Connectivity problems

Hey dudes, sorry for not updates for a few days but the internet in my room has been out for a couple of days, kind of a bummer that I'm paying $88 a month for it when it goes down for days at a time. But I can't complain when it's lucky that I have it at all, with my own room in a trailer instead of being in a dirty tent with no internet ever.

I won't be posting any pictures, as I'm on a government computer and we can't hook up cameras or thumb-drives for security reasons. I also won't be posting as many pictures in general, for security reasons. Don't want to give out intel on the layout of the base, etc. But I should be able to post a few here and there.

The past few days I've just been in training, mostly Powerpoint slide-shows, learning the layout of the base, learning what we can and can't do, what we need to watch for, etc.

I did have additional weapons training to learn the ASP police baton though, which was pretty intense. It is by far the most hands-on training I've had with the Air Force so far.



It's basically a collapsible nightstick, made of metal with a rubbery foam grip. We practiced extending it, doing strikes with it on a guy holding a pad with it open and closed, etc. Then one of the trainers got dressed up in a full "red man" suit, with pads over his entire body and we played out scenarios using a padded baton. It was full contact and also included role-playing such as setting up scenarios like "You see one of the guys you're escorting running towards the runway, towards an airplane, what do you do?". At one point the "red man" grabbed my ASP and we ended up rolling around on the ground fighting for it. In two out of the four scenarios I actually talked him into compliance, which I thought was cool. After all of my scenarios he told the other instructor I had excellent voice control and he actually couldn't even find a hole to initiate a physical confrontation, so I thought that was a nice compliment. I've never been in an actual fight so it was my first time really being in a confrontation with someone, even if it was just a training environment. It was helpful though and I learned a lot about the weapon and about how quickly those situations can go down and how hard it is to keep cool and really be in control and not just start flailing your arms around.

Other than the training I've mostly been eating and sleeping. The dining facility is very good, much better than Qatar. Just simple things like the mashed potatoes are much better here. We eat with the Army as well as Romanians and whoever else is stationed on the base. The Army vastly outnumbers the Air Force here, by a huge amount. We have our own little area inside the larger Army base with our own gates and everything. The dining facility has a huge variety though, with three main lines, a short order grill, a hot sandwich bar, a cold sandwich bar, salad bar, fruit bar, dessert bar, "healthy" bar, etc. The dessert bar has ice cream, pies, they'll make milk shakes, ice cream sundaes, anything you can imagine. I plan to avoid it and not even look at it again. The healthy bar has fresh salads, fresh cut fruit they cut right in front of you, etc. They also have signs up with a suggestion of what you should eat at each meal in order to stay under 1800 calories a day, which is a helpful starting point if you want to keep your calories low. The dining facility is run by Army personnel, but most of the actual work is done by Iraqis. They are very friendly and understand English pretty well. From what I've seen they are always very happy and eager to work.

Everyone carries a weapon here, which is a little weird considering I hadn't seen one since basic training, being stationed in the states. The Army has to carry a weapon 24/7, but we only carry them when on duty. I feel sorry for the guys with the big M60 machine guns, as they are much heavier than the M16 or M4 and they still have to go everywhere with them.

The BX is pretty nice, they have just about everything we need, food, uniform items, movies, music, toiletries, etc. There is a Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, some italian restaurants, etc. I don't plan to eat there though, as I get all I can eat at the dining facility and there is no point in wasting money on food. Maybe once in a while I'll try a burrito and see how it compares to the ones at home. The locals also have various little shops selling souvenirs and jewelry and rugs and electronics and things like that.

Hopefully my internet will be back up soon and I can post a few pictures and more updates. Things are good though, so just wanted to let everyone know I was OK. Hope things are good in the states!

Iraq!

Well I finally arrived in Iraq. That's about as specific as I can be because honestly I don't even know what day of the week it is or what the date is without looking it up online on my blog or somewhere else. Weekends have no meaning here (not that they did back home either, when I worked on crew) so it's hard to keep track of days.

In Qatar we got about 30 minutes notice that our flight was coming in, so we rushed to pack and track down everyone, as there are no cell phones or other way of communicating easily. After finally finding everyone and getting checked out of our tent we barely made it to the terminal in time to... wait. It's commonly heard about the military that there is a lot of "hurry up and wait", and it is 100% true. We rushed over there and then waited probably 20 minutes to go to the next stage of the process where we got our gear (Helmet, individual body armor, etc), then went back to the terminal and... waited. Then we got our weapons out of the armory and... waited. Then we emigrated from the country, went to the gate... and waited.

Finally the plane came and we got formed up in a little formation and walked out to it. We rode on a C-130 which is by far the worst plane in the history of the world, at least for passengers. I will never again complain about cramped quarters on a commercial flight or even a sitting next to a screaming baby on a flight. We sat on basically cargo nets, squished together as tight as possible with our helmet, carry-on bags and body armor on. It's a super loud plane (props, not jets), we all had to wear ear plugs so our ears wouldn't be ringing for days afterwards. All together we spent hours and hours of time traveling. That's a lot of hurry-up-and-waiting.



