, I mean, you talked about it a bit, but it's like,
1:11:54
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
1:11:55
SPEAKER_00: do you really...
1:11:56
SPEAKER_00: Like,
1:11:56
SPEAKER_00: why would you...
1:11:58
SPEAKER_00: Did you care about Iraq that much at that point that you're...
1:12:02
SPEAKER_00: I guess.
1:12:03
SPEAKER_03: I guess.
1:12:03
SPEAKER_03: I think more than Iraq...
1:12:06
SPEAKER_03: Because I thought about it a long time.
1:12:07
SPEAKER_03: Because it's the values that we brought to the table.
1:12:14
SPEAKER_03: And I had by then seen that maybe it was not a mission impossible.
1:12:20
SPEAKER_03: But you bring values to the table not by talking about values.
1:12:27
SPEAKER_03: You have to show values.
1:12:30
SPEAKER_03: So I always thought I need to be out there with them.
1:12:35
I need to show the friendly face of the Western world because
1:12:40
they right now are
1:12:41
used to seeing soldiers in full battle rattle the same way
1:12:45
soldiers are used to
1:12:47
SPEAKER_03: seeing terrorists.
1:12:49
SPEAKER_03: They're not used to seeing normal people.
1:12:52
So I sort of started being the bridge between two cultures who
1:13:00
hated each other,
1:13:01
SPEAKER_03: but I think they hated each other because they didn't know each other.
1:13:06
And I was like,
1:13:06
okay,
1:13:07
I need to show the Iraqis that we are actually nice people.
1:13:11
SPEAKER_00: You see signs of hope that you could actually make a bigger change.
1:13:14
SPEAKER_03: And, you know, I started seeing signs of hope.
1:13:17
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:13:17
SPEAKER_00: Unbelievable.
1:13:20
SPEAKER_00: Like the night before you do that, do you sleep?
1:13:23
SPEAKER_00: No.
1:13:24
SPEAKER_03: No, no.
1:13:25
SPEAKER_03: That was probably the worst night.
1:13:26
SPEAKER_03: Also because I had to set up a whole,
1:13:28
SPEAKER_03: if I disappear,
1:13:29
so I couldn't tell my own team because they would have ratted
1:13:32
me out immediately.
1:13:33
SPEAKER_03: And I would have done the same, by the way.
1:13:36
SPEAKER_03: I couldn't tell the military because if they say,
1:13:39
SPEAKER_03: OK,
1:13:39
SPEAKER_03: and I will cover you,
1:13:40
SPEAKER_03: whoever covers me and something happens to me,
1:13:42
SPEAKER_03: it's court martial.
1:13:44
SPEAKER_03: And I can't inflict that on someone.
1:13:46
SPEAKER_03: So I told a colleague of mine, State Department, U.S.
1:13:48
SPEAKER_03: State Department colleague who worked on another team.
1:13:53
SPEAKER_03: And he was also a former Marine.
1:13:57
SPEAKER_03: So to me, it was like, he told me, don't do it.
1:14:00
SPEAKER_03: It's crazy.
1:14:01
SPEAKER_03: But the whole plan was like,
1:14:03
SPEAKER_03: if I do not show up at this time in front of the Nasseria prison,
1:14:09
because I did ask the military to come and be in front of the
1:14:14
Nasseria prison at a
1:14:16
SPEAKER_03: specific time on that Friday late afternoon.
1:14:20
SPEAKER_03: And I didn't tell them anything else.
1:14:23
SPEAKER_03: So as you didn't know what I was up to.
1:14:28
SPEAKER_03: But I told the other guy from the other team,
1:14:34
SPEAKER_03: if I don't show up at this time,
1:14:36
you need to tell them that I have gone out with Governor Aziz
1:14:41
so they can at least
1:14:42
SPEAKER_03: hunt down the governor and see what happened.
1:14:45
SPEAKER_03: So there was a whole plan in place.
1:14:48
But then I also noticed that I got stuck in a traffic jam
1:14:51
coming back from the hunting trip.
1:14:53
SPEAKER_01: And it's like, oh, my God.
1:14:54
SPEAKER_03: Now we will have the whole forces unleashed to free me.
1:14:57
SPEAKER_03: And I am stuck in traffic, banal traffic.
1:15:00
But,
1:15:00
you know,
1:15:01
when you don't have phones,
1:15:02
it's kind of hard to communicate.
1:15:04
It's all things you don't think about when you live in this
1:15:06
part of the world.
1:15:07
SPEAKER_03: But when you live in that part of the world,
1:15:08
SPEAKER_03: it's like,
1:15:09
SPEAKER_03: well,
1:15:09
SPEAKER_03: I'll just pick up a phone and call.
1:15:11
SPEAKER_03: That's not how it works.
1:15:12
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:15:12
SPEAKER_00: So you've had – so at this point you've been –
1:15:15
SPEAKER_00: You've been almost shot by your bodyguard.
1:15:18
SPEAKER_00: Your hotel room has been blown up by a rocket.
1:15:21
SPEAKER_03: My beloved governor, a few months later, I had him over for dinner.
1:15:25
SPEAKER_03: And he tells me,
1:15:28
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:15:28
SPEAKER_03: they called me doctora because they were sure I was,
1:15:31
SPEAKER_03: they were convinced I was a medical doctor.
1:15:34
SPEAKER_03: And I told them I'm not, but it's useless.
1:15:36
You know,
1:15:37
they're pretty stubborn when they decide that you're something,
1:15:39
you're something.
1:15:40
SPEAKER_03: So he looks at me and says,
1:15:41
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:15:41
SPEAKER_03: doctora,
1:15:42
I am so happy I didn't succeed in killing you because you're a
1:15:48
very nice person.
1:15:49
SPEAKER_00: He confessed it.
1:15:50
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
1:15:51
SPEAKER_00: Oh, my.
1:15:51
SPEAKER_00: What do you say to that?
1:15:52
There was a candor to it where,
1:15:54
you know,
1:15:55
he wasn't here hiding behind anything.
1:15:57
SPEAKER_03: He was like, yeah, we kill people here.
1:15:59
SPEAKER_03: And I tried to kill you, but I was wrong because you're a nice person.
1:16:02
SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
1:16:03
SPEAKER_00: Did you just say thank you to that?
1:16:05
SPEAKER_03: Well, I'm also kind of glad you didn't succeed.
1:16:08
SPEAKER_00: There's one incident.
1:16:10
I think I'm going to have to fast forward over because there's
1:16:14
a bunch of other
1:16:15
SPEAKER_00: stuff I want to get to.
1:16:16
SPEAKER_00: You end up, Soleimani's controlling this part of Iraq at the time.
1:16:21
SPEAKER_00: You end up having a fatwa placed on you by somebody else.
1:16:26
Your reputation now has gotten to this point where you're able
1:16:29
to get word to
1:16:30
SPEAKER_00: Soleimani to call off
1:16:32
SPEAKER_00: The fatwa.
1:16:33
SPEAKER_00: So,
1:16:34
SPEAKER_00: you know,
1:16:34
SPEAKER_00: you're one of these very few people who've been in that circumstance is
1:16:38
SPEAKER_00: unbelievable.
1:16:39
And then,
1:16:41
you know,
1:16:41
you've earned this title Honorary Man,
1:16:44
which is,
1:16:45
you know,
1:16:45
it's both...
1:16:48
SPEAKER_00: endearing, respectful, and hilarious.
1:16:51
SPEAKER_00: And, you know, it comes with so many undertones and meanings.
1:16:57
SPEAKER_00: But yeah, can you, I mean, explain this title.
1:17:00
SPEAKER_03: It happened.
1:17:02
SPEAKER_03: You've got to understand that, again, we humans are very adaptable.
1:17:06
SPEAKER_03: One thinks, oh, she did all this stuff.
1:17:07
SPEAKER_03: You know, if you live in that part of the world, eventually you adapt.
1:17:12
SPEAKER_03: And I had so got used to...
1:17:14
my role that i would just take helicopters have at that point i
1:17:18
had bodyguards and
1:17:19
they take me places and they would often have me sit at the
1:17:22
head of the table or on
1:17:23
the right hand side of the general in charge or the governor
1:17:27
and the tables are
1:17:28
these long tables full of guys where they put their ak's on the
1:17:32
table and these
1:17:33
moustaches and it's all it's all about violence and strength
1:17:36
and here comes anna
1:17:38
SPEAKER_03: I had a flat jacket on and I would embellish it with plastic flowers,
1:17:41
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:17:43
SPEAKER_03: just to show that I'm not Rambo.
1:17:47
SPEAKER_03: I don't have guns.
1:17:48
SPEAKER_03: I got to wear this because, you know, for safety reasons.
1:17:52
And some French journalists came and visited and stayed for a
1:17:56
while with the team.
1:17:58
SPEAKER_03: And then we became quite friends with one of them.
1:18:00
And after one of these large meetings,
1:18:02
she said,
1:18:02
listen,
1:18:02
Anna,
1:18:03
do you even realize...
1:18:05
SPEAKER_03: How weird this is.
1:18:07
SPEAKER_03: Because whether it is also with Americans,
1:18:08
SPEAKER_03: also Americans,
1:18:09
SPEAKER_03: it was all American soldiers,
1:18:11
SPEAKER_03: three-star generals,
1:18:12
SPEAKER_03: and me briefing General Odierno or Petraeus.
1:18:15
SPEAKER_03: And it's just me and a bunch of guys.
1:18:19
SPEAKER_03: And he's like...
1:18:21
SPEAKER_03: do you even know how this looks so weird?
1:18:24
SPEAKER_03: And I was like, does it really look weird?
1:18:25
SPEAKER_03: I was like, yes, it looks weird.
1:18:28
SPEAKER_03: And you're the only woman.
1:18:29
SPEAKER_03: So I was like, yeah, let's, let's try the woman question here.
1:18:32
So I went to one of these big meetings,
1:18:34
all military guys and the chief of police of Nasseria.
1:18:37
SPEAKER_03: And, and I said, I just said, listen, just to end up the meeting.
1:18:40
SPEAKER_03: And there was journalists there.
1:18:41
SPEAKER_03: I said, why me?
1:18:43
SPEAKER_03: I'm a woman.
