Sometime around a year ago, I was sitting in a Buffalo Wild Wings, for those who dont' know its a chain restaurant, and for the slower ones in the group, they specialize in Buffalo Wings. That isn't the point of my story. I was paying, and the pen I was given was a bright yellow Bic, and had a cutesy phrase on it, something to the effect of "I stole this pen from BWW because they were too cheap to give me one". Me being me, I stole it. Now, this wasn't a crime of passion, I had a need for a pen, this yellow monster called out to me, it wanted a new home. I gave it a loving place to live in my left breast pocket. There are a couple things you need to know about me before any of this makes sense or before you begin to care, empathize and then feel my pain. I can NEVER keep a pen. On Active duty, I always had a pen on me, but typically it was a different one daily, or sometimes a couple a day, I have a habit of leaving them behind and sometimes focusing on what I am doing next, rather than closing out what I am doing currently. So, for me a pen is something I am usually searching for....this yellow pen was different. Once I put it in my pocket a year ago, it's been there ever since. I have cared for it, changed its ink with a similar pen, and even hovered over it as someone borrowed it. I really did love this pen. Another fact you need to know about me is that when I am in uniform, I have a very set way I do things, and certain places that I always put certain items. Keys in my left front pocket, chapstick and my money clip in the right front picket, wallet in the back left, etc. Doesn't sound like a big deal but I am really anal about it and I check after I get dressed in the morning to make sure I have it all. Obviously this morning, something was missing and of course, it was my pen. Granted, it was just a pen, but it symbolized something for me, and I was really proud of the fact that through all this BS and all the places I've been, I have managed to not lose this pen. So much for that. I have a feeling I left it at the ANA yesterday as we were REALLY busy and I was distracted. That leads me into:
WE GOT THE INTERNET! I am shocked but the ANA building was wired for the internet finally, and we were re-imaging machines yesterday to get them online. I thought sure all the ground work I laid for this and all the paperwork and frustrating phone calls were going to be for nothing, and my relief would get to see this installed. It was great to get that major milestone knocked out....it will make me feel much better about leaving!
We visited another school today. An elementary school across the street, literally, across the street, our drive was possibly 15 seconds. It was fun, we spent most of our time giving out stuff to the Kindergarten class, and then we funneled the rest to the older kids. I found a few boxes of stuff buried deep in our closet that I thought I had already given out, so some of you were very generous today and didn't even know it! Again I appreciate being the final step in your generosity...thank you! Pictures are here.
53 more days.
I miss my pen.
Gary
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
Saturday, March 24, 2007
I have irresistible legs
Some of my best writing comes from when I just sit and start typing. When I think about it, I tend to over think, and then it just comes out as crap. Well guess what....today is your lucky day. I JUST seconds ago finished typing up a new entry...it wasn't great, but it certainly had its moments. Guess what? GONE! Some stupid combination of keystrokes, unknown to me caused my web browser to suddenly jump to a new part of the blogging world and the work I just put in was gone in a blink. Very frustrating and on top of that, I now have to over think it, to try to get back what I just wrote. I apologize in advance if this is a waste of minutes of your precious time. In fact, I will give you double your money back on your subscription fees if after reading this you aren't 100% satisfied.
I went on my first walk around the entire ANA side of the base the other day. I have driven the entire base and at times have obviously walked over parts of it, but I had yet consciously gone out for a walk.
Steve decided for Lent to give up snack food - ambitious yes - but in his mind necessary. He wants to lose some weight before going home, in fact, we all do. In addition to his decreased snack food consumption, he goes on two or three walks everyday around the entire ANA base, somewhere in the area of 3-5 miles. Since it was a nice day, and I was on one of my scheduled off days from the gym, I decided to join him.
I put on my shorts and a sweatshirt, although in hindsight the sweatshirt may have been overkill. We started off, and within the first mile had a myriad of catcalls and whistles in our direction. See, Afghans don't do the shorts thing...they are a long pants people. Seeing our very white, but obviously very buff legs was too much for them to handle and they had to express themselves. It's always nice to know that middle aged, middle eastern men find your legs attractive.
While walking, we came across a huge warehouse with what sounded like the Afghan version of house music blaring. It was New Years day here, so we assumed it was some party for that. Large groups of guys were headed in that direction, and several groups invited us to join them (see the previous paragraph for the reasons why). We politely declined as I shudder to think of the prospects of a dark warehouse filled with 300 Afghan men, no women and the two of us.
Our Marine Colonel who was in charge of Camp Blackhorse had to go home a few months ago. He caught some Afghan crud virus and had to be sent to Germany for treatment, and then supposedly he was coming back. Evidently the risk of re-infection was high enough that they decided to send him back to the states instead. We got our new Colonel last week. Haven't met him yet, so far seems like a decent enough guy.
