Outside the wire

So I guess its been just over 2 weeks since I got here. I've pretty busy with the transition and getting settled into a routine here, so I put off blogging until something exciting happened. After all, no one really wants to hear about my daily life (which consists of sleeping, working out, eating, working, and more working out). It is like groundhogs day here. I even eat the same thing almost everyday. I'm sure that surprises no one. We will see how long that last. Anyways, I will go into more detail about everyday life here when I run out of interesting things to talk about. But for now, I will tell you the story of my first time going off the post and into the wild of Kuwait...

A couple days ago, we got a tasking to have our public affairs noncommissioned officer go up to Camp Beuhring to take pictures of the Virginia State governor's visit to Kuwait. Since I am that Soldier's supervisor, I volunteered to go with her. Partially to help her take pictures/interview people, since I have newspaper experience, and partially because I just wanted to freaking leave and see Kuwait. After talking to some people, I convinced them it was best for everyone if I went on the trip, and so it was settled- SGT Felix and I would go up to Buehring to see the governor, but we would also take our commander and first sergeant with us so they could explore the area too. This turned out to be in our favor, as a stop at Ali Aslem was added to our itinerary, allowing us to leave around 10 and be gone for the whole day. Score. I was getting bored of the office anyways.

So we all pack into the commander's truck at 1000 and hit the road. As soon as we drove off post, I immediately noticed there was a plethora of sand. I knew it was everywhere on post, but I hadn't realized that it literally stretched as far as the eye could see in every direction. We saw some small cities, and the houses were very different than anything I was used to- they were very squat and square. Not what you would call architectural masterpieces. Anyways, we drove by a couple of towns, but eventually turned off onto a road that just went on into the desert for as long as the eye could see. There was literally nothing but sand in every direction. Every now and then, you would see a nomad in a trailer. I wonder how they sustain themselves. Where do they get food and water in the middle of the desert? Our best guess is that they were camel herders, but no one really knew where these people came from. One notable thing about the desert highway was every couple miles you would see a dead or decomposing camel on the side of the road. I can only assume they were hit by cars at night, as there is no other logical explanation for all the dead camels. At one point we passed a particularly intact camel, and decided to stop and take a picture (in case we didn't get a chance to see any live ones)

 

It was hilarious. Not funny that the camel was dead, but funny that 4 Army soliders were just standing around taking pictures of a dead camel. We need a new hobby. After the camel photo op, we drove another half hour and finally arrived at Ali Asalem to visit our two soliders that are tasked on mission there to work with military dogs. It was really cool to see the kennels, dogs, and trainers. I wish I could have gotten tasked for that mission, but unfortunately as the S1 I am too important to get tasked off base. The highlight of our trip to Ali Asalem was lunch, which was at a restaurant on post that served traditional Kuwaiti food. At first I was a little apprehensive, but our first sergent convinced me it was delicious. He was right. I had the chicken swarma, which is basically a chicken wrap with a ton of delicious spices and stuff in it. SUPER DELICIOUS. After lunch we hit the road again, and luck was on our side. We saw real camels. Live ones.

 

 

As you can see they are really sanitary creatures that love to eat the trash people have dumped on the side of the road. Unfortunately, my commander said I was not allowed to get out to pet and/or ride them. Party pooper. The rest of the ride to Buehring was pretty uneventful, but it still was fun to just look out the window at the desert. It's beautiful in its own way, although I can see how it would get tedious to drive hours through it. I can't imagine how people walked through it before cars. It's so hot and empty and endless. When we finally got to Buehring, we got to listen to the governor speak for about an hour. He was well spoken (for a Republican). He also did a rather lengthy question and answer session for any Virginia residents who wanted to stay and ask things. He touched on everything from VA benefits to the tolls they are imposing on the tunnels right by my house. It was pretty interesting. He also posed for pictures with anyone who wanted them, and let us fill out a paper where he will send a letter of encouragement to your loved one (mom/dad expect a letter from the VA governor in a bit).