1:18:44
SPEAKER_03: Why me?
1:18:45
SPEAKER_03: And why not others?
1:18:46
SPEAKER_03: And, uh,
1:18:48
SPEAKER_03: Oh, it was like it was started.
1:18:50
There was a true brainstorming session around the table,
1:18:53
everything in Arabic.
1:18:54
And then the three-star general comes out and says,
1:18:57
because,
1:18:58
doctora,
1:18:58
you are an honorary man.
1:19:01
SPEAKER_03: So they had fixed the issue.
1:19:03
SPEAKER_03: Not a woman.
1:19:04
SPEAKER_03: The title is that.
1:19:06
SPEAKER_03: Let's move forward.
1:19:08
And,
1:19:08
you know,
1:19:09
it was,
1:19:10
you know,
1:19:10
I said that to a few colleagues when I used to work for Google.
1:19:13
SPEAKER_03: And they was like, oh, my God, what an insult.
1:19:16
SPEAKER_03: That, again, the Silicon Valley view, that's a tribal view.
1:19:21
SPEAKER_03: That's how it works.
1:19:24
SPEAKER_03: If you really want to change that world, show your face.
1:19:28
SPEAKER_03: That was my whole point.
1:19:30
SPEAKER_03: Let's not talk about women's rights.
1:19:32
SPEAKER_03: Let's implement them.
1:19:34
SPEAKER_03: So by seeing me every day out there and not only the men,
1:19:38
SPEAKER_03: but also the women were like,
1:19:40
SPEAKER_03: oh,
1:19:40
SPEAKER_03: maybe we can get there.
1:19:42
And also within my Iraqi team at the beginning,
1:19:45
there were very few women.
1:19:46
Then there were more women to the point where then I picked my
1:19:48
deputy as a woman.
1:19:51
And I like to say that it's like she was the most qualified
1:19:55
engineer among all.
1:19:57
SPEAKER_03: So I picked her also because she had the right numbers.
1:20:01
SPEAKER_03: I didn't just pick her because she was a woman,
1:20:04
SPEAKER_03: but I slowly transitioned to a very mixed team of men and women.
1:20:10
SPEAKER_03: But that's how you do make change.
1:20:14
SPEAKER_03: You need to show it.
1:20:15
SPEAKER_00: So, I mean, we touched on some of this.
1:20:18
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:20:20
SPEAKER_00: Okay, I remember reading No Good Man Among the Living.
1:20:24
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever read that book?
1:20:26
SPEAKER_00: It's this guy who goes to Afghanistan on a motorcycle,
1:20:30
SPEAKER_00: and he's a kid,
1:20:32
SPEAKER_00: I think,
1:20:32
SPEAKER_00: if I remember right.
1:20:33
SPEAKER_00: He was at MIT, and he just decides...
1:20:35
screw it i want to find out what's happening in afghanistan and
1:20:38
he goes on a on his
1:20:40
motorbike and he's driving around or a bicycle i think it was a
1:20:43
motorbike and um
1:20:44
you know so he ends up getting this it's it's like one of the
1:20:47
best books i've ever
1:20:48
read honestly and and he gets this um this un well i don't it's
1:20:53
a biased view but
1:20:54
he's getting this unfettered view of of um what happened from
1:20:59
the american
1:21:00
SPEAKER_00: occupation and
1:21:01
SPEAKER_00: you know, it's all very similar.
1:21:02
SPEAKER_00: There were similar themes, right?
1:21:04
SPEAKER_00: It's,
1:21:05
it's like all this money comes in and there's good intentions
1:21:08
and then things just
1:21:09
SPEAKER_00: go awry as people try to grab all the money and nothing,
1:21:13
SPEAKER_00: you know,
1:21:13
SPEAKER_00: it feels like so hopeless.
1:21:14
SPEAKER_00: Um, and, and clearly it's just like repeats again and again.
1:21:18
SPEAKER_00: Right.
1:21:18
SPEAKER_00: And,
1:21:19
SPEAKER_00: and,
1:21:19
SPEAKER_00: um,
1:21:20
SPEAKER_00: countries have done this forever,
1:21:21
but the U S is sort of the main one now who like goes and tries
1:21:25
to set up shop and
1:21:26
SPEAKER_00: fix things.
1:21:27
SPEAKER_00: Um,
1:21:27
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
1:21:28
SPEAKER_00: from your experience,
1:21:29
SPEAKER_00: you outlined some of the things you did,
1:21:31
SPEAKER_00: but like,
1:21:31
SPEAKER_00: is this,
1:21:32
is this universally just a hopeless thing to do to go into some
1:21:38
country and try and
1:21:39
SPEAKER_00: establish order?
1:21:40
SPEAKER_00: Are there,
1:21:40
SPEAKER_00: are there like any,
1:21:42
clearly you had a means of operating in this total chaotic
1:21:46
environment that was
1:21:46
SPEAKER_00: effective,
1:21:47
SPEAKER_00: um,
1:21:48
SPEAKER_00: uh,
1:21:49
I'm sort of changing my question on the fly because maybe it is
1:21:52
just hopeless for
1:21:53
SPEAKER_00: some,
1:21:53
SPEAKER_00: some country to come in and try to establish order,
1:21:56
SPEAKER_00: but certainly there must be lessons to be learned of,
1:21:59
SPEAKER_00: um,
1:22:01
SPEAKER_00: effective things that can be done in dramatic situations like this.
1:22:05
And so you did highlight a couple,
1:22:07
but I just,
1:22:08
I wondered if there's any other lessons to give.
1:22:09
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:22:10
SPEAKER_03: I think one of the first things is,
1:22:13
SPEAKER_03: um,
1:22:14
SPEAKER_03: we all speak about involve them,
1:22:16
SPEAKER_03: involve them,
1:22:17
SPEAKER_03: involve them.
1:22:18
SPEAKER_03: Um,
1:22:20
But at the end of the day,
1:22:21
we involve them and then they come with a shopping list.
1:22:23
SPEAKER_03: I need four bridges here.
1:22:26
SPEAKER_03: I need eight schools there.
1:22:28
SPEAKER_03: And then you look at the bridges.
1:22:29
They all go from some prominent person in the province or in
1:22:36
the city to drive to them.
1:22:38
SPEAKER_03: It's all favors.
1:22:40
SPEAKER_03: Now,
1:22:41
SPEAKER_03: I understand maybe initially you need to do a little bit of that,
1:22:44
SPEAKER_03: but then you've got to stop.
1:22:46
SPEAKER_03: then it needs to... We need to change the way people do business.
1:22:52
SPEAKER_03: And that's what I did with the governor.
1:22:55
Governor,
1:22:56
if you want to be successful,
1:22:58
you need to start making a difference in the province.
1:23:02
SPEAKER_03: You need to stop.
1:23:03
SPEAKER_03: That's where then the rule of law comes in.
1:23:05
SPEAKER_03: You really think that you can...
1:23:09
lock everyone up he would um how do you say you know hammer
1:23:14
hammer uh you know when
1:23:16
he knew that his opponents would gather in the evening in
1:23:20
specific places he would
1:23:22
have his militias go there close all windows and all doors and
1:23:26
burn people alive in
1:23:27
there i know there's like oh my god this is horrible oh yes it
1:23:30
is horrible it
1:23:31
happens everywhere now i can't go to the governor and say oh
1:23:36
come on stop doing
1:23:37
SPEAKER_03: this
1:23:39
SPEAKER_03: First thing you'll deny, oh, it's not me, and we all know it's him.
1:23:42
SPEAKER_03: He needs to understand what is on the table if he stops doing it.
1:23:48
And my argument was,
1:23:52
if you keep on being seen as the murderer,
1:23:56
we're going towards elections.
1:23:59
SPEAKER_03: They won't vote for you again.
1:24:01
SPEAKER_03: So you need to start governing the way.
1:24:05
SPEAKER_03: And as I do,
1:24:06
like I had set up a complaints day so that people would bring
1:24:11
in the complaints to
1:24:12
SPEAKER_03: me.
1:24:13
At the beginning,
1:24:14
I would look into them and see what can I do here and there.
1:24:18
SPEAKER_03: But then it was like, governor, this is what your people need.
1:24:22
SPEAKER_03: And by the way,
1:24:23
it would be much more effective if you took a day from your
1:24:28
schedule and sit there
1:24:30
SPEAKER_03: and listen to your constituency.
1:24:33
SPEAKER_03: And he did it.
1:24:34
SPEAKER_03: And then the head of the provincial council did it.
1:24:37
SPEAKER_03: Interestingly, the head of the chief of police did it.
1:24:40
So you need to be in touch with your people because now it is a
1:24:44
democracy.
1:24:46
SPEAKER_03: People are going to vote.
1:24:48
SPEAKER_03: Saddam is no longer here.
1:24:49
SPEAKER_03: And he did not get voted again.
1:24:53
So,
1:24:54
you know,
1:24:54
you'd need to get them to train them in thinking differently.
1:24:59
And like I used to have a huge amount of,
1:25:02
I mean,
1:25:03
you just mentioned the fatwa.
1:25:05
SPEAKER_03: It's the Iraqis who saved me from the fatwa.
1:25:07
SPEAKER_03: Why?
1:25:08
SPEAKER_03: Because killing me would have been counterproductive.
1:25:12
SPEAKER_03: I was seen like she's the only one out here.
1:25:15
Muqtada al-Sadr preaches anti-Western,
1:25:18
but he's in Iran studying to become an Ayatollah.
1:25:21
SPEAKER_03: I never see him here.
1:25:22
SPEAKER_03: She is in the slums.
1:25:24
SPEAKER_03: She does stuff.
1:25:25
SPEAKER_03: She brings in medical teams from all over the world to help us.
1:25:30
SPEAKER_03: So all of a sudden, and I went regularly to the amusement park.
1:25:35
SPEAKER_03: Now, we pay very little attention to normal life.
1:25:39
SPEAKER_03: We speak about all lack of electricity or lack of water.
1:25:43
Lack of normalcy,
1:25:45
lack of fun,
1:25:47
lack of spaces where you have a picnic on Friday night.