We were back at work today after the mini vacation for the New Year. Zak was supposed to go to Mazar-E-Sharif up north for some celebration but ended up staying home due to bad road conditions. He sat at home like I did and was just as bored, although I can't really complain as the time goes fast on off days!
56 more fun filled days.
Gary
I went on my first walk around the entire ANA side of the base the other day. I have driven the entire base and at times have obviously walked over parts of it, but I had yet consciously gone out for a walk.
Steve decided for Lent to give up snack food - ambitious yes - but in his mind necessary. He wants to lose some weight before going home, in fact, we all do. In addition to his decreased snack food consumption, he goes on two or three walks everyday around the entire ANA base, somewhere in the area of 3-5 miles. Since it was a nice day, and I was on one of my scheduled off days from the gym, I decided to join him.
I put on my shorts and a sweatshirt, although in hindsight the sweatshirt may have been overkill. We started off, and within the first mile had a myriad of catcalls and whistles in our direction. See, Afghans don't do the shorts thing...they are a long pants people. Seeing our very white, but obviously very buff legs was too much for them to handle and they had to express themselves. It's always nice to know that middle aged, middle eastern men find your legs attractive.
While walking, we came across a huge warehouse with what sounded like the Afghan version of house music blaring. It was New Years day here, so we assumed it was some party for that. Large groups of guys were headed in that direction, and several groups invited us to join them (see the previous paragraph for the reasons why). We politely declined as I shudder to think of the prospects of a dark warehouse filled with 300 Afghan men, no women and the two of us.
Our Marine Colonel who was in charge of Camp Blackhorse had to go home a few months ago. He caught some Afghan crud virus and had to be sent to Germany for treatment, and then supposedly he was coming back. Evidently the risk of re-infection was high enough that they decided to send him back to the states instead. We got our new Colonel last week. Haven't met him yet, so far seems like a decent enough guy.
We were back at work today after the mini vacation for the New Year. Zak was supposed to go to Mazar-E-Sharif up north for some celebration but ended up staying home due to bad road conditions. He sat at home like I did and was just as bored, although I can't really complain as the time goes fast on off days!
56 more fun filled days.
Gary
Tuesday, March 20, 2007
Every dog has its day
Proving that even the sun shines on a dog's a** occasionally, here are pictures of a rainbow at Blackhorse.
Wanted also to send a thank you to Pat Heinrichs for the two HUGE boxes of girl scout cookies we received! We in the room each took a box or two and then I put the rest out in the MWR room for the camp to get a crack at. Last I checked, they were all but gone in less than 6 hours :) Never underestimate hungry soldiers and fresh girl scout cookies.
In the words of Frosty the Snowman - Happy New Year!
Gary
Wanted also to send a thank you to Pat Heinrichs for the two HUGE boxes of girl scout cookies we received! We in the room each took a box or two and then I put the rest out in the MWR room for the camp to get a crack at. Last I checked, they were all but gone in less than 6 hours :) Never underestimate hungry soldiers and fresh girl scout cookies.
In the words of Frosty the Snowman - Happy New Year!
Gary
Sunday, March 18, 2007
First and 10
We cross into double digit months today. I celebrated by taking a nap, and the camp celebrated by losing power for 3 hours! It also decided to pour today, it was almost a flood worthy rain.
We were informed they are adding a guy to our room. We were hoping to ride out our remaining time with just the three of us, but as I've mentioned in previous posts, the people just keep coming. I don't know the guy, but Bob seems to think he is okay. Shouldn't change all that much, just a little less room for everyone.
I think I have mentioned before the big plotter that we have in the S-6 office. It is slowly getting out that it exists and people keep coming over trying to use it to print huge pictures of themselves. Needless to say, I am not breaking out the cable (which I keep in my truck) for that nonsense. We did however have the education officer come over and want to print out legitimate stuff, so I was helping him the other day. Zak was out, so I had a different interpreter who isn't up on tech language and doesn't have a clue how to work a computer. As I was setting up his document to print, I asked him to go over the document and ensure it was correct, because I didn't want to have to re-print. He said it was fine, and I went to load the printer with paper. Seconds later, I am informed that something is missing, so we managed to figure out what, and fix it. I ask again about the correctness of the document - it's in Dari, I certainly can't spell check it. He tells me yes and I head back over to load the paper, which I am most of the way through when he tells me something else is missing. This little event happens TWO more times, for a total of 4. Originally I asked him to just look it over and find mistakes and he gave it a quick glance rather than read it and said it was okay. I did everything just short of begging to get him to just read the document. Irritating. We finally get to the point where I print - the first page comes out and he has this look on his face that I immediately recognize - it's that same face a kid makes when he is on the bus and realizes he forgot his homework. It comes out and he tells me the title is missing. I really wanted to shoot him. Of course, as I mentioned before, I have an interpreter who doesn't know much about computers, doesn't know how to type, so we had to go find another interpreter that can type to get the title on a page so I could print it. I gave this printer a loving nickname the first day it arrived, I call it the Piece of S**t. I think it still applies.