 

 

That's my commander and first sergent with the governor. As you can tell, my commander is way to cool to smile for pictures. After the governor visit, we stopped by Green Bean on the way off post to get delicious coffee smoothies for the drive back. Green Bean is slowly growing on me. I still will always love Starbucks, but I love the protein smoothie Green Bean does. The ride home was uneventful. Same scenery, different time. Although, I believe we missed three turns on the way back, so it took almost twice as long. I was neither driving nor navigating, so I take no blame for that. The commander and first sergeant said they had it covered. Yeah right. Luckily, our little detours took us past McDonalds, and I got a picture with the Kuwaiti Ronald. 

 

We really aren't supposed to stop anywhere public in uniform, but I pretended I had to pee so we could get pictures. It was fun. I had a lot of fun the whole day. The trip took longer than it should have because of getting lost and fooling around, but it was so nice to get out of my little tent. And it was good company too. I love my commander and first sergeant. They are good people. As is SGT Felix. Good people always make road trips better. Needless to say, I will be volunteering to go on as many trips outside of post as possible.

The Journey

The journey here was relatively uneventful, except for one small detail: My kindle decided to die on the first long flight. Literally the ONE item that I own that can entertain me endlessly decided to wipe every single book from it's memory. Not only has this never happened before, but I didn't know how to get it all back. After messing around with it for a while, I realized that I would just have to restore it to factory settings and reload all of my books from my laptop. While that was an extremely annoying process, I managed to get everything back within an hour's time span on the first plane ride. However, it did wipe my spot in all the books I was reading, which was a huge hassle. So I just found my place in the one book I was reading and will find my place in the others later. That will teach me to read more than one book at the same time.

So while this whole kindle debacle was going on, the guy next to me (actually he was a seat down because we had the middle seat open, THANK GOD) was nice enough to get my backpack down from the overhead compartment in order for me to get my laptop out. He was looking at me kind of funny though, as if he could not fathom why the demise of a silly little kindle would cause so much panic. He said that he didn't read much. Umm, I can tell. Anyways, so he took it upon himself to start talking to me, while I am frantically trying to fix the kindle. As it turns out, he is a semi-professional MMA fighter who was actually one of the stars of the MTV show Caged (I know. I had never heard of it either, but I looked it up. It's an actual thing, and he was on it). So he told me stories about his adventures with Jena Jamison and some other people when MTV flew him to Vegas for a weekend. It was super interesting. And pretty cool that the Air Force (he was an Air Force SGT) let him do that while still working. I guess any PR is good PR. So this is going to be his last tour, and then he is getting out to fight professionally. Pretty cool stuff. I usually don't like talking to strangers on planes, but he was actually really nice and interesting. The awkward part came when he asked me if I had any hobbies like fighting and I was like, "Um, I like to read...and gestured to my kindle." I felt like a loser. But he was cool about it and said his wife loved to read, but he just didn't have the patience for it. I told him I had also gotten into crossfit recently, and he said I would find plenty of that downrange.

So the entire journey to Kuwait took something upwards of 36 hours. Freaking insane. We left Fort Eustis at 830 am Sunday and arrived in Qatar at 100 am Tuesday (there's a 7 hour time difference in there). It was quite the emotional journey. Me being the smart Lieutenant I am, decided that I would not sleep the night before so I would be tired for the plane (like I did before we flew to India). This works well in theory, but doesn't work when you are so emotionally drained, excited, nervous, etc that your body refused to shut down. In fact, it just makes you a grumpy puss for the whole journey. We didn't leave the Norfolk Naval terminal until 3:45 pm. Then we flew to Maine where we got heroes greetings from the volunteers there. Apparently they greet every single Solider that deploys. It was really neat: there were dogs and free snacks and people taking pictures. However, this was the high point of the journey. It was all downhill from there. After an hour and a half layover in Maine, we flew six and a half hours to Germany (which I slept none of due to above Kindle issues). And not the nice part of Germany either. Some little shit air base that didn't even have a passenger terminal, so they put us in a warehouse with folding chairs and a single person bathroom- for all 300+ people on our flight. And this layover was even longer than the first: 3 hours in that shit hole. Although the weather in Germany was AMAZING. 65 and sunny with no humidity. Nice teaser before we went to hell. And onwards to hell did we go. We flew another 5.5 hours to Qatar. I got to sleep a little on that flight, but only when a movie came on that I wanted to watch. Then my body was like, "No Wizard of Oz for you. Sleep time." Stepping off the plane in Qatar was...uncomfortable to say the least. It was 115 and sunny. Can you say shock? And this time for the layover, we didn't even have a warehouse. Nope. They set up a tent for us on the runway. In the 115 degree heat. That 3 hours was fun. I slept a little more to pass the time. We then finally boarded the plane for the last time, a 55 minute flight to Kuwait. I think it was around 1000 Monday night when we landed in Kuwait. We then sat on buses for 2 hours, as they loaded our baggage and waited for our escort to Arifjan. We finally arrive on base around 1 am Tuesday morning. Fun fact about the bus ride from the airport to Arifjan: we had to draw the curtains of the windows as not to "advertise" the American Soldier presence to the Kuwaitis. A) How many people are on the road after midnight and B) Do you think they don't know what is inside of the large buses of people going from the airport towards the Army base? Silly people. Anyways, we got there, had a few briefings, got our bags and rooming assignments, etc. I was in bed by around 4 am, at which point I decided to get online. Needless to say I have not slept sufficiently in the past few days.

