U.S.: Democracy! Whiskey! Sexy!

One night, the CPA's senior adviser for youth and sport, Mounzer Fatfat, sat at the head of a banquet table in white shirt and tie, beating out an infectious rhythm on an Arab derbakah drum. Bar patrons danced and clapped along.

A tiny back room at the cafe also holds the green zone's chief liquor store, where bottles of whiskey, vodka and wine are sold at approximately double the price charged outside the green zone's blast walls.

The backroom liquor store is a typical stop along the way to one of the green zone's frequent ''trailer parties'' held in the cramped temporary housing.

Luckier residents prefer the big barbecue parties put on by security firms like Kroll and Olive. The green zone's dearth of eligible women means men aren't as likely to be invited.

Worst off, perhaps, are the few thousand U.S. soldiers living in full view of the carousing. The Pentagon's General Order No. 1 prohibits U.S. troops from drinking, although soldiers say liquor is easy to come by especially in the green zone.

The zone also boasts a pizza parlor and pair of highly competitive Chinese restaurants. There is the palace swimming pool and a ''casino'' that is really a glorified game room. The zone's several gyms are popular, the occupation seeming to have transformed many who arrived overweight into fitness buffs.

One street has been converted into a souk, where Iraqis sell bootleg DVDs, rugs and trinkets. On a recent visit, a boy on a motorbike pulled up and made a hushed offering: ''Hey! porno?''

''I don't know if they are corrupting us or we're corrupting them,'' one CPA official quipped.

Woi!woi!woi!woi!woi! Heat in de place! heat in de place! Hold me!

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