1:25:51
And that's where I decided I'm building an amusement park where
1:25:55
women can also walk
1:25:56
SPEAKER_03: around because after,
1:25:57
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:25:58
SPEAKER_03: when the sun goes down,
1:25:59
SPEAKER_03: women are all locked up in the houses.
1:26:01
SPEAKER_03: Let's build a place where they can walk with their husbands,
1:26:04
SPEAKER_03: their kids,
1:26:05
SPEAKER_03: go out and flirt,
1:26:06
SPEAKER_03: exchange little tickets.
1:26:08
SPEAKER_03: So how do you actually date in a country where you can't do that?
1:26:12
SPEAKER_03: Tickets going out, love notes, phone numbers.
1:26:15
SPEAKER_03: But if you don't create that space, that life stops.
1:26:19
SPEAKER_03: And I created that space and regularly went on Fridays.
1:26:23
SPEAKER_03: And there's actually a video about,
1:26:25
SPEAKER_03: and I hadn't,
1:26:26
where I come down from this catapult where you're with the legs
1:26:29
up and the head
1:26:30
SPEAKER_03: down.
1:26:30
And that's where I realized this is probably more dangerous
1:26:33
than anything else I
1:26:34
SPEAKER_03: ever did,
1:26:34
SPEAKER_03: knowing the engineers who just,
1:26:36
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:26:36
SPEAKER_03: screwed the thing.
1:26:37
SPEAKER_03: It's like, oh my God, this is so.
1:26:39
SPEAKER_03: But when I go down,
1:26:40
SPEAKER_03: the whole park,
1:26:41
SPEAKER_03: we're talking about hundreds of people were cheering my name.
1:26:45
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:26:46
SPEAKER_03: And this is how we need to start thinking about rebuilding.
1:26:52
SPEAKER_03: I don't want to go into the whole Gaza thing,
1:26:54
SPEAKER_03: but you need,
1:26:56
SPEAKER_03: we have created a gazillion of new terrorists out there.
1:27:02
SPEAKER_03: We need to bring them back on board.
1:27:04
SPEAKER_03: How do you do that?
1:27:06
SPEAKER_03: Hope.
1:27:07
SPEAKER_03: We need to bring back hope.
1:27:09
SPEAKER_03: We need to involve them in whatever is going on.
1:27:12
SPEAKER_03: It will be, you say, mission impossible.
1:27:15
SPEAKER_03: I don't like that word.
1:27:16
SPEAKER_03: And it will be not something that you do in one or two years.
1:27:20
It will be a lifelong thing where groups,
1:27:23
hopefully,
1:27:23
of smart people take over.
1:27:26
SPEAKER_03: And then at the end, do it behind the scenes.
1:27:28
SPEAKER_03: Right.
1:27:30
SPEAKER_03: Because the big work that I did was never slammed out there.
1:27:36
SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
1:27:36
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
1:27:36
SPEAKER_00: it sounds like it was this mix of going out in the field,
1:27:39
SPEAKER_00: having this relationship.
1:27:40
SPEAKER_03: Don't be on the media bragging about the last great thing that you did.
1:27:44
SPEAKER_00: Well, this is the heart of my question.
1:27:46
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I know you don't want to hear the word impossible.
1:27:51
The care and nuance of what you're talking about in somebody
1:27:54
who's lived through
1:27:55
SPEAKER_00: this and now has this experience and this knowledge.
1:27:57
SPEAKER_00: This does not strike me as like,
1:28:00
SPEAKER_00: you know,
1:28:00
SPEAKER_00: it seems like a much cruder,
1:28:01
SPEAKER_00: broader brush that is usually applied to these things.
1:28:04
SPEAKER_00: And it's inevitably going to be military led.
1:28:08
SPEAKER_00: And so, so, I mean, how, yeah, how, how does that change?
1:28:12
I mean,
1:28:12
how do you get,
1:28:13
how do you get not just one on a,
1:28:15
but you know,
1:28:16
like a hundred?
1:28:17
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:28:17
SPEAKER_03: And it was also in Iraq,
1:28:19
SPEAKER_03: it was military led,
1:28:20
SPEAKER_03: but then you got to,
1:28:21
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:28:21
SPEAKER_03: the military listens and,
1:28:23
SPEAKER_03: The military are,
1:28:24
SPEAKER_03: at the end of the day,
1:28:25
SPEAKER_03: also the first ones who do not want to do reconstruction.
1:28:28
SPEAKER_03: They invade countries.
1:28:30
So they would be more than happy to have civilians jump in and
1:28:36
do that work.
1:28:37
But a lot of civilians do not want to put their life at risk to
1:28:40
do that work.
1:28:42
SPEAKER_03: And so it's really...
1:28:44
SPEAKER_03: Because also when I would tell...
1:28:46
SPEAKER_03: And often,
1:28:47
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:28:47
SPEAKER_03: I had to tell the U.S.
1:28:49
SPEAKER_03: military...
1:28:50
I remember once there was a high-level official from the
1:28:52
Italian government,
1:28:54
SPEAKER_03: and it was during,
1:28:55
SPEAKER_03: I think,
1:28:57
SPEAKER_03: D'Alema's mandate.
1:28:58
SPEAKER_03: And he was, you know, central left.
1:29:01
SPEAKER_03: And one thing I'm quite proud of, I survived everyone.
1:29:06
SPEAKER_03: That's the fact I am apolitical.
1:29:08
SPEAKER_03: Now, of course, I have my political views, but I am a technocrat.
1:29:12
SPEAKER_03: I do this for a living.
1:29:14
So when this person,
1:29:15
high-level official,
1:29:16
came,
1:29:18
she was like,
1:29:19
I don't want to see a single U.S.
1:29:22
SPEAKER_03: military in your team.
1:29:25
SPEAKER_03: And we were on a U.S.
1:29:26
SPEAKER_03: base in southern Iraq.
1:29:28
SPEAKER_03: So it's like, you will see plenty of them.
1:29:31
SPEAKER_03: But then I went to my team members,
1:29:33
SPEAKER_03: the ones who were embedded in my team who were military,
1:29:37
SPEAKER_03: and I just told them up front,
1:29:39
SPEAKER_03: it's just not my choice.
1:29:40
SPEAKER_03: I would have everyone in here and say...
1:29:42
SPEAKER_03: Everyone is,
1:29:44
SPEAKER_03: I am the face of this,
1:29:45
SPEAKER_03: but everyone is working at this,
1:29:47
SPEAKER_03: whether you're Iraqi,
1:29:48
SPEAKER_03: whether you're American,
1:29:49
SPEAKER_03: whether you're Australian,
1:29:50
SPEAKER_03: whether you're Italian,
1:29:52
SPEAKER_03: which was also the difficulty as a team lead to bring all these different
1:29:55
SPEAKER_03: mentalities in one shot.
1:29:57
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
1:29:58
SPEAKER_03: But it was anti-US military.
1:30:02
SPEAKER_03: And they all left.
1:30:04
SPEAKER_03: I said, just stay away from here for the whole day.
1:30:07
SPEAKER_03: And let's just pretend that it's just us.
1:30:10
SPEAKER_03: So the military listens.
1:30:12
SPEAKER_03: If they're treated with respect, they'll respect back.
1:30:14
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:30:18
SPEAKER_00: Are you hearing from friends about Iran right now?
1:30:22
SPEAKER_03: Oh, yeah.
1:30:22
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:30:23
SPEAKER_00: I mean, what are you hearing?
1:30:25
SPEAKER_00: What do you think?
1:30:26
You know,
1:30:27
Iran,
1:30:28
this is,
1:30:28
again,
1:30:29
we like the black and white,
1:30:31
the bad guys and the good guys.
1:30:33
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:30:36
Let's not forget that the regime that is in place has been in
1:30:39
place for decades.
1:30:41
SPEAKER_03: And this regime has come out of a revolution.
1:30:44
So they have put in place everything to counter exactly what
1:30:49
we're seeing today.
1:30:54
Secondly,
1:30:55
when Ayatollah Khomeini took over,
1:30:58
he had a whole cabinet written out.
1:31:01
SPEAKER_03: He had a whole plan.
1:31:03
SPEAKER_03: For years he had worked with the mosques.
1:31:06
SPEAKER_03: He had worked with the bazaris,
1:31:08
SPEAKER_03: which are the ones who work in the bazars,
1:31:10
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:31:11
SPEAKER_03: the people who do commerce.
1:31:12
SPEAKER_03: He had it all planned ahead.
1:31:16
SPEAKER_03: I find it amazing that we're talking about the Shah's son replacing,
1:31:23
SPEAKER_03: and he has lived for 45 years in Virginia.
1:31:28
SPEAKER_03: He's rich.
1:31:30
SPEAKER_03: The Shah got toppled because he was more often in San Marit skiing.
1:31:34
SPEAKER_03: He was never in his country.
1:31:36
SPEAKER_03: We're talking about, also a lot of Iranians who live in the U.S.
1:31:40
SPEAKER_03: are all former Shah supporters.
1:31:45
SPEAKER_03: I know Iran well.
1:31:47
SPEAKER_03: The Shah used to impose Western way of dress code.
1:31:55
SPEAKER_03: So if you wore a chador during the Shah's time, they would hit you.
1:32:00
SPEAKER_03: You had to wear a skirt.
1:32:02
SPEAKER_03: Well, that's not democracy.
1:32:04
SPEAKER_03: Frankly, of course the Western world likes that.
1:32:08
SPEAKER_03: They have makeup and they have miniskirts and they travel and...
1:32:14
SPEAKER_03: But that was imposing a way of life to a population that is Persian.
1:32:21
SPEAKER_03: Whereas, for example, Iraq, we struggled in getting Iraq together.
1:32:24
SPEAKER_03: Iraq is all tribal.
1:32:26
SPEAKER_03: There's not even an Iraq.
1:32:28
SPEAKER_03: God forbid we get against Persia.
1:32:31
SPEAKER_03: They will reunite against the common enemy.
1:32:34
SPEAKER_03: There's no tribes there.
1:32:35
SPEAKER_03: They'll get all together and then they'll start fighting again.
1:32:38
SPEAKER_03: So...
1:32:39
SPEAKER_03: I really hope that there's no vacuum also because this is not...