Luckily, we had all of Tuesday to recover. I slept from 6am until 330 pm. It was glorious. Then I went exploring in the heat, only to find my oasis: Starbucks. I promptly got a mocha light frappaccino, and yes it tasted just like home. However, I could not use my Starbucks card there, and I got a strange look from the Kuwaitis working the place. Oh well. The rest of the day was spend exploring the gym, PX, and dining facilities. All are small, but acceptable. There is even a gym dedicated to crossfit. I am excited about that.

Today we spent all morning in boring welcome briefs and orientations. I got to meet the LT I am replacing, and tomorrow we are going to start our 9 day transition before he leaves. Other than that, I took a nap and read a little. Melissa and I decided that we are giving ourselves a few days to acclimate to the heat and catch up on sleep before we start working out. We are going to start going to crossfit everyday at 630 am on Friday. I think 5 days is a good transition, and it is nice to be lazy for a little while we are getting settled in.

Deploying

Emilia reminded me about this blog, and she is right. This is the perfect opportunity for me to keep in touch with everyone and document my first deployment. I can't guarantee there will be many interesting things for me to say, but I will try to write in here every now and then without being too boring. I've heard deployments are usually like Groundhogs Day, but who knows maybe I will have lots of adventures, love affairs, and witty conversations with Generals to report on...or I will sit behind a desk everyday.

Right now I am sitting in the Norfolk Naval station airport. We have three more hours until we take off. Who knows how long the journey will take. I know we have a layover in Bangor, Maine, Ramstein, Germany, and possibly Qatar.  I don't expect to be in Kuwait until sometime later tomorrow. It's a weird feeling not to know when and where you are going to be in a few hours. I don't even know where I will be sleeping for the next couple of days. Saying goodbye to the family was hard. I was surprised that I teared up as much as I did, but I think it was a combination of sleep deprivation, PMS, crazy hormones, and nerves. Also, I have a hard time not crying when my mom is balling hysterically. And to be honest, I am not really sad or nervous. I am more excited for a change of scenery. The last few weeks at work have been too much drama for me, and I need to get away. Granted, I complained for over a year that Fort Eustis was boring. Now I finally have friends, a life, excitement, and I'm leaving. Oh well. I will be back in 9 months. It feels like no time since Chelsea left back in September, so maybe my deployment will go by just as fast. I hope so. I was a nice little breather from Eustis, a chance to collect my thoughts and grow up a little. Then I'd love to come back and spend another year with all my friends. I have really grown to love and appreciate the relationships that I have developed, especially over the past 6 months. Katrina and I got really close before she left, as did Joanna and I (especially after Katrina left). Chelsea is back, and while we didn't talk much during her deployment (because everyone knows I suck at communicating) we are closer than ever now. Plus I love the guy friends I have here now Ben, Ryan, JP- they are all awesome, and I want the opportunity to spend more time with them. And even as stressful as being an S1 was, I loved being in 53rd and working with many of the commanders and staff there. I hope I will get the opportunity to with them when I return. I guess I will have to wait and see. I am excited to meet new people in Kuwait. Maybe I can even find myself a hot, available LT or CPT to befriend...

 Anyways, I am exhausted. I am going to use my last hour or two to call some people before my cell phone is rendered useless. See you all on the other side of the world...