This week is the Afghan new year. Those very familiar with the signs of the Zodiac will know their calendar already as it follows it to the letter. I find that odd. The current month is Hamal (no idea on spelling) which translates to fish. Next month is called whatever the Dari word for Ram is. Happy 1386 everyone. Good news about all this is that the terps are off a good chunk of this week, which means I am off a good chunk of this week!
61 days to go.
Gary
We were informed they are adding a guy to our room. We were hoping to ride out our remaining time with just the three of us, but as I've mentioned in previous posts, the people just keep coming. I don't know the guy, but Bob seems to think he is okay. Shouldn't change all that much, just a little less room for everyone.
I think I have mentioned before the big plotter that we have in the S-6 office. It is slowly getting out that it exists and people keep coming over trying to use it to print huge pictures of themselves. Needless to say, I am not breaking out the cable (which I keep in my truck) for that nonsense. We did however have the education officer come over and want to print out legitimate stuff, so I was helping him the other day. Zak was out, so I had a different interpreter who isn't up on tech language and doesn't have a clue how to work a computer. As I was setting up his document to print, I asked him to go over the document and ensure it was correct, because I didn't want to have to re-print. He said it was fine, and I went to load the printer with paper. Seconds later, I am informed that something is missing, so we managed to figure out what, and fix it. I ask again about the correctness of the document - it's in Dari, I certainly can't spell check it. He tells me yes and I head back over to load the paper, which I am most of the way through when he tells me something else is missing. This little event happens TWO more times, for a total of 4. Originally I asked him to just look it over and find mistakes and he gave it a quick glance rather than read it and said it was okay. I did everything just short of begging to get him to just read the document. Irritating. We finally get to the point where I print - the first page comes out and he has this look on his face that I immediately recognize - it's that same face a kid makes when he is on the bus and realizes he forgot his homework. It comes out and he tells me the title is missing. I really wanted to shoot him. Of course, as I mentioned before, I have an interpreter who doesn't know much about computers, doesn't know how to type, so we had to go find another interpreter that can type to get the title on a page so I could print it. I gave this printer a loving nickname the first day it arrived, I call it the Piece of S**t. I think it still applies.
This week is the Afghan new year. Those very familiar with the signs of the Zodiac will know their calendar already as it follows it to the letter. I find that odd. The current month is Hamal (no idea on spelling) which translates to fish. Next month is called whatever the Dari word for Ram is. Happy 1386 everyone. Good news about all this is that the terps are off a good chunk of this week, which means I am off a good chunk of this week!
61 days to go.
Gary
Sunday, March 11, 2007
Birthday with the ANA
Had an interesting day at the ANA today. Steve decided to have a cake made because we had my birthday, my terp Zak's was also today and Steve's is coming up. It started as the three of us, but kept growing as we figured out that seven of us including terps and the ANA had birthday's this month. It went from a small party to an all out party with singing, cake and of course tea. it was fun. Nothing horribly exciting, but more than I expected. Pictures here. Yes, that is a Kiwi cake.
We had an interesting talk the other day from a professor at the Naval Postgrad school who came to visit. He is an expert in Afghan history and has done piles of research on the future of Afghanistan and what it will truly take to defeat the Taliban. I will spare the boring details, but essentially, he is saying we have the wrong mindset here, and that the tribal nature of the culture just can't be won over with the way we in the west think. It's just not possible. The tribes have a term - Badal (revenge) which basically to them means that if we kill one person from a village, they feel like they have to kill ten to make up for it, and of course in real terms it means we have lost the support for the village forever. The Taliban knows this and does everything it can to put us in that situation. He mentioned a phrase the Taliban use - The Americans have the watches, we have the time. Interesting. This place is going through an Iraqization and I have a feeling this will be an incredibly telling year for the future of Afghanistan.
Gary
We had an interesting talk the other day from a professor at the Naval Postgrad school who came to visit. He is an expert in Afghan history and has done piles of research on the future of Afghanistan and what it will truly take to defeat the Taliban. I will spare the boring details, but essentially, he is saying we have the wrong mindset here, and that the tribal nature of the culture just can't be won over with the way we in the west think. It's just not possible. The tribes have a term - Badal (revenge) which basically to them means that if we kill one person from a village, they feel like they have to kill ten to make up for it, and of course in real terms it means we have lost the support for the village forever. The Taliban knows this and does everything it can to put us in that situation. He mentioned a phrase the Taliban use - The Americans have the watches, we have the time. Interesting. This place is going through an Iraqization and I have a feeling this will be an incredibly telling year for the future of Afghanistan.