1:32:44
SPEAKER_03: I've watched all the...
1:32:45
I've actually worked in all the countries where the Arab
1:32:48
Springs were unleashed.
1:32:50
SPEAKER_03: I was in Libya, I was in Egypt, and I had welcomed them all.
1:32:54
Maybe because I came from Iraq,
1:32:56
it was so damn hard,
1:32:57
it's better if it comes from the inside.
1:32:59
SPEAKER_03: Well, none of those countries have succeeded.
1:33:02
SPEAKER_03: Libya, I go there, it's in hands of militias, ruthless militias.
1:33:06
SPEAKER_03: It's more dangerous than Iraq at its peak.
1:33:08
SPEAKER_03: No one speaks about it anymore.
1:33:09
But Syria shows that a dictator can stay in place and be the
1:33:14
dictator of a bunch of
1:33:15
SPEAKER_03: ashes for 10 years.
1:33:17
SPEAKER_03: That's what happened in Syria.
1:33:19
SPEAKER_03: Tunisia, they voted actually democratically.
1:33:22
SPEAKER_03: They have a president.
1:33:24
SPEAKER_03: And after 10 years of democracy, he dismantled the parliament.
1:33:28
And everyone's clapping because finally we're back to a
1:33:31
dictatorship and it will function.
1:33:33
SPEAKER_03: The only country that actually somehow functions is Egypt.
1:33:38
SPEAKER_03: Well, Egypt has al-Sisi.
1:33:40
SPEAKER_03: He's a general.
1:33:42
SPEAKER_03: And he's definitely not democratic.
1:33:44
SPEAKER_03: But we're fine with that because he's the friend of the Western world.
1:33:50
SPEAKER_03: I would love to see a transition like that in Iran.
1:33:53
SPEAKER_03: To me, that's the only way where you go.
1:33:56
As I had said in Iraq,
1:33:57
you've got to go from the extreme and slowly,
1:34:01
slowly chill.
1:34:03
SPEAKER_00: So someone who's something of a dictator, but more moderate.
1:34:08
SPEAKER_03: And maybe not so religious,
1:34:10
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:34:11
SPEAKER_03: start being,
1:34:12
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:34:13
probably a Qasem Soleimani would have been kind of the perfect
1:34:16
fit in there.
1:34:17
SPEAKER_03: Although he's, you know, but he was a general.
1:34:19
SPEAKER_03: He had the buy-in from the population.
1:34:22
SPEAKER_03: He had fought in the Iran-Iraq war.
1:34:24
So he was the strong man,
1:34:25
but he didn't have,
1:34:27
you know,
1:34:27
he wasn't religious.
1:34:29
SPEAKER_03: These slow transitions need to happen in those places.
1:34:33
SPEAKER_00: So what do you make of MBS?
1:34:37
SPEAKER_00: MBS?
1:34:38
SPEAKER_00: In Saudi Arabia.
1:34:39
SPEAKER_00: Oh, sorry, yeah.
1:34:39
SPEAKER_00: And trying to make,
1:34:41
SPEAKER_00: you know,
1:34:41
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
1:34:43
SPEAKER_00: cosmetically or I think not even cosmetically,
1:34:46
SPEAKER_00: like some actual changes.
1:34:48
SPEAKER_03: I think he is.
1:34:49
SPEAKER_03: I haven't been to Saudi.
1:34:51
SPEAKER_03: I hear that it's improving.
1:34:54
SPEAKER_03: But again, we also need to be careful not to align ourselves.
1:34:58
SPEAKER_03: Because now if we align with Saudi, of course we are disaligned.
1:35:03
SPEAKER_03: with Iran, because one is Shia and the other one Sunni.
1:35:07
I always wondered why are we aligning ourselves so closely to
1:35:10
someone and why
1:35:12
aren't we just taking a step back and understanding what can we
1:35:17
do with a country
1:35:19
SPEAKER_03: I actually wrote a post last week on LinkedIn.
1:35:26
SPEAKER_03: Do you know that in Iran,
1:35:29
Iran is the second country in the world that performs
1:35:37
sex-changing surgeries?
1:35:40
SPEAKER_00: I did not.
1:35:41
SPEAKER_03: So I didn't either.
1:35:42
SPEAKER_03: But number one is, I think, Thailand.
1:35:47
SPEAKER_03: No, number one is Thailand.
1:35:48
SPEAKER_03: Number two is Iran.
1:35:50
SPEAKER_03: And it is sponsored by the government.
1:35:54
SPEAKER_03: Now, I'm not saying this is just a shock.
1:35:56
But this is a government that if it manages to work around
1:36:02
religious rules,
1:36:03
SPEAKER_03: which in that case is you are a woman in the wrong body.
1:36:08
SPEAKER_03: So you're not, you know, whereas they throw gay people into prison.
1:36:15
SPEAKER_03: If you want to change your sex, no, because it is black and white.
1:36:18
SPEAKER_03: You're in the wrong body.
1:36:20
SPEAKER_03: We will help you get in your right body.
1:36:22
So now there is a law that allows Iranians to change their sex
1:36:27
and the government
1:36:27
SPEAKER_03: pays for part of the operation.
1:36:31
SPEAKER_03: So this shows...
1:36:33
SPEAKER_03: But if they find some loopholes, they will go for those loopholes.
1:36:38
SPEAKER_03: We need to find the loopholes.
1:36:41
SPEAKER_03: We need to sit around the table with them and say,
1:36:44
SPEAKER_03: okay,
1:36:45
SPEAKER_03: in Italian we say mettere acqua nel vino.
1:36:48
We need to put some water in our wine reciprocally and come up
1:36:52
with something that
1:36:53
SPEAKER_03: is diluted for both,
1:36:55
SPEAKER_03: but works out initially as a stepping stone towards something else.
1:36:59
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:37:01
SPEAKER_00: Are you okay on time?
1:37:02
SPEAKER_00: I'm fine.
1:37:03
SPEAKER_00: All right.
1:37:03
SPEAKER_00: I've kept you over what I promised already.
1:37:06
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
1:37:07
SPEAKER_00: Well, we're not a Middle Eastern politics show.
1:37:12
SPEAKER_00: I'll pull back for a second.
1:37:15
And then I'm just grossly fast forwarding through a ton of
1:37:18
stuff because obviously
1:37:20
SPEAKER_00: you stayed in country for a number of years long.
1:37:24
SPEAKER_00: The people are going to have to read your book, which we should say.
1:37:29
SPEAKER_00: I mean, so it's been published in Italy.
1:37:30
Right now,
1:37:31
the title is Della Mia Guerra,
1:37:33
Della Mia Pace,
1:37:34
Of My War,
1:37:35
Of My Peace.
1:37:36
SPEAKER_03: And it's published in Italy by HarperCollins.
1:37:39
SPEAKER_03: And it's had a huge success.
1:37:41
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it was a bestseller in your own media and everything.
1:37:45
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so maybe I was wrong.
1:37:46
SPEAKER_00: I mean, Honorary Man was the title I saw.
1:37:48
Honorary Man is a title that I always loved,
1:37:51
but it translates awfully bad in Italian.
1:37:54
So I have now rewritten it in English,
1:37:58
and the title that I like is Honorary Man.
1:38:01
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so hopefully people will be able to get this.
1:38:05
SPEAKER_03: I need to find an agent and then hopefully pitch it in the U.S.
1:38:09
SPEAKER_03: market.
1:38:09
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's incredible.
1:38:10
SPEAKER_00: I got to read the English translation.
1:38:12
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's just, there's parts of your story.
1:38:15
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you kind of start chronologically and you're born in Italy.
1:38:21
I'll be honest,
1:38:22
because I want to kind of come back to contemporary,
1:38:26
more contemporary times.
1:38:27
SPEAKER_00: But I mean, I'm a...
1:38:29
SPEAKER_00: Your mother sounds like quite a difficult person to grow up with.
1:38:35
You go through some of the travails of her judging your weight
1:38:41
all the time and
1:38:42
SPEAKER_00: keeping this constant watch on you,
1:38:45
SPEAKER_00: being very hard on you,
1:38:46
SPEAKER_00: kind of like undermining everything you try to do.
1:38:51
SPEAKER_00: You were a tennis prodigy growing up.
1:38:53
SPEAKER_00: I played competitive tennis when I was identifying with all that.
1:38:57
SPEAKER_00: You come from this...
1:38:58
SPEAKER_00: This tennis family from a...
1:39:00
SPEAKER_00: It was either an uncle or a grandfather who built...
1:39:02
SPEAKER_03: My grandfather was the founder of the most famous Italian tennis records,
1:39:07
SPEAKER_00: Maxima.
1:39:07
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
1:39:08
SPEAKER_00: You know, during World War II.
1:39:10
SPEAKER_00: And through about the age of 16, you're winning all these tournaments.
1:39:13
SPEAKER_00: You're heading towards being a professional tennis player.
1:39:16
You have a horrific knee injury and then a series of surgeries
1:39:21
that go wrong that
1:39:22
SPEAKER_00: kind of ends that.
1:39:23
SPEAKER_00: And then, like we talked about, I mean, you end up doing...
1:39:28
Working with these ambulances in Italy and then becoming a
1:39:30
journalist and a traveler.
1:39:32
SPEAKER_03: And I might add, you know, it took me a long time to write the book.
1:39:35
SPEAKER_03: Not so much because of the Iraq stuff, but because of the mother stuff.
1:39:39
I'm shortchanging it,
1:39:40
but it is,
1:39:41
it's very...
1:39:42
And it wasn't just,
1:39:44
she was brutal.
1:39:45
SPEAKER_03: I mean, I don't go in details because I don't like, but...
1:39:48
It's when you're 13 and your mother takes you to a plastic
1:39:52
surgeon because she hates your face.
1:39:54
SPEAKER_00: She didn't like your chubby cheeks.
1:39:55
And I needed to change my face and weigh me every day and beat
1:39:59
the hell out of me.
1:40:00
SPEAKER_03: And I never was overweight in my whole life.
1:40:03
SPEAKER_03: It was never pleasing someone.
1:40:05
SPEAKER_03: It wasn't so much just the beating, but the daily humiliation.
1:40:08
SPEAKER_03: So one of the messages that I like, that I try to give out is...
