Editor's Note: After getting back from a whirlwind trip through Iraq for WWE's Tribute to the Troops misson, Joey Styles sent in these pictures of his journey. Click on the photo to receive more information, or visit his Tribute to the Troops galley in his profile photo section for more.
The Tribute to the Troops event is over and everyone seems physically, mentally and emotionally drained.
To me, the event felt like a combination of WrestleMania and an Orginal ECW pay-per-view. The enthusiasm of everyone at WWE and the Troops matched that of Wrestlemania and the intimacy of five thousand rabid fans where you can make eye contact with every soldier felt like the Original ECW.
In what seemed like only a few moments, the event rushed by and before we knew it, our Superstars were doing media interviews, the hardest working crew in entertainment was breaking down and loading tons of production equipment onto trucks that will transport the multimedia masterpiece to our C-17 cargo plane.
In the meantime, I am sending back this event recap and our phenomenal photographers Dave "Gunner" Gunn, Craig Ambrosio and Scott Brinegar are emailing photos back to WWE.com headquarters in Stamford, CT. Speaking of our photographers who are as important to WWE.com as anyone else, it is a special person that volunteers to enter a war zone carrying a camera while wearing a kevlar helmet and vest.
As a special thank you to you WWE.com visitors that helped transform the Web site into a multimedia mosiac this year, we will post the first ever Tribute to the Troops WWE Divas photo shoot featuring Lilian Garcia, Maria, Eve, Mickie James, Kelly Kelly and Alicia Fox dressed as Santa's Helpers to bring joy, happiness and visions of sugar plums (or whatever you dream up) dancing in your heads.
Just like five-year-old Joey Styles Jr., who is counting down the days until Christmas on the calendar, you too will have to wait for Santa's special offerings as these photos will not be posted until December 16 when we will post one gallery each day until December 20 when Tribute to the Troops air on NBC for the first time.
After hundreds of hot showers and hot dinner chow, team WWE will begin our journey home. Five hours from Baghdad to Germany, three hours to refuel and refresh and another eight hours to our nation's capital. Tribute to the Troops 2008 is in the books.
In the same way children around the world are counting down the days until Christmas, I am counting down the days until Tribute to the Troops 2009.
Editor's Note: The preceeding was relayed from e-mail message reports from the WWE's Tribute to the Troops mission. Names of the bases visited have been omitted at the request of the U.S. Army, so as not to divulge WWE's location in Iraq.
Last night, resourceful and charming WWE television producer, Heather Mitchell, informed me, cameraman Sean Sellman and still photographer Kristin Prouty that she had somehow arranged for us to be fortunate enough to attend and document the opening of a new school in Western Baghdad, and that we would be traveling off base on the ground or "outside the wire."
I had no idea what "outside the wire" meant until I was instructed that I had to wear a kevlar helmet and vest and asked,
"What is your blood type, sir?" "Excuse me." "I need to know your blood type, sir."
"WHAT!?"
At this point, four fully-armored Humvees each manned by a driver, a medic and a gunner pull up with our "tour guide," Lt. Col. Monty Willoughby, a man in his mid-40s, shaved bald and seemingly made of ice. For those of you keeping score at home, that's 13 soldiers and four armored vehicles with bulletproof glass to drive four WWE employees to the opening of a school.
Lt. Col. Willoughby is very prominent in Western Baghdad because he and his soldiers have greatly improved the quality of life of those who live there. He instructed us that if we were fired upon, we should stay in our vehicles and let them handle the situation. (Really? That's too bad. I was hoping for a good gunfight to work off breakfast.)
During the 30-minute drive, our driver, Soldier Khamo of Chicago, shared with me that last month a convoy of Humvees was attacked on the very road we were on and one of the vehicles was knocked on its side. (Please stop talking. Do we get satellite radio in this thing?)
Upon our safe arrival, we were indeed blessed to witness the opening of the Karama School which will educate more than 1,000 young male and female Iraqi children. We had the pleasure of interviewing a proudly smiling Lt. Col. Willoughby and an Iraqi three-star brigadier general. The school auditorium was standing room only, filled with Iraqi media, proud educators, local government and many of the soon-to-be students of the brand new school which still smelled of fresh paint.
After the ceremony, we four humble WWE employees, members of the United States Army, members of the Iraqi Army, Iraqi policemen, parents, students, teachers and local dignitaries celebrated together by sharing a meal.
As we packed up our gear in preparation for our journey back to the base, I looked up and saw a smiling United States soldier get down on one knee and put his sunglasses on a 3-year-old Iraqi girl who was beaming right back up at him.