Gary
Monday, March 05, 2007
The past year - I hardly knew ya
Today is a nice day...a magical day even. I think I may go eat a huge bowl of lucky charms while scratching off lottery tickets and chasing rainbows singing Irish drinking songs. Today I have been gone for a year. Last year at this time I was flying to Norfolk in a cloud of uncertainty and fear, looking into the barrel of what I thought at the time was going to be 12 months away from home. Turns out 12 months was optimistic as it will be closer to 14 or 15.
We did get some good news the other day, we were given actual dates of when we are leaving, flying out and getting back to Norfolk. For obvious reasons I won't be putting all that down here, but suffice to say its a bit earlier than it could have been, and it's just nice to know.
CDR Nail finally made it back home for leave. He was the last of our group to go. By the time he gets back, we will have just over a month left. Hopefully he is having a good time.
The Afghans are on auto pilot at this point. I go in, I watch how they are doing, and step in if need be. They have a major end of year inspection this month (their new year is around the 20th of March, whoo hoo, 1386 here we come!) and I have just watched as they are able to pull out and show all of our inventories, describe their communications plans and just generally show they know what they are talking about. I am really happy with their growth. It will be interesting to see if the US side starts pulling back out of the Garrison after we leave to let them grow on their own. At some point, we are more of a hindrance than a help, just by the mere fact of being around.
Gary
We did get some good news the other day, we were given actual dates of when we are leaving, flying out and getting back to Norfolk. For obvious reasons I won't be putting all that down here, but suffice to say its a bit earlier than it could have been, and it's just nice to know.
CDR Nail finally made it back home for leave. He was the last of our group to go. By the time he gets back, we will have just over a month left. Hopefully he is having a good time.
The Afghans are on auto pilot at this point. I go in, I watch how they are doing, and step in if need be. They have a major end of year inspection this month (their new year is around the 20th of March, whoo hoo, 1386 here we come!) and I have just watched as they are able to pull out and show all of our inventories, describe their communications plans and just generally show they know what they are talking about. I am really happy with their growth. It will be interesting to see if the US side starts pulling back out of the Garrison after we leave to let them grow on their own. At some point, we are more of a hindrance than a help, just by the mere fact of being around.
Gary
Thursday, March 01, 2007
Progress marches on
Camp Blackhorse is still in the middle of its massive expansion. The construction has waned as most of the B-huts are now up and functional, but I have it on good authority that they are going to fire up the virtual bulldozers soon. We are going from about 300 now, to somewhere in the area of 600 by June, and very likely bigger by the end of the summer. It almost has the feel of a booming mining town in the 1800's, if a booming mining town had internet and a gym. Can you imagine how history would have changed if Wild Bill Hickok would have owned a laptop computer and would have been playing solitaire or online poker? He would never have been shot in the back of the head. I digress.
Wooden structures, people you have never seen before, long lines for food and the post office. There are parallels to be drawn from this experience. The only difference is being here early isn't going to make me a millionaire as I don't own any of this property nor do I get to work my claim. The best I get is dirt in my ears, wet socks, and a half hearted thank you on my way out the door. I don't envy those coming after us. I suppose coming in fresh, this situation would not be nearly as bad as described, everything is relative. The ebb and flow of this place only really affects those that never flow out of here.
March. Yup, March. That's all I have to say about that. Actually it's not, so allow me to continue. My birthday is in a few days, 11 to be precise. I have had birthday's away from home before, no big deal. It's another day, and will be that much closer to April which is NEXT month, and that my friends is when our reliefs show up. NEXT MONTH! Doesn't mean I'll leave anytime close to when they get here, but at least they will be here.
It snowed three inches two days ago, and today its probably 65 out. Afghanistan is doing its best to make sure I feel at home by providing me with standard Midwest weather.
Baseball is back and 79 days (plus or minus a couple) until I see it live.
Gary
Wooden structures, people you have never seen before, long lines for food and the post office. There are parallels to be drawn from this experience. The only difference is being here early isn't going to make me a millionaire as I don't own any of this property nor do I get to work my claim. The best I get is dirt in my ears, wet socks, and a half hearted thank you on my way out the door. I don't envy those coming after us. I suppose coming in fresh, this situation would not be nearly as bad as described, everything is relative. The ebb and flow of this place only really affects those that never flow out of here.
March. Yup, March. That's all I have to say about that. Actually it's not, so allow me to continue. My birthday is in a few days, 11 to be precise. I have had birthday's away from home before, no big deal. It's another day, and will be that much closer to April which is NEXT month, and that my friends is when our reliefs show up. NEXT MONTH! Doesn't mean I'll leave anytime close to when they get here, but at least they will be here.
It snowed three inches two days ago, and today its probably 65 out. Afghanistan is doing its best to make sure I feel at home by providing me with standard Midwest weather.
Baseball is back and 79 days (plus or minus a couple) until I see it live.
Gary
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