1:40:14
SPEAKER_03: capitalizes on bad juju.
1:40:16
SPEAKER_03: We all get hit by shit in life eventually.
1:40:20
SPEAKER_03: You know, whether it's this... My childhood was extremely hard, but...
1:40:28
SPEAKER_03: Use it as a trampoline to do other stuff.
1:40:31
SPEAKER_03: So a lot of people ask me, how did you survive in Iraq?
1:40:34
And,
1:40:35
you know,
1:40:35
when you are a small kid and your mother hates you,
1:40:38
you just don't understand.
1:40:41
SPEAKER_03: You don't figure it out.
1:40:42
SPEAKER_03: It's just a conundrum.
1:40:43
SPEAKER_03: You go in your room.
1:40:44
SPEAKER_03: And I would think all night through.
1:40:49
SPEAKER_03: And then you go to an Iraq.
1:40:51
SPEAKER_03: One plus one makes two.
1:40:52
SPEAKER_03: You know, my bodyguard didn't like me.
1:40:56
SPEAKER_03: It makes sense that he didn't like me.
1:40:58
SPEAKER_03: He tried to kill me.
1:40:59
SPEAKER_03: Period.
1:40:59
SPEAKER_03: I actually wanted to meet him.
1:41:01
SPEAKER_03: They didn't want to meet him.
1:41:02
They didn't want me to meet him because they thought I'll beat
1:41:04
the hell out of him.
1:41:05
SPEAKER_03: No, I wanted to sit down and have a chat.
1:41:08
SPEAKER_03: It made sense.
1:41:09
SPEAKER_03: Instead, if for, you know, decades you live, think, why, why, why?
1:41:14
SPEAKER_03: It
1:41:17
SPEAKER_03: It was important.
1:41:18
SPEAKER_03: I mean, it prepared me for what came after.
1:41:21
SPEAKER_03: So I say sometimes Iraq was a walk in the park.
1:41:24
SPEAKER_03: It wasn't a walk in the park,
1:41:25
but at least mentally it was compared to everything that I had
1:41:30
to endure when you
1:41:31
SPEAKER_03: don't have the tools to fight.
1:41:32
SPEAKER_00: So where do you think this part of you,
1:41:36
SPEAKER_00: like that sort of realization that you're talking about,
1:41:38
SPEAKER_00: first of all,
1:41:39
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
1:41:39
SPEAKER_00: is that something that you have when you're a teenager?
1:41:42
SPEAKER_00: I find...
1:41:45
SPEAKER_00: You know,
1:41:45
there's so many people that bad things happen to them and they
1:41:48
let it kind of
1:41:48
SPEAKER_00: control their lives.
1:41:49
SPEAKER_00: And then there's a whole other class of people who,
1:41:52
SPEAKER_00: like you're talking about,
1:41:53
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
1:41:53
SPEAKER_00: I remember my mother was...
1:41:56
battling cancer for years and years and years and years is
1:41:59
horrific she's she's
1:42:01
well she's 78 now she's most like active uh you know generally
1:42:06
happy person i know
1:42:07
and and like always um kind of was like it's not going to get
1:42:10
me down and and um um
1:42:13
you know there's just people who kind of react to these things
1:42:15
differently did you
1:42:17
SPEAKER_00: so was this like a do you remember a conscious no it wasn't okay
1:42:21
SPEAKER_03: I think I always had the fighter instinct in me.
1:42:24
SPEAKER_03: It wasn't conscious.
1:42:25
SPEAKER_03: But I would always try to maintain my integrity.
1:42:28
I always tried to please my mom and had to cut it off with her
1:42:34
because this trying
1:42:35
SPEAKER_03: to please would then I would eliminate myself.
1:42:39
well she does some crazy shit yeah you know so at some point 10
1:42:43
years ago i was
1:42:45
like this is it yeah and she still can it's a mother yeah so
1:42:49
she still has the can
1:42:51
get in my head so the only way to get away with it was like i
1:42:54
can't do this i tried
1:42:56
for 40 years to please you i tried and tried it's not working
1:43:00
let's just quit
1:43:02
SPEAKER_00: What about this, like, wanderlust, this almost – maybe I'm wrong.
1:43:07
SPEAKER_00: It feels like you almost have,
1:43:08
SPEAKER_00: like,
1:43:08
SPEAKER_00: an addiction to – or a thirst to,
1:43:13
SPEAKER_00: like,
1:43:14
SPEAKER_00: feel these dramatic – to put yourself in pretty dramatic sort of spots.
1:43:19
SPEAKER_00: Or, you know, you're okay with that.
1:43:21
SPEAKER_00: I'm okay with that.
1:43:22
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:43:22
SPEAKER_00: Like, is that –
1:43:25
SPEAKER_00: Because I've always had a wanderlust.
1:43:27
SPEAKER_00: It's clear from how much you're traveling at a young age.
1:43:29
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you've got that.
1:43:30
SPEAKER_00: And we're both journalists.
1:43:32
SPEAKER_00: I mean, there's that.
1:43:32
SPEAKER_00: I want to see the world.
1:43:33
I want to see how this thing actually functions and meet all
1:43:36
the interesting people.
1:43:37
SPEAKER_00: That part I get.
1:43:40
SPEAKER_00: Did that come from some of your upbringing?
1:43:42
SPEAKER_00: Or do you think that was just always inside?
1:43:44
SPEAKER_03: I think that was inside.
1:43:45
SPEAKER_03: And I did travel a lot with my family, with all the pros and cons.
1:43:48
SPEAKER_03: I mean, with my dad.
1:43:49
SPEAKER_03: And he was a famous mathematician.
1:43:51
SPEAKER_03: Went a lot to Russia.
1:43:52
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:43:53
SPEAKER_03: I traveled a lot.
1:43:54
SPEAKER_03: I think the main thing that I have is I'm curious.
1:43:58
I have this deep curiosity that I want to stick my nose in
1:44:01
stuff that I don't understand.
1:44:03
SPEAKER_03: And I hate judging what I don't understand.
1:44:07
SPEAKER_03: So I don't like to sit back and watch what's happening in Iran and say,
1:44:12
SPEAKER_03: oh,
1:44:12
SPEAKER_03: and just listen to the talking heads.
1:44:14
SPEAKER_03: I want to go there and figure it out myself.
1:44:17
SPEAKER_00: When you,
1:44:17
SPEAKER_00: you know,
1:44:18
SPEAKER_00: like when I do,
1:44:18
SPEAKER_00: and I have not been in nearly as dramatic situations as you have,
1:44:23
SPEAKER_00: it's like a few that are a little harrowing and,
1:44:26
SPEAKER_00: you know,
1:44:27
SPEAKER_00: even just doing the job of like,
1:44:28
SPEAKER_00: we make this travel TV show.
1:44:31
I mean,
1:44:31
there does become something of like a addiction though to,
1:44:35
to like,
1:44:36
living these these very full dramatic days sometimes you come
1:44:39
home and it just
1:44:40
feels it feels so much more sedate it's a little um hard like
1:44:44
did you did you start
1:44:45
to ever question like maybe i'm i am i'm just pushing things i
1:44:50
i had that and i was
1:44:51
my husband was really happy about it didn't last long we went
1:44:54
to pakistan on a
1:44:56
SPEAKER_03: motorcycle
1:44:58
SPEAKER_03: And it was the most undangerous country I've been to.
1:45:02
SPEAKER_03: And everyone thinks, oh, it's Osama bin Laden land.
1:45:04
SPEAKER_03: It was maybe the nicest trip I've ever had.
1:45:07
SPEAKER_03: It was a year and a half ago.
1:45:08
SPEAKER_00: I've always wanted to go, yeah.
1:45:09
SPEAKER_03: It's a gorgeous country, but more than gorgeous.
1:45:12
SPEAKER_03: You know, the whole Karakoram Highway to the China border.
1:45:16
SPEAKER_03: The people are extraordinary.
1:45:18
SPEAKER_03: And that's where I also learned...
1:45:20
SPEAKER_03: We always look at people that, oh, they must hate America.
1:45:23
People have more important things to do than hate America or
1:45:29
hate the Western world.
1:45:30
SPEAKER_03: They have to put bread and butter on the table.
1:45:34
SPEAKER_03: So going there,
1:45:36
SPEAKER_03: especially with a husband who is American,
1:45:37
SPEAKER_03: looks American,
1:45:38
SPEAKER_03: he was scared as shit.
1:45:40
SPEAKER_02: Yes.
1:45:43
SPEAKER_03: And then they all wanted selfies with him.
1:45:47
SPEAKER_03: It was a completely different vibe.
1:45:50
SPEAKER_03: So we often get also scared of what we see on TV.
1:45:53
And of course,
1:45:53
we only see the flags and the lock bar,
1:45:55
but people are different.
1:45:58
And I think that experiencing that and talking about it and
1:46:02
writing about it is
1:46:04
SPEAKER_03: still something that I feel very deeply about.
1:46:06
No,
1:46:07
no,
1:46:07
I have the same experience pretty much everywhere I go,
1:46:10
universally,
1:46:11
everywhere I go.
1:46:12
SPEAKER_03: But on a motorcycle in Pakistan, eventually, it was so dangerous.
1:46:16
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:46:16
SPEAKER_03: And I went to India, it was way less dangerous.
1:46:18
SPEAKER_03: I mean,
1:46:18
in the mountains and sliding on ice and everything and trucks
1:46:21
and tuk-tuks and
1:46:22
SPEAKER_03: everything.
1:46:23
One,
1:46:23
the first,
1:46:24
I think the second evening,
1:46:25
I told my husband,
1:46:26
he's like,
1:46:26
I think it's over.
1:46:29
SPEAKER_03: I reached the age thing.
1:46:32
SPEAKER_03: There's an age for everything.
1:46:34
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:46:34
SPEAKER_03: So I might have to chill out a little bit.
1:46:36
SPEAKER_03: Sure.
1:46:36
SPEAKER_00: I should know this because it's in the book,
1:46:38
but I was looking your husband up earlier and I saw Air Force
1:46:41
and Marines and a
1:46:42
SPEAKER_00: couple.
1:46:45
SPEAKER_03: He's a retired Marine colonel.
