By Hilary Stauffer, head of the Reporting, Policy and Strategy Unit in the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Baghdad
I didn’t expect to miss the Hippo.
Currently in the middle of my ninth week of lockdown on the United Nations compound in the Green Zone in Baghdad, there are so many things that I miss from my life back home, beyond the compound gates: Thai food and well stocked grocery stores are just some of them (on my last trip to the tiny shop we have on the compound, I managed to buy laundry detergent and a pomegranate — it was all they had left). And yes, of course, family and friends — although if I’m honest, my loved ones have contacted me more in the last nine weeks than they have the previous 15 years.
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