64 AMERICAN SPYblistering summer day and offered a plastic cup of lemonade. Despite
my natural (and understandable) naiveté about almost everything in life,
internal warning bells went off. I told them I’d drink it but only if they each
took a sip first. They did, and I then told them I’d changed my mind. Not
surprisingly, the lemonade was in fact urine.
In CIA-speak, those bells going off in my head were my “CI antenna”—
counterintelligence warning signs that things may not be the way they appear.
Years later, when I “executed” my sister’s beloved, oversized, pasty-
faced doll Priscilla by hanging her from the date palm tree in our front
yard, her giant plastic head covered in a black shroud, I was subconsciously
laying the groundwork for my future efforts to help eradicate ISIS in Iraq.
At least that’s how I like to rationalize my behavior now. (Sorry, sis.)
When I finally cracked open the World Book Encyclopedia my parents
bought to further our public school educations, I went straight to the
formula for gunpowder. And proceeded to buy the components and make
my own. It’s no wonder that years later I literally and figuratively had a
blast during my two weeks of explosives training on a secret CIA base
located somewhere on the Atlantic Seaboard.
Growing up, I also loved poring over old-fashioned folding paper maps
and planning fifty-mile “bike hikes” to the various mountain parks around the
city in which I lived. My friends and I would leave the house before dawn, our
bicycles laden with army surplus canteens, mess kits, and other gear as we set
out on our memorable adventures. During that same carefree era, my brothers
and I would hunt, catch, and kill doves and crawdads and cook them in our
poor sister’s Easy Bake Oven, thoughtlessly leaving the toy oven’s insides splat-
tered with blood and feathers. (To this day she refuses to cook.)
Who knew that bike hikes and backyard barbecues would prepare me
so well for nighttime land navigation and jungle survival training during
the CIA’s paramilitary course?
I grew up with wonderful Palestinian and Lebanese friends and neigh-
bors, and as a result I’ve always been predisposed to love Arabs, their food,
and their culture. When years later I entered Iraq to kick off my business
venture, I felt right at home with the warm Iraqi hospitality.
During high school and college, I worked long, hot summers on a large
ranch, where I was able to pick up more colloquial Spanish with hard-
working migrant farm workers from Mexico. I also spoke Spanish regularly