1:46:46
SPEAKER_03: I met him in Baghdad.
1:46:47
SPEAKER_03: He was a fighter pilot in Baghdad.
1:46:51
SPEAKER_03: He was an advisor to the Ministry of Finance.
1:46:54
SPEAKER_03: And now he works for Google.
1:46:55
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, the two of you get married.
1:46:58
SPEAKER_00: You end up in Palo Alto.
1:47:00
This is supposed to be the kind of relaxing,
1:47:03
more sedate portion of your life.
1:47:05
SPEAKER_00: You almost immediately get a brain tumor at the age of 46, I think.
1:47:12
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so still very, very young.
1:47:13
SPEAKER_02: I just embarked here.
1:47:15
SPEAKER_00: And the doctor first tells you this is pretty much inoperable.
1:47:19
SPEAKER_00: It's behind your eye.
1:47:20
SPEAKER_00: You're screwed.
1:47:20
SPEAKER_00: And then some other doctor kind of gives you what might be better news.
1:47:24
SPEAKER_00: I suppose he's like, I have options.
1:47:26
Although one of them,
1:47:27
you know,
1:47:28
is that you'll be a vegetable after this surgery is done.
1:47:32
SPEAKER_00: And so you take this really high-risk surgery.
1:47:35
SPEAKER_00: So, I mean, that must have been shocking.
1:47:36
SPEAKER_00: You've lived this insane life.
1:47:38
SPEAKER_00: You come to Palo Alto.
1:47:39
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
1:47:40
SPEAKER_00: It's very... Finally.
1:47:42
SPEAKER_00: The weather's nice.
1:47:43
SPEAKER_00: It's pretty easy going here.
1:47:45
SPEAKER_00: You're working at Google.
1:47:46
SPEAKER_00: You're getting free lunch.
1:47:48
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
1:47:48
SPEAKER_00: And then you get a brain tumor.
1:47:49
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:47:50
Well,
1:47:51
that was,
1:47:52
again,
1:47:52
it was...
1:47:53
I had not looked after myself for a long time.
1:47:57
SPEAKER_03: So even when I went to the ER and they said, but this is a golf ball.
1:48:01
SPEAKER_03: I mean, did you have migraines?
1:48:02
SPEAKER_03: I had had migraines for years.
1:48:05
SPEAKER_03: And I was going blind.
1:48:07
SPEAKER_03: And finally I had time.
1:48:08
SPEAKER_03: So I said, okay, let's go get a pair of glasses.
1:48:11
SPEAKER_03: Now I have time to go get myself a pair of glasses.
1:48:13
SPEAKER_03: And they were like, you need to go to the ER.
1:48:16
And all of a sudden I have this and they tell me there's
1:48:18
nothing we can do.
1:48:19
SPEAKER_03: And then again, luck, God.
1:48:22
I get this call from Dr.
1:48:24
Chang,
1:48:24
who is one of the gurus of experimental surgeries at Stanford.
1:48:28
SPEAKER_03: But again, even after the surgery, of course, I thanked him profusely.
1:48:32
SPEAKER_03: And then he said, I have never seen anyone fight so hard to live.
1:48:40
Yeah,
1:48:41
and you're trying to get on a plane into,
1:48:42
like,
1:48:43
Kenya the next day or something.
1:48:48
So,
1:48:49
again,
1:48:49
there is definitely,
1:48:50
and that's also a message where fighting helps.
1:48:53
SPEAKER_03: It's not just some rumor that is around.
1:48:56
SPEAKER_03: I mean, if you really hang on to life, your options go up.
1:49:02
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you mentioned God.
1:49:04
SPEAKER_00: Are you religious?
1:49:04
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:49:05
SPEAKER_03: I, I'm spiritual.
1:49:07
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
1:49:08
SPEAKER_03: I'm spiritual.
1:49:08
SPEAKER_00: So you're not a, you're not a hardcore Catholic.
1:49:10
SPEAKER_03: No, I'm not.
1:49:11
Although I met with the Pope,
1:49:12
but I'll let this,
1:49:13
uh,
1:49:14
whoever will read the book.
1:49:15
SPEAKER_00: That was a very, I should say, I don't want to go through everything.
1:49:19
SPEAKER_00: I want people to read the book when it comes out.
1:49:21
SPEAKER_00: Um, all right, we're going to do a couple of just last stories.
1:49:24
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
1:49:25
SPEAKER_00: for me,
1:49:25
SPEAKER_00: it was hilarious that you end up working for Google X and,
1:49:31
SPEAKER_00: you know,
1:49:31
SPEAKER_00: they used to have this project.
1:49:33
SPEAKER_00: Oh, and now I'm blanking on the name Project Loon.
1:49:35
SPEAKER_00: And,
1:49:36
SPEAKER_00: you know,
1:49:36
it was to fly these high altitude balloons where they would
1:49:40
deliver Internet to
1:49:41
SPEAKER_00: places that were struggling to get high speed Internet.
1:49:43
SPEAKER_00: So it's in some ways...
1:49:45
fantastic job for you because you're gonna have to go to these
1:49:48
these countries
1:49:49
these difficult spots and arrange the the the politics and
1:49:53
everything to make make
1:49:54
make this happen um without getting shot without getting shot
1:49:58
but i mean and we'll
1:49:59
get into the mechanics of that which i thought were quite
1:50:02
amusing for me just yeah
1:50:04
SPEAKER_00: knowing tech companies so well but you know one of your first
1:50:08
SPEAKER_00: First moments at Google,
1:50:09
SPEAKER_00: I was talking about the free lunch is,
1:50:11
SPEAKER_00: well,
1:50:11
SPEAKER_00: they're having these like,
1:50:12
SPEAKER_00: you know,
1:50:12
SPEAKER_00: the Larry and Sergei,
1:50:14
SPEAKER_00: um,
1:50:14
SPEAKER_00: sort of gripe sessions where the workers can go,
1:50:17
SPEAKER_00: actually,
1:50:17
SPEAKER_00: this was with Astro Tellers.
1:50:19
SPEAKER_00: I had Google X.
1:50:21
SPEAKER_00: And so,
1:50:22
SPEAKER_00: so you've just come back,
1:50:23
SPEAKER_00: you've,
1:50:23
SPEAKER_00: you've almost been blown up like 18 times.
1:50:26
You've had a fatwa called against you and the people at Google
1:50:30
are complaining
1:50:31
SPEAKER_00: about the quinoa,
1:50:32
SPEAKER_00: the quality of the sushi.
1:50:33
SPEAKER_03: I had no idea what quinoa was.
1:50:36
SPEAKER_03: It's like, what is that?
1:50:37
SPEAKER_03: Must be a project name.
1:50:39
So you think this is a code name for some project that's not
1:50:42
going quite right,
1:50:43
SPEAKER_00: but really they just,
1:50:45
SPEAKER_00: they want better grains in sushi at lunch.
1:50:47
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:50:48
SPEAKER_00: So that must have been a massive culture shock.
1:50:50
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:50:51
SPEAKER_03: It was.
1:50:52
SPEAKER_03: You know, and it's...
1:50:58
SPEAKER_03: It was, and I have to say, I still struggle with that.
1:51:01
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's not like we've approved on that.
1:51:04
You know,
1:51:06
and that is why I think that going to places,
1:51:10
you know,
1:51:10
Loon was great.
1:51:11
SPEAKER_03: Oh, we are saving people around the world.
1:51:13
SPEAKER_03: But then the one who went around the world was me.
1:51:17
SPEAKER_03: And then eventually I started,
1:51:18
SPEAKER_03: because I am not a deeply technical person,
1:51:21
SPEAKER_03: so if I can speak big picture about the project,
1:51:23
SPEAKER_03: it's good.
1:51:24
SPEAKER_03: But then if we've got to go into the technicalities, I need engineers.
1:51:27
SPEAKER_03: And the first steps with those engineers were really interesting because,
1:51:31
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:51:31
SPEAKER_03: they're like,
1:51:32
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:51:32
SPEAKER_03: then I saw myself sort of like the mama.
1:51:36
SPEAKER_03: It's like, do you have a suit?
1:51:38
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:51:39
SPEAKER_03: Oh, I never wore a suit, not even at my wedding.
1:51:41
SPEAKER_03: I don't care about your wedding.
1:51:43
SPEAKER_03: You have to wear a suit if you're meeting with a minister,
1:51:48
SPEAKER_03: a prime minister,
1:51:48
SPEAKER_03: a president,
1:51:50
SPEAKER_03: a human,
1:51:51
SPEAKER_03: a common human on the African continent or in Indonesia or
1:51:56
SPEAKER_03: suit and tie, no flip-flops and Bermudas.
1:52:00
SPEAKER_03: And you've got to clean up.
1:52:01
SPEAKER_03: And it was a mantle.
1:52:03
SPEAKER_03: It was this whole... But then again, it's not knowing the world.
1:52:08
SPEAKER_03: Because then when I finally traveled with them and always said,
1:52:12
SPEAKER_03: we need to go there a couple days sooner,
1:52:15
SPEAKER_03: because it's not about having a successful meeting.
1:52:19
SPEAKER_02: It's about trust.
1:52:20
SPEAKER_03: And it's a PowerPoint slide for them up there.
1:52:23
SPEAKER_03: Who cares about the logo a little more upright,
1:52:25
SPEAKER_03: a little more like this is just what we focus on.
1:52:28
SPEAKER_03: It's about, is there the right warmth around the table?
1:52:31
SPEAKER_03: Do these people actually care for us?
1:52:34
SPEAKER_03: So how do you show care?
1:52:35
SPEAKER_03: Go there a couple days before.
1:52:37
I would have,
1:52:38
would tour the slums of Dar es Salaam on a bicycle with the
1:52:41
engineering team.
1:52:42
SPEAKER_03: Just these are the people that you claim you want to help.
1:52:45
SPEAKER_03: You need to meet them.
1:52:46
SPEAKER_03: You need to stop and talk to them.
1:52:48
SPEAKER_03: I went to Mass in a Catholic country, and I don't go to Mass either.
1:52:54
SPEAKER_03: But it's in the cathedral.
1:52:57
SPEAKER_03: You meet the people.
