WEEK 3

November 20-26, 2006

Today was the day to show Ed and Greg around the CJSOTF-A area, introduce them to the people we are working with, and show them the operation here in Afghanistan. Since their arrival, Ed and Greg have been ooohing and aaahing about everything here, except the maintenance facilities I have been working in. According to them, everything except the maintenance area is much better than what they have in Iraq.

We have several other countries represented here on Bagram. The largest (other than us) must be the Polish. Then the Koreans, French, British, Romanians, Canadians, Australians, and Egyptians all are here. There is very little difference in uniforms between the British, Canadians, and Australians except for hats and the flag on their shoulder. The Egyptians stick out like a sore thumb, especially with their nearly pink and gold work-out uniforms. Oh yeah, there are some Afghani forces here as well (the good guys, not the Taliban). We keep the Taliban in a huge prison right here on Bagram.

One of the things I had to point out to Ed and Greg were the French uniforms. You would think that a country with one of the top fashion hot-spots in the world would have decent looking uniforms. They are hideous. They appear to be made out of spandex because they are virtually skin tight. They also seemed to mimic the U.S. DCU (Desert Camouflage Uniform) pattern and combine it with the British desert uniform. The final result resembles mismatched colors in blotches painted on some poor human being’s body.

It gets dark here at 1715. I mean pitch black. We have very few lights on at night; kind of an Army thing, I guess. I would think we could turn on the outside lights along the sidewalks and in front of buildings, especially since we own the airspace and have done so since 2001. But alas, we are forced to navigate around the area after dusk by Braille. Sure, some of the areas we already know by heart, primarily the stroll to the bathroom. However, it is those unfamiliar areas that must be cautiously approached with out-stretched arms in front of your body and the high-stepping, soft-walking process we have all done in the dark.

Whenever anyone leaves the confines of Camp Vance, we are required to carry our personal weapon. I’m not exactly sure why, but that is the requirement. Maybe it’s because we have Local National (LNs) and TCNs working about or maybe it is to demonstrate a show of force. Whatever the reason, I certainly like having that 9mm with me; especially when I go to the FedEx location and have to remind the LN that I want my shipment today. Just merely putting my hand on the holstered pistol seems to convey bunches.

One of the things I will never get used to is women with weapons. Sure, those of you that are women probably now think I’m some kind of male chauvinist. But the fact remains that I spent most of my career in the Armor community where we did not have women in uniform. It was rare to see a female soldier. It was even rarer, I mean winning the lottery rare, when a female was carrying a weapon. As it happened, I was standing outside of Camp Vance the other morning waiting to meet Brian Nelson when an attractive girl of maybe 25 walked by me in a jacket and jeans. It wasn’t till she walked past me that I noticed an M16 slung over her shoulder across her back. She was obviously part of the U.S. military and currently not on duty because she was wearing civilian clothing. I however, was still caught by surprise with the fact that I was witnessing something I would not see in the U.S., and on the whole, thought it strange.

Like Iraq, our currency on Bagram is USD. Also like Iraq, our change (the metallic kind (pennies, nickels, dimes, and quarters)) is not used here. Instead we are given pogs. Pogs are plastic, credit card thin, coinage about the diameter of a U.S. half-dollar with specific denominations printed under the exterior laminate. There are no penny pogs, just nickels, dimes, and quarters. The even stranger part of this story is that several of the items in the PX for instance, have prices that end in numbers like .97 or .99 cents. So, if you buy three items that have prices ending in 9, your final amount would end in 7 (no tax here). Since there are no penny pogs, the cashiers dispense change upward to the 0. Why?! Why not make every item in the store end in 5 or 0? Why make it more difficult for the cashiers and confuse the customer? Why?! Do we have to get Congress involved in this? Anyway, I already have a box-full of pogs. Sure I could spend them here as change, but I think I would rather send them to the kids and let them have fun with them at Fort Lewis or McChord.

We have facilities here to do our laundry. Yeah, KBR will do your laundry for you on Tuesdays and Thursdays, but I have yet to try them here. Sure, they are supposed to be the same as Iraq, but once again, I have not tried them. Why? I don’t know, just haven’t. There is something familiar with throwing your own laundry in a washing machine and dryer that was previously used by someone who doesn’t understand the molecular properties of bleach that appeals to me. I mean, I look forward to blotches and splotches on my clothing that only comes with reckless abandon on your own accord in the laundry room. I think I just like the pink and purple sheets that I have currently which were once royal blue. It’s kind of an Americana thing to me.