Here are some pictures of when we first got on the plane and were still excited about it and thought it was cool. That lasted about 5 minutes. If I took a picture at the end of the flight you'd see a bunch of really unhappy, tired, cranky, annoyed people. It was fun at the beginning though, I felt like I was about to jump out the back of the plane like in the movies.






Sorry the video is really dark, but it was dark in the plane. That's me waving at the end.

After the flight from hell we finally arrived in Iraq in the middle of the night, and boy was it nice to arrive in this barren desert, war-torn, hostile country of Iraq! Compared to that plane anyway... We did some in-processing, met our supervisors, went to eat at the dining facility, then came to our rooms and went to bed.

I have to go for now, have training all day today. Hopefully tonight I can talk more about the base and my room and what's been going on. I don't have a lot of pictures of the base yet as I've just kind of been getting familiar with things, but I'll get some up eventually.

Desert Oasis!

Today we found out that there is a whole other side of the base with a much bigger and nicer BX, barber shop, restaurants, another theater, Starbucks, a lounge area with pool tables and video games, etc. It's like a little desert oasis!


This is called "Jack's Place", I found it a day or two ago. It's basically a quiet reading room where you can sit on the big fluffy chairs and read magazines or a book. There is a small library of free books there, as you can see in the picture above. Also hot chocolate, coffee, snacks, etc. I had some hot chocolate last night to warm up after freezing to death out on the computer.




Here's the big BX on the other side of the base. It's a real building, not just a tent. There's WiFi there, so people are all over the place with their laptops.


Here's the food court, they have a Starbucks, an Asian restaurant, etc.



Here's the main BX part, almost as big as the one we have at my base in the states.




Here's the game room, they have probably 6 or 8 PS3s, Xbox 360s, etc. They have a pretty big selection of games that you can check out as well, or buy your own in the BX and play it I guess.


Another view of the game room.


Pool tables, foosball, air hockey, TVs, etc.


The central fountain area in the BX again.


Movie poster at the theater.

I bought some Crocs to use as shower shoes at the BX. As always I'm highly concerned with shower fashion accessories so the regular black $.99 thongs were not going to cut it. I also bought some soap, as I am not only concerned with fashion in the shower, but also cleanliness. And I'll need a lot of soap to feel clean in the showers here, as they are mostly disgusting filth holes. Perhaps I will take a picture of them later so that you can all enjoy them.

Also while we were out we saw some TCN escorts and got a preview of what our lives will be like for the next 4 months. There were a bunch of Qatari civilians or someone working on building a building, and a few Air Force personnel just sitting on a stool watching them work. That's what I'll be doing in Iraq, except I'll have on my helmet and body armor and be carrying a weapon I think. So that should be even more fun.

Still don't know when I'll get out of here, but it is becoming a bit tiresome living out of my backpack and trying to sleep in a tent full of other guys. Will be nice to get to Iraq and get my own room or at least just have one roommate and have a job to keep me busy. Which sounds strange to say it'll be nice to get to Iraq, but at least it'll be a steady schedule and I'll know what to expect and can unpack my things and have a "home".

More Qatar Pictures

Well we were supposed to leave for Iraq this morning but after partially out-processing we found out our plane was canceled so we had to in-process again, go pick up our linens again, get our tent back, etc. Then we took a nap for two hours. So now I have an entire day to kill, at least. Here are some random pictures I took this morning.



My boots. Yeah, I'm pretty bored.



Even in Qatar people can't resist writing stupid things on walls. I bet it was all Army guys that did it...



"View" from the bus stop, angle 1.



And angle 2.



People put stickers of their squadrons all over the place. Usually they try to put theirs in a more difficult place to reach than the others, so that they are more elite than the other stickers. I can imagine bored Airmen and soldiers with a bunch of stickers in their pockets saying "Hey, let's see how high we can get this sticker up that pole!", and then spending the rest of the afternoon engineering some complex tower structure to stand on so that they can get their sticker 15 feet in the air.



My view from my bed. Very scenic. That tube thing is the heater vent. Someone went out to turn it on this morning and I heard a loud squeal from the generator outside then that tube whipped really loud with all the air going through it. It scared the crap out of me.



Clever one. Thought my wife would like it.



The crew. All from my base (the ones closest anyway).



Watchtower.



And a video of the bus ride this morning. It could go on for another 30 minutes and would basically look the same. Everything is just flat, dusty, sandy, and brown for as far as you can see.

Qatar Video

Qatar

Like I said in my last post, I'm currently in Qatar at Al Udeid Air Base, which is a major hub for all flights going into and around Iraq. We don't know when our plane will leave and so we're staying in the transient billeting for now. They are big tents with about 20 bunks per tent. Our group that is going to Ali AB is all in the same tent plus others going to other areas. We got here and it was freezing cold. Again, my cold weather gear was in my checked luggage along so I was quite uncomfortable for a while. Even during the day here there is a chilly wind and I don't think it got above about 60 degrees today, though I didn't wake up until 2pm after in-processing and going through customs last night.