1:52:58
SPEAKER_03: They will see you.
1:53:00
SPEAKER_03: Probably a lot of ministers will be there.
1:53:01
So on the Monday meeting,
1:53:03
they will already know you,
1:53:04
and you showed respect.
1:53:05
SPEAKER_03: Also, after Mass, you usually get invited.
1:53:08
SPEAKER_03: They won't.
1:53:09
SPEAKER_03: They'll invite you over for lunch.
1:53:11
SPEAKER_03: But you also have to see the faces of the Africans when you get to Mass.
1:53:15
SPEAKER_03: And it's like, but you should go to the Anglican Mass.
1:53:17
SPEAKER_03: I was like, no, no, no.
1:53:19
SPEAKER_03: I want this Mass.
1:53:20
SPEAKER_03: And I was like, but do you speak Swahili?
1:53:22
SPEAKER_03: No.
1:53:23
SPEAKER_03: I was like, well, then why?
1:53:25
SPEAKER_03: It's a different Mass.
1:53:26
SPEAKER_03: The Anglican Mass, I know it by heart.
1:53:28
SPEAKER_03: It's frankly pretty boring.
1:53:30
SPEAKER_03: A Swahili mass with a guy on the thing that screams.
1:53:33
SPEAKER_03: And you get to know a culture.
1:53:36
And then interestingly,
1:53:37
when you show curiosity about the culture,
1:53:40
they invite you for lunch.
1:53:42
SPEAKER_03: And that's where you build a rapport with people.
1:53:45
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:53:45
SPEAKER_00: I mean, do you think this is clearly a flaw of Silicon Valley?
1:53:49
SPEAKER_00: I think it's, I don't want to smirch an entire nation.
1:53:53
SPEAKER_00: I think it's kind of an American flaw, if I'm honest.
1:53:55
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I think we're always in a rush to do so many things in business.
1:54:00
SPEAKER_00: And I don't know if we are wired to take care of these kind of details,
1:54:07
SPEAKER_00: you know,
1:54:08
SPEAKER_00: and we shortchange all this stuff.
1:54:10
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it is.
1:54:11
SPEAKER_03: I mean, I am afraid that the world is kind of taking that.
1:54:16
SPEAKER_02: That was my next question.
1:54:17
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
1:54:17
SPEAKER_02: Is it American?
1:54:18
SPEAKER_02: Is it Western?
1:54:19
SPEAKER_03: Maybe it was initially an American trade, the workaholics.
1:54:23
SPEAKER_03: Everything needs to be done by close of business.
1:54:26
Well,
1:54:26
that or,
1:54:27
you know,
1:54:27
what's the motto of Google X,
1:54:29
the Astro is like...
1:54:31
SPEAKER_03: Break, build and break.
1:54:35
SPEAKER_00: Go fast, break things.
1:54:37
SPEAKER_03: If I break a relationship, it's over.
1:54:41
SPEAKER_03: I need to wait for a coup or the guy to die.
1:54:45
SPEAKER_03: So I cannot break it.
1:54:47
SPEAKER_03: So I really need to do my homework well.
1:54:50
SPEAKER_03: I need to dress appropriately.
1:54:51
I mean,
1:54:52
the homework that's done around it,
1:54:53
you just don't walk in a place like that.
1:54:55
SPEAKER_03: You need to know...
1:54:57
SPEAKER_03: Everything about your interlocutor,
1:54:59
SPEAKER_03: at whatever level he or she is,
1:55:01
SPEAKER_03: also to be able to do small talk,
1:55:03
SPEAKER_03: if they go biking,
1:55:04
SPEAKER_03: if they swim,
1:55:04
SPEAKER_03: if they do that.
1:55:05
SPEAKER_03: I mean, anything.
1:55:06
SPEAKER_03: And it takes a long time.
1:55:10
SPEAKER_00: Well, and you're a consultant now, right?
1:55:12
SPEAKER_00: Now I'm consulting.
1:55:13
SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
1:55:13
SPEAKER_00: so did you find,
1:55:14
SPEAKER_00: was it,
1:55:15
SPEAKER_00: you know,
1:55:16
SPEAKER_00: I don't know how freely you want to speak about this or not,
1:55:18
SPEAKER_00: but I mean,
1:55:18
did you find Google could internalize some of these lessons you
1:55:22
were trying to
1:55:23
SPEAKER_00: teach,
1:55:23
SPEAKER_00: or do you find that the culture here is just never going to get it?
1:55:27
SPEAKER_03: Well,
1:55:27
I think either then they give up on all the projects that are
1:55:31
worldwide and that
1:55:32
SPEAKER_03: need human approval.
1:55:34
SPEAKER_03: You know,
1:55:34
SPEAKER_03: what really shocked me,
1:55:35
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:55:35
SPEAKER_03: at Loon,
1:55:36
SPEAKER_03: there were,
1:55:36
SPEAKER_03: I don't know,
1:55:37
SPEAKER_03: 150 engineers,
1:55:38
SPEAKER_03: up to 200 really smart engineers.
1:55:41
SPEAKER_03: I was the only one.
1:55:43
SPEAKER_03: And only one in charge of relations with government.
1:55:47
SPEAKER_03: And I'm like,
1:55:49
SPEAKER_03: I had to be everywhere because to fly those balloons,
1:55:52
SPEAKER_03: we flew them out of Winnemucca in the U.S.
1:55:55
SPEAKER_03: To get to Africa, Kenya, they have to fly over a bunch of countries.
1:56:00
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I should describe it maybe a little bit better.
1:56:02
I mean,
1:56:02
these are kind of persistent balloons that are flying in the
1:56:07
stratosphere all the time.
1:56:08
And so it's like another country's airspace and you're trying
1:56:11
to provide infrastructure.
1:56:12
SPEAKER_00: You're trying to provide internet to consumers and institutions.
1:56:18
SPEAKER_00: And so, you know, it's infrastructure.
1:56:20
SPEAKER_00: I mean, this is like a thing a country's going to care about.
1:56:23
SPEAKER_00: Oh, yes.
1:56:24
SPEAKER_00: Oh.
1:56:24
SPEAKER_00: Oh, yes.
1:56:25
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the telecoms are going to care.
1:56:27
SPEAKER_00: Everyone.
1:56:28
SPEAKER_00: Everyone.
1:56:28
SPEAKER_03: And, you know, Google is one of the largest companies in the world.
1:56:32
SPEAKER_03: It is American.
1:56:33
SPEAKER_03: We have balloons flying on top of their heads.
1:56:35
SPEAKER_03: The question is, do you have cameras?
1:56:37
SPEAKER_03: Are you spying on them?
1:56:38
SPEAKER_00: Well,
1:56:38
SPEAKER_00: and you're like,
1:56:39
SPEAKER_00: in most cases,
1:56:40
SPEAKER_00: they were trying to do it for free often,
1:56:41
which I'm sure the local telecommunications companies are not
1:56:45
super thrilled about.
1:56:46
SPEAKER_03: Well, it was always an agreement with the local telco.
1:56:49
SPEAKER_03: So, you know, those are hard to get.
1:56:52
SPEAKER_03: For example, to get to Kenya, we had to fly over Congo and Tanzania.
1:56:56
SPEAKER_03: Those don't get anything.
1:56:59
So I had to go to these places and usually talk to the secret
1:57:03
services and the
1:57:04
SPEAKER_03: aviation authorities and say,
1:57:06
SPEAKER_03: can we just fly over?
1:57:08
SPEAKER_03: Because we're serving the Kenyans.
1:57:11
SPEAKER_03: Well, for example, Tanzania hates Kenya.
1:57:12
SPEAKER_03: I still remember when the last CEO of Loon said,
1:57:15
SPEAKER_03: well,
1:57:15
SPEAKER_03: just tell them that you're serving their Kenyan brothers.
1:57:18
SPEAKER_03: They hate each other since centuries.
1:57:20
SPEAKER_03: So he'll kick me out.
1:57:22
SPEAKER_03: Done.
1:57:23
So I am trying to get to fly over systematically over countries
1:57:28
that don't
1:57:29
have anything in,
1:57:31
you know,
1:57:31
they're just like,
1:57:32
well,
1:57:32
you're just spying on us.
1:57:33
I still remember I met once President Museveni,
1:57:36
who is another full-fledged dictator in Uganda.
1:57:40
SPEAKER_03: And I had met with everyone in his,
1:57:42
SPEAKER_03: for two years,
1:57:43
SPEAKER_03: everyone in his cabinet and had everyone on board.
1:57:45
SPEAKER_03: Then finally I meet the big guy and he says, so who's kicking the can?
1:57:49
Because with dictators,
1:57:50
you often get to the point,
1:57:51
who's kicking the can?
1:57:52
SPEAKER_03: It's like, well, I don't know who, but the can is being kicked.
1:57:55
SPEAKER_03: And it's like, but what's the concern?
1:57:57
SPEAKER_03: And it's like,
1:57:57
SPEAKER_03: the concern is that we spy on you and we do not have cameras,
1:58:01
SPEAKER_03: but I can't really prove it.
1:58:04
And,
1:58:04
you know,
1:58:04
I was suddenly just laid back and said,
1:58:06
but you already spy on us?
1:58:08
SPEAKER_03: If you want to know how much sugar I put in my coffee in the morning,
1:58:10
SPEAKER_03: you already know if you want to know.
1:58:12
SPEAKER_03: And I said, yeah, that's what I try to say.
1:58:14
SPEAKER_03: We don't do balloons in the stratosphere flying with the winds to spy.
1:58:19
SPEAKER_00: We already have satellites for that, yeah.
1:58:21
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that's easier ways.
1:58:24
SPEAKER_00: Yeah,
1:58:24
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
1:58:25
I could see a world where I bet the Silicon Valley approach was
1:58:29
sort of like,
1:58:29
SPEAKER_00: let's not talk to these people.
1:58:31
SPEAKER_00: Let's just do this.
1:58:32
SPEAKER_00: Because if you ask for permission, they're going to say no.
1:58:36
SPEAKER_03: And at the beginning, it was like that.
1:58:37
SPEAKER_03: But then it became too large and we had to scale.
1:58:40
SPEAKER_03: And then there's the Civil Aviation Authority, ICAO.