Any remnants of anxiety that still remained inside me immediately dissipated as I realized that Baghdad and Iraq as a whole were growing safer by the day thanks to primarily anonymous heroes like Monty Willoughby of Colorado Springs and the brave young servicepeople following his selfless example.
Editor's Note: The preceeding was relayed from e-mail message reports from the WWE's Tribute to the Troops mission. Names of the bases visited have been omitted at the request of the U.S. Army, so as not to divulge WWE's location in Iraq. For more of Joey's photos from Baghdad, see his Tribute photo gallery.
While visiting Forward Operating Bases in the Baghdad area, Joey Styles spoke to Army Cpt. Andrew Graziano of Charlotte, N.C., about WWE's Tribute to the Troops tour.
GRAZIANO: My grandfather started serving in the Army for World War II, and jumped into Normandy. My dad served in the Army for 24 years, as well as my older brother, and my uncle for the last 20 years has also served.
JOEY: And what did it mean to the troops for the WWE Superstars to show up today?
GRAZIANO: The soldiers out here … they just want to work hard, and they don’t expect much. But when they receive something like this, they get really excited about it. They’ve been talking about it for several months.
When they heard you were coming out to do a live show, and coming out to their remote station, it meant a lot to them. They’ve been talking about it non-stop for about a week now.
JOEY: Tell us about the private who’s a big WWE fan...
GRAZIANO: Sure. There’s a young private who’s been making a model car out here in his free time, hand-painting it. In the last couple of days, when he heard you were coming, he went out and painted “WWE” on the top of it.
And when he presented it to The Big Show to get it signed, Big Show commented that it was a cool model car. He was so taken back he could barely speak. You could tell that would be a story that he’ll tell for the next couple of years, if not his lifetime. It probably made his deployment.
JOEY: On behalf of WWE, we thank you for protecting our freedoms, so we can go do what we do around the world.
GRAZIANO: Well, we’re very grateful to have you. This is an extension of service for these entertainers to come out and see the troops, and we’re very grateful. Thank you.
Editor's Note: The preceeding was transcribed from audio reports from the WWE's Tribute to the Troops mission received Wednesday. Names of the bases visited have been omitted at the request of the U.S. Army, so as not to divulge WWE's location in Iraq.
Hi everyone. This is Joey aboard the C-17 and I have never seen anything like this in my life. No commercial flight even remotely compares to the inside of a C-17 cargo plane fitted with airline seats in the middle and solid steel jump seats lining both sides.
Bags are hanging everywhere as each one of us, besides having our one suitcase, was handed a sleeping bag and a WWE duffel bag, with toiletries and such. Behind us are just pallets and pallets of equipment, including everything we need to set up the ring, and an HD video wall. So, for the first time, the Armed Forces attending Tribute to the Troops will be treated to the full WWE TV experience, and should make for an unbelievable special on NBC, and of course, there will be clips on WWE.com.
I can not stress enough the bedlam of loading all the WWE personnel onto a military cargo plane, which normally would not transport human cargo. There will be video clips and photos to match this blog, but this is simply unreal, and we haven’t even taken off yet, it’s 2 a.m. ET and we’ve just begun to taxi.
I will remember this trip for the rest of my life … or until the next time I take a steel chair to the skull.
LATER … LANDING IN IRAQ….
This is Joey Styles, and we are finally on the ground in Iraq, still inside our C-17 cargo plane. It was eight hours from Washington D.C. to Germany, a three-hour layover in Germany at Ramstein Air Force Base, and then another five hours to Iraq.
It is 1 o’clock local time, and while there is a policy of “what happens on the plane stays on the plane,” there is an unwritten rule that you do not fall asleep on the first leg of this trip from the USA to Europe. And some people try to skirt this rule, and hide in corners of the plane, behind cargo at the back of the plane.
Lilian Garcia was one such person.
Lilian was unfortunately and unceremoniously awakened by a bucket of ice water being poured over her head. As JBL said, “She looked so hot, we had to cool her off.”
However, JBL was not the man who perpetrated such a heinous act, and while it is not like me to reveal who would do something like that, I can tell you that you may see the pirated video footage on WWE.com’s “The Dirt Sheet.”
Editor's Note: The preceeding was transcribed from audio reports from the WWE's Tribute to the Troops mission, recorded Monday and Tuesday. Names of the bases visited have been omitted at the request of the U.S. Army, so as not to divulge WWE's location in Iraq.
