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Our living arrangements were some of the finest that the
army could ever have provided. If the time period was pre civil war era that
is. Those tents and cots would have been Presidential quality back then! Lol
See what I mean? LUXURIOUS! It’s all good though, we weren’t
really in a position to complain about the fact that we were being treated like
shit by big army since almost EVERY other National Guard unit out here was in
the same position. What solidified the misery, however, was when it would rain,
it’d pour! That meant flooding. That meant we had to dig a damn trench in and
around the tent so the rivers could flow! Ah, President Grant would be proud to
be sleeping in one of these fine establishments.
The food was good though! I mean the first week we actually
had access to a chow hall! Mmmmm, all of the crunchy/rubbery fake eggs our lil
tummy’s could ever want or need for at least a lifetime. That coupled with some
random pogeybait stuffing our pockets as we walk out of the building from a
meal meant we could definitely look forward to some serious QT with a
portashitter! Ahh that fresh ammonia smell! Mornings wouldn’t be complete
without gagging on the air you’re breathing at least once, am I right?! However
if that didn’t satiate your appetite enough, or you were just getting bored with
the same ol’, same ol’ then the Army has a solution for you: Meals Ready to
Exit! … Or was it Meals Refusing to Exit?... They’d have you believe that
they’re actually (as their name implies) Meals Ready to Eat. To be fair, the
MRE has changed its menu over the past few years to a few things that are
actually edible but it’s a sort of Pyrrhic victory in the sense that opening a
bag to open more bags to get to fake ass stew or some weird ass substance they
want you to believe is chicken really makes a decent taste no longer matter to
the depressing situation you’re currently in.
It’s cool though, there were options out there if you didn’t
mind paying a bit of Euros for the trouble. Laundry was also interesting, a pay
to play place that actually didn’t cost anything. You see you’d put the $1.50
needed to start the washing machine through the feeder tray but the collection
bin wasn’t installed in any of them. So you basically just had to have a
community pot of six quarters and you’re covered for as many people as needed.
Dryers are the same story but with less at once. A single quarter gives you six
minutes of drying time and the tray that normally would collect said quarter is
likewise removed. Domestic life shouldn’t have been as much of a concern as it
was but, we had tons of time yet limited forewarning for every single task we
had to accomplish. So it was basically sitting around waiting for either the
go-ahead with doing whatever personal task you had, or “we got less than five
minutes to accomplish this complex preparation task or we’re in trouble!”
Convenient, huh?
*sigh*
Look I’d like to make it out like there are some unique
problems only attributable to us and our lil adventure that might make you more
sympathetic to our “plights” and “woes” but, to be honest, we weren’t the only
unit out there in Tent City (not actually on the map!) dealing with the pile of
dog shit that the post provided us. This kind of segues (with a little more
discussion for another time) into the political faux pas that has been the past
couple administrations’ budget decisions. BAAASically, they’s bein a BASIC
BITCH wit dey moneys… (lol) So with that being said, I’d be a complete douche
to not acknowledge the fact that there were a couple other company sized
elements from different states sharing this particular piece of real estate and
dealing with the same craptastic treatment that has been handed to us by our
active duty host(s). They’re still not the whole problem since there’s always
the discussion of that base being filled with soldiers of a new generation who
signed up to go overseas to get some trigger time, got stuck in a purely
training post, and now have ZERO perspective on their current MO, who are also
currently being led by higher-ups who may or may not have been sent there as a
punishment. (This is the assumption since I cannot fathom any other reason for
THEIR lack of leadership breakdown…)
*le
sighhh*
I guess I have a bit of a chip on my shoulder since I’ve had
an amazing career and I want to temper and channel as much of that to every
other soldier I come across.
Well, not much else to report on our on base conditions. If
you’ve ever visited one, you know what the commissary and exchange are. There’s
a single little movie theater (never used by yours truly.) A decently equipped
but pathetically small gym. All of which were about a mile and some change up a
hill and away from us. Whatever may have been close to us in the tent
city/training barracks area, a couple of closed shops, a gym with no one to
tend to it (so also closed) and a little shoppette with some janky ass hours
(like 7 am to 2 in the afternoon…sometimes!) were also understaffed and unused.
The barracks were given to the foreign nations participating with us and a
handful of US supporting units to include inserted O/C’s. About the only things
to do within proximity of Tent City is go get one of the BEST gyros I’ve EVER
eaten outside of the Laundromat(many many Euros were spent indulging in such a
delicacy), get some overpriced but limited pogeybait from the little Shoppette
(like a mini Post Exchange), or get some QT with your bodyweight in the form of
taking a jog to the pullup/dip bars and having a good workout.
Life was simple out in this place where we thought to escape
the Washingtonian rain (and didn’t!). You wake, you wait to see when the next
hard time was, you filled the time in between with something to keep you sane,
pack for a few days in between, then leave to take it to your ‘enemies’ over
the course of a few days at a time. For all the bitchin I’m doin, I’m gonna
miss it. The boys and I got a great opportunity to bond and grow as a unit and
I’m forever greatful for opportunities like the one we were given.
Stay the course fools! Chapter 4’s comin soon!
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