The bunks aren't too uncomfortable, but after so long traveling and trying to sleep on an airplane, any flat surface feels pretty good to sleep on. The tents are heated which was great last night, but this morning it got unbearably hot, as I don't think the heating system has a thermostat, it's just on or off and it was left on. I would guess it was about 90 degrees in the tent and I was sleeping right under one of the vents on the top bunk (the vents are the white tubes hanging from the ceiling, if you can see them in the pictures). Needless to say I was just laying on top of all my covers and was still burning up, but managed to still get at least some sleep. You can also hear the wind blowing against the tent, the door opening and closing as people come and go, open their storage trunks, etc. My wife would not sleep well here! :) Somewhere along the way I lost days of my life. I remember getting on the plane in Denver, and somehow I've ended up here days later and I only slept in a bed for one night. I'm not sure where the rest of the days went, but they were sneaky about it.

The little base here has quite a lot of stuff. There is a large central tent that everyone calls "the bra" because it looks like a bra, which is where I'm sitting to write this with the WiFi. It's quite cold and I'm right out in the open so my typing is getting slower and slower as my fingers decide to stop moving quite as nimbly. There is a media building with computer access, a movie theater, dining facility open 24/7, gym, BX, bar (we're limited to 3 beers with a ration card, if someone chooses to drink) magazine reading room, Pizza Hut/Subway/Baskin Robbins/Coffee shop, etc. You can even buy a custom tailored suit here for cheap. And, inexplicably, there is also a place to buy a new car. I'm not sure why or how, maybe it's some kind of tax break? We don't have any duties here, so we can just wander around using the WiFi or gym or whatever else we want all day. Picture of the bra below along with our tents from the outside along with the volleyball court (full of rocks, ouch) and one of the bunkers where we would go if we were attacked (which are apparently also used as a popular make-out spot for couples, as they are not allowed in the opposite sex's billeting).





The dining facility isn't bad, food is similar to basic training, except now I have time to eat it and taste it. I just swipe my ID card on the way in and then have unlimited access to whatever I want. I can see why a lot of people gain weight out here, it's basically an all-you-can-eat buffet for every meal, including sodas, ice cream, cookies, short-order grill, etc. I'll have to watch what I eat so I can leave about 25 pounds of myself out here in the desert! The good thing is that there is also a salad bar and fruit bar so it's just as easy to eat more healthily. The sodas are all in Arabic of some kind, as well as the milk.







The glass of "stuff" in the following picture is supposedly "lemonade". It tastes sort of like lemonade but looks suspiciously exactly like the "orange juice" that I had last night for breakfast. I have a theory that the machine that dispenses the juice actually contains only one kind of liquid and then they just change the labels. I think I may avoid the juice in the future and stick to the water/milk, though I hear the fruit punch at least isn't brown. Maybe they add red food coloring to that spout.



The jet lag isn't bad so far. A couple more nights and I should be pretty much on the right schedule. I guess working on crew and switching between nights and days all the time has made me pretty flexible as far as staying awake or sleeping at random times.

Here are a couple more pictures of our billeting area to finish up this post. I'll post again if anything else interesting happens here in Qatar!

Norfolk to Germany

Hello from Qatar! I'm currently sitting at an outdoor WiFi hotspot in Qatar but this post will be about Germany, with a post to follow about Qatar, if my fingers don't completely freeze up and keep me from typing (it's very cold here!).

We left from Norfolk, VA and boarded a chartered MD-11 to take to Germany. It's like a normal commercial aircraft with flight attendants and everything but all of the passengers are military. The terminal at the Naval Station had a USO so we got goody bags full of stuff like shampoo, snacks, playing cards, etc. They also had nachos and popcorn and movies/books/boardgames.





I sat in the back of the plane and somehow chose the row of seats that were narrower than any other, with armrests that didn't go up. So, within the first 30 minutes I found a new seat because I was miserable in the one I was in as I couldn't move my legs at all and was squished into it. That row must have been made for babies. It was about an 8 hour flight to Germany and I didn't get much sleep. They played a couple movies and we had some horrible food and that's about all there is to say about that.

Arriving at the terminal in Germany we were originally told to stay in the gate area because we just had to refuel the plane and then get back on, but after about 30 minutes of waiting they said it was going to be longer than expected so we could roam around the base a bit. We walked to the BX (Base Exchange, the store) and looked around but noticed that as it was on an American military base, everything was American and there wasn't much German stuff to see other than some beer steins for sale and the street sign that I took a picture of. So, we didn't get to experience much German culture on our short layover. It was a very nice base from what I could tell though, the terminal was very modern and nice and the BX was a good size. It was very chilly there, and I was unprepared as all my cold weather gear was in my checked baggage so it was a very brisk walk to the BX. The only German I heard was from the security people at the checkpoint doing the luggage x-rays and security checks.