1:58:43
SPEAKER_03: They all wanted to know, okay, end of this.
1:58:46
We need to have things in place that allow you letters of
1:58:50
agreement that allow you to do this.
1:58:52
SPEAKER_03: So frankly, pretty much from the get-go, I knew it wouldn't work out.
1:58:57
SPEAKER_00: So are you cynical about – I mean,
1:59:01
the cliche here is that everybody's trying to save the world or
1:59:04
they say they're
1:59:04
SPEAKER_00: trying to save the world even if they have the shittiest,
1:59:08
SPEAKER_00: most rudimentary app for whatever,
1:59:10
SPEAKER_00: ordering sandwiches or something.
1:59:14
SPEAKER_00: Are you –
1:59:16
SPEAKER_00: when you have your step back, do you find Silicon Valley?
1:59:19
SPEAKER_00: Um, I guess it's not black and white, but you know, yeah.
1:59:22
I mean,
1:59:22
does it drive you crazy or is this an inspiring place with,
1:59:26
with interesting thinkers?
1:59:28
SPEAKER_03: It has interesting thinkers, not too many in my line of work.
1:59:33
SPEAKER_01: Um,
1:59:35
SPEAKER_03: but it does,
1:59:36
SPEAKER_03: you know,
1:59:36
SPEAKER_03: this whole close of business and there are countries where,
1:59:39
SPEAKER_03: and I had to explain it,
1:59:40
SPEAKER_03: um,
1:59:42
SPEAKER_03: Actually, it was Mike Cassidy.
1:59:44
SPEAKER_03: He was an extraordinary human being.
1:59:46
But it was like,
1:59:48
you know,
1:59:49
I finally,
1:59:49
another thing that was hard,
1:59:50
hire people on the ground.
1:59:53
SPEAKER_03: I was like, well, no, you go.
1:59:54
No,
1:59:54
I need people who are also have the right connections with the
1:59:57
right person.
1:59:57
SPEAKER_03: Maybe it's all about, you know, knowing people.
2:00:00
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
2:00:00
SPEAKER_03: Now,
2:00:00
SPEAKER_03: when you are in places where,
2:00:02
SPEAKER_03: you know,
2:00:02
SPEAKER_03: there's a dictator and the dictator would never pass Google's ethics and
2:00:07
SPEAKER_03: compliance.
2:00:08
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
2:00:08
SPEAKER_03: So if I'm trying to hire someone within the circle to get me to and get,
2:00:13
SPEAKER_03: you know,
2:00:14
SPEAKER_03: in the door and of course he doesn't,
2:00:16
SPEAKER_03: he or she doesn't go through ethics and compliance.
2:00:18
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
2:00:19
SPEAKER_03: But if I can hire an 18-year-old student,
2:00:22
SPEAKER_03: it helps the student,
2:00:23
SPEAKER_03: but the student doesn't help me.
2:00:25
SPEAKER_03: I need those people.
2:00:26
So to even get Google to understand,
2:00:28
I need those dodgy people to move forward.
2:00:31
SPEAKER_03: Because the governments that we interact with,
2:00:34
SPEAKER_03: are dodgy to start with.
2:00:37
SPEAKER_03: So either we say we do not work with dodgy governments,
2:00:40
SPEAKER_03: well,
2:00:41
then you stop working because every government is in some shape
2:00:44
or form dodgy.
2:00:46
SPEAKER_03: Then you have to, you know, put water in your way.
2:00:50
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
2:00:52
And when I was at Bloomberg,
2:00:53
I'll probably get someone in trouble,
2:00:55
but I don't care.
2:00:56
SPEAKER_00: I'm not there anymore.
2:00:57
SPEAKER_00: I remember we'd film somewhere like Nigeria,
2:01:00
SPEAKER_00: you know,
2:01:01
SPEAKER_00: and it's like,
2:01:01
SPEAKER_00: you know,
2:01:03
we would take our annual little automated HR courses on bribery
2:01:09
and things like
2:01:09
SPEAKER_00: this.
2:01:10
SPEAKER_00: It's like, okay, well...
2:01:12
SPEAKER_00: I'll click these boxes.
2:01:13
SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure you guys understand the mechanics of actually filming.
2:01:17
SPEAKER_03: Have they signed an NDA?
2:01:19
SPEAKER_03: I'm in the middle of the desert and I got to have NDA signed.
2:01:24
SPEAKER_00: I hate to tell you,
2:01:25
but there is money that needs to change hands in some
2:01:28
circumstances in order.
2:01:30
SPEAKER_00: for things to happen, and you probably want to ask fewer questions.
2:01:34
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, just do it.
2:01:38
SPEAKER_03: Don't ask questions if you don't want to be told lies.
2:01:40
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
2:01:42
SPEAKER_00: Well, Anna, it's so fascinating.
2:01:46
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I could badger you with questions forever.
2:01:50
I cannot wait for your book to be translated and out in the
2:01:54
United States.
2:01:55
SPEAKER_00: This 100% all needs to be translated
2:01:58
SPEAKER_00: a television show or a movie.
2:02:00
SPEAKER_00: I kept picturing,
2:02:01
SPEAKER_00: um,
2:02:02
SPEAKER_00: oh God,
2:02:02
SPEAKER_00: now I'm going to forget the,
2:02:04
SPEAKER_00: uh,
2:02:05
SPEAKER_00: zero dark 30 or something like that,
2:02:07
SPEAKER_00: except the,
2:02:08
SPEAKER_00: the heroin is,
2:02:09
SPEAKER_00: is like helping people and not,
2:02:11
SPEAKER_00: not torturing and kidnapping people.
2:02:14
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
2:02:14
SPEAKER_03: I would like to avoid that.
2:02:16
SPEAKER_00: That was how I was picturing you, um, going through all of these things.
2:02:20
SPEAKER_00: I feel like, uh,
2:02:22
SPEAKER_03: Well, it's very nuanced.
2:02:23
SPEAKER_03: You know, I have very good friends who have tortured people.
2:02:30
SPEAKER_03: And we have discussed it because I discuss things.
2:02:32
SPEAKER_03: But I also think people feel that there's no judgment.
2:02:35
SPEAKER_03: So it's like, explain to me why.
2:02:37
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
2:02:41
SPEAKER_03: Then I might disagree or in some ways agree on some things,
2:02:45
SPEAKER_03: but it's the whole thing when people feel comfortable,
2:02:48
SPEAKER_03: then they are.
2:02:49
I remember the chief of police of Nasri,
2:02:50
I knew that I had issues with this whole,
2:02:53
you know...
2:02:54
SPEAKER_03: torturing stuff.
2:02:55
SPEAKER_03: And he would tell me, you know, I'm chilling out.
2:02:58
SPEAKER_00: I'm in therapy.
2:03:01
SPEAKER_00: We're torturing less now.
2:03:04
SPEAKER_00: It's okay.
2:03:07
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
2:03:07
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I think I'm like you on some sense.
2:03:10
SPEAKER_00: I'm just a very open-minded person.
2:03:12
SPEAKER_00: People are often put in
2:03:15
extraordinary circumstances and have to navigate those and the
2:03:19
world is complicated
2:03:21
SPEAKER_00: and,
2:03:23
SPEAKER_00: you know,
2:03:23
SPEAKER_00: far more dramatic than day-to-day stuff in Silicon Valley quite often.
2:03:27
SPEAKER_00: But it's an extraordinary life.
2:03:29
SPEAKER_00: I'm so glad
2:03:31
SPEAKER_00: um, Jessica about this.
2:03:34
SPEAKER_00: I did not,
2:03:34
SPEAKER_00: I,
2:03:34
I was kind of a crazy thing while you're just sitting there
2:03:38
getting your hair cut
2:03:39
SPEAKER_00: to hear about all this.
2:03:40
SPEAKER_00: And so, um, so I'm really grateful.
2:03:42
And then I think you're off,
2:03:43
you're off on,
2:03:44
um,
2:03:45
on a fun trip or something.
2:03:46
SPEAKER_03: I'm going to,
2:03:47
SPEAKER_03: again,
2:03:47
SPEAKER_03: after the tumor that I had,
2:03:49
SPEAKER_03: I decided I need to take some boxes here before,
2:03:51
SPEAKER_03: before next round shows up.
2:03:53
SPEAKER_03: And I always wanted to go to, uh, inauguration ceremony of Olympic games.
2:03:58
SPEAKER_03: And now there's, uh,
2:03:59
SPEAKER_03: The ceremony Olympic Games opening ceremony is in Milan.
2:04:02
SPEAKER_03: I am from Milan.
2:04:03
I still have my one-bedroom little apartment there from when I
2:04:07
was a student.
2:04:08
SPEAKER_03: So I'm off to Milan tomorrow.
2:04:10
SPEAKER_00: Okay, we'll see.
2:04:11
SPEAKER_00: We're ending on a positive note.
2:04:14
SPEAKER_03: Where people actually fight for the flag without killing each other.
2:04:19
SPEAKER_00: Well, thank you so much.
2:04:20
I hope we stay in touch because I think you probably live too
2:04:25
far from the office.
2:04:26
SPEAKER_00: And thank you so much for being generous with your time.
2:04:29
SPEAKER_03: Well, thank you.
2:04:30
SPEAKER_03: Thanks a lot.
2:04:34
SPEAKER_00: The Core Memory Podcast is hosted by me,
2:04:36
SPEAKER_00: Ashley Vance,
2:04:37
SPEAKER_00: and or Kylie Robison,
2:04:39
SPEAKER_00: or both of us together.
2:04:41
SPEAKER_00: It is produced by me and David Nicholson.
2:04:45
Our theme song is by James Mercer and John Sortland,
2:04:48
and the show is edited.
2:04:51
SPEAKER_00: always by the John Sortland.
2:04:54
SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much to Brex and Elon Ventures for all your support,
2:04:58
SPEAKER_00: and thank you most of all to everybody for listening or watching.
2:05:03
SPEAKER_00: We love you.
2:05:04
Please leave us a like,
2:05:05
a review,
2:05:06
a subscribe,
2:05:08
all those tremendous things.
2:05:10
SPEAKER_00: Thank you, and we'll see you again.