Oh, the best part is the dryers. It takes 40 minutes to wash 10 yards of clothing and nine hours to dry it. I am not kidding. Maybe it’s the altitude (doubt it). Maybe it’s the moisture in the air (nope). Maybe it’s the reflection of the snow off the Hindu Kush Mountains (nice try). No, it is really the Maytag dryer that has been used more times in one year than a regular dryer gets used at the Shirley’s in twenty years. These poor dryers are used up in three months.
Wow, today they assigned me new facilities in Camp Oeullette which is about a mile from Camp Vance. I have a building that resembles a two-car garage and another building that could house 100 people with a two-car workshop attached. Of course, it has been vacant for years and required extensive cleaning and removal of unwanted crap. The intent is that I move into the building and use the area for living and working. The working part is under-way now; however, the living part will take some time. Although I have cable TV there, I do not have a telephone or internet or palatial rooms that meet with my approval. I have requested stadium-fulls of lumber and assorted paraphernalia to begin the construction process, but, alas, it has not yet arrived.

Ed, Greg, and I went to the DFAC at our appointed time for Thanksgiving Dinner on Thursday. They really had a nice spread. We had REAL turkey with REAL dressing, REAL mashed potatoes (I avoided the sweet potatoes as you probably guessed), REAL gravy, REAL vegetables, and REAL biscuits. For the most part, it tasted as it looked (pretty good). I even had a slice of Pumpkin Pie with the spray-on whipped cream and vanilla ice cream al-a-mode. I washed it all down with Sparkling Cider and a Starbuck’s Mocha Frappuccino in the bottle.

Camp Bagram was taken over from the Taliban who took it over from the Russians who took it over from previous Afghani aggressors. Every building has a different design and structure that was built by different people. Depending on who built the buildings, the rooms, roof heights, door ways, etc. are all different. Why am I telling you all this? Because I have found it customary to duck every time I go through a door way, just like Charles does every day except I am much shorter than the tall man.

The real meat of this story is about a boy who played poker with buddies in a room that was no doubt built by the 5’3” Afghanis. Although the ceiling was a stout 6’4”, the height of the door was an impressive 5’7”. I ran out of the room to use the bathroom (no indoor plumbing here) in between poker hands and returned in the same quick manner, but forgot to duck on my approach to the door way. My forehead collided with the fanciful wood trim surrounding the mud and brick earth-works of the door way entrance and somehow propelled me in the opposite direction toward the rock and gravel approach to the door. I remember very little except picking myself out of the gravel and slowly walking into the room where my buddies stood agape. I had a terrific headache and my right elbow screamed for medical attention. To make a long story short, I had the best poker night of my time here, a red mark on my forehead, and a yellow and purple elbow that still reminds me of the whole experience.

You know, I actually do work here. We have been tearing apart vehicles and engineering and fabricating armor panels that protect the occupants. I really like this job. It is one of the few jobs that reward you with actually seeing your progress. I know that every inch of armor that is placed in these vehicles seriously helps someone. I truly love the fact that I am in a position to make situations better for others.

It’s also cool that I can tell someone that I engineer stuff. Sure dealing with measurements can be confusing, but combining that with three-dimensional Auto-CAD software and air-powered tools nearly takes my breath away. Every time I get to spline a curve or XYZ a point in space, I get kinda excited. Finally after twenty years since algebra, trigonometry, and calculus, I actually get to apply and understand a bunch of that stuff that I swore would be useless. Although it may make me sound like a geek, I enjoy this stuff.

OK, some of you have asked me about pictures, internet, and phone. Currently I have no dedicated phone and internet line. That is forthcoming. In the meantime I must try to share those limited resources with the other 17,000 military and civilian members stationed here. I would send all-you-all pictures, but my 15kbs pipeline takes me about 30 minutes a picture to upload at the smallest mega-pixel setting. So, I have been saving the butt-load of pictures I am taking on my hard drive and will produce a CD for distribution in the next couple of weeks. I will obviously send the first CD to my lovely wife who can email them out to you on our 640mbs line in mere seconds. Obviously she will screen only the most vivid, sharpest, and appealing pictures for your review.

Well, I gotta run and get back to the simple life here. I’ll send more later.


Craig