Two Lunatics on a Mission to Mosul

By Carmen Gentile

Photographs by Nish Nalbandian

Orginally published in Motorcyclist. 11/13/2017

My first instinct is to keep the mood light by joking with the soldiers in camouflage uniforms who can keep our newly acquired motorcycle off the road and threaten our dream.

I tell them through our translator and driver, Sangar, that they better have beds for us in the small, shabby trailers at the checkpoint along the road connecting Iraq’s war-ravaged city of Mosul and the relatively gleaming, prosperous Erbil just 35 miles away.

The soldiers laugh, though my comedic stylings aren’t changing their minds.

“How about this,” I say, prefacing a Hail Mary proposal, “I’ll arm wrestle you all. If I beat you guys, you let us go.” Feats of strengths are popular among soldiers in Iraq, so I figure offering one as a condition for letting us pass is just crazy enough to work.

They chuckle, shake their heads, and tell me they’ll get the biggest guy they have to take me on.