Hello everyone. I have been contemplating doing this blog, one specific to my journey here in Afghanistan. I have been here for over 70 days and just got a new computer, so I think it is time to dialog what is going on. I will add pictures soon and beef it up. Feel free to share the link with who you want to. I could only have 10 emails to automatically update to.
I arrived here on 4 December 2010. I left my family behind and it devastated me. I left them on 30 ovember. It took me a long time with a lot of long hours of flying to get here-most of which a lot of you know about, so I am not going to revisit it all. Today is 17 Feb 2011.
I can share with you more of how my arrival here went and what it is like now. I was lucky enough to have some good people here who were looking out for my well being. One of them not being the Major. He wanted to have me sleep on a cot in the office until the guy I replaced, Maack left. Keep in mind, the office is an office, with windows, no blinds. Various heaters, no security, no privacy and for me to stay there until Maack left? Maack moved to the transient tents and let me have his room. It was the very decent thing to do.
I had emailed a lot back and forth with Maack about what the job was etc, a couple million questions really-which I am so thankful he answered. I also was told, it would be best for you to send your boxes here so you don't have to mess with them in all the traveling it took to get here. Being the person I am, I didn't want to have to want or need for anything here-so I packed up 7 action packer boxes with my belongings to get me through the year. I have all my hygiene needs-soaps etc. Medicine for just about anything. Two sets of sheets, comforters, blankets, memory foam, pillows-you name it, I packed everything. Plus of course all my clothes I would need-uniforms, PT uniforms, cold weather, wet weather, warm weather. Everything. I also packed stuff to keep in touch with everyone. Stationary, cards, thank you cards. I have cards for the kids, cards for Kevin. Special Holiday cards-birthdays, Anniversary etc. I tried to remember it all. I also have stickers, tattoos, word search books-all that kind of stuff for the kids. I have a crafty kit of markers, construction paper, stick on characters, flowers and other assortment of things to make them pictures. I included ways to help count down the days, weeks, months. I have a box of pictures called Mandalas that are all circular based. I color one each Thursday to count down the weeks. I will be coloring #12 tomorrow. They are all dated and I have a memory attached to each one. Some were more intricate to color and cut out-depending on how tough the week was. The snowflake for 24 December took 2 hours to cut out for example. I also have a date calendar, that each day you cut out a design-like cutting out snowflakes. It is called Kirigami. I look forward to doing them every night. They are starting to get really hard now and they take a good 20 or 30 minutes to do, depending on how hard the cuts are. I have the Mandalas taped up on my window and the Kirigami's on my ceiling. Each month it changes to a new color, so my ceiling will be a rainbow of colors. So much better then the grey walls that surround me. The kids color me pictures or write random things and send them to me-those are covering the walls too. I have one area of the wall that is covered with my life. It is my life in pictures. I have over a hundred pictures taped up, it is great and when I am having a horrible day, I just sit there and look at them, mostly cry when I do, but, I look at them and tell myself I will soon be back to it all again. They are taped right beside my bed and I say goodnight to it all each night and recall a memory to put me to sleep at night.
On another wall I have cards that I have gotten from friends and family. I have two post cards too. One for the Tucson Marathon for 2011 and one for the Ostrich Farm-both are from Kevin. I also have the rave runs out of Runners World taped up. They are great places to run that Runners World has in their magazines every issue. I look at them and pretend I am running there. I can't run here. One lap around the FOB is about 600 meters. I may get desperate.
On another wall I have my Arizona calendar that I mark down the days with. It is such a huge gratification to flip the calendar to a new month. I couldn't wait to just start marking days in January, to start the calendar at all. I have my El Tour De Tucson race number to remind me I will ride again and remind me what I overcame in that ride-this will be nothing compared to that. It was also my last event I did. I have little sticky notes from Kevin on the wall too. A lot of them have just notes about the things he sent me, some say other stuff, like "you are the apple of my eye" on the apple shaped sticky notes. They are colorful and they make me smile.
My room is a RLB, a relocatable building. It is a metal can. It about 20 feet long by about 10 feet wide. I haven't officially measured it, it is approximate. I did write a letter to Kevin and did a diagram of it. I stepped it out with my feet, so this is my approximate measurement. I have the room to myself, which is great about being on a FOB (Forward Operating Base)-it is way smaller then a normal base and has 90% less then a regular base too. Kind of like a small town compared to the city. I like small towns, so it works fine for me. My door locks and I do have a window. It has a metal prison blind as I call it, which I only just figured out yesterday how to raise it up-to let in full sunlight. It blocks out all sunlight though and it can be pretty dark in here. I get tired though of the overhead light from the fluorescent bulbs. I have a couple lamps that I turn on for a change time to time. I of course brought the lamps with me-prepared for anything, and light bulbs too.
The building my room is in, we call it the embassy-although some people don't like it to be called that, well it is the embassy. It is the nicest and biggest living accommodations on the FOB. We have 8 RLBs on the bottom with 8 stacked on top of them. We have stairs that Maack and his guys built to go upstairs, then they built another landing above the RLBs that serves as a lookout and helps with the rain water to flow off of the cans. It is pretty cool.
Everyone who lives in the embassy-with the exception of upstairs, we all work together. Upstairs there are some higher ranking people who just live there for whatever reason. They guy above me has been gone on R&R leave (Rest and Recovery) so I haven't had to hear him for awhile-it has been nice. Sounds like he throws all his belongings on the floor and he is maybe 400 lbs the way he stomps around. I have no idea who the guy is, chances are he outranks me, so I am not going to say anything to him. We are losing some of our neighbors though. Three Army guys are leaving and their replacements aren't living here. Not a fan of strangers moving in. Q, he is Air Force-he is leaving, his replacement is here though and he is moving in his room. The Major wanted to move in there-thank god that didn't happen. He can stay upstairs and annoy the people up there.
The bathrooms. There is the good shower and the bad shower. The good shower is a single stall in a room that the door locks and the heater works so you don't get pneumonia when you step out. The bad one is rusty, the heat isn't strong enough to reach to the shower part, there are 3 stalls-but only enough hot water for 1 and a half shower. Since I have been here, I have had more then 20 cold showers, countless lukewarm and very few hot showers. Now, they are doing construction to replace the old showers, so now us ladies have to share the single stall shower. That is like 10 women sharing one shower. Haven't had a hot shower in a week. I would rather skip taking a shower then shower cold again. I am hoping tomorrow the bad showers are done.
The food. When I first got here, the food was awesome. Then Jackie the dining facility (DFAC) manager left and it went downhill-fast. There were several times I walked in there-looked at what they had and walked out and skipped eating. It was getting pretty bad. I stopped going to the gym because I wasn't eating enough to sustain working out and would probably pass out and get hurt. I asked if Kevin would start sending me soup and those Healthy Choice pasta or rice things where you add the water and microwave them. Those have saved my life. I can go to the gym again because at least I have something in my stomach. He also sent me tortillas and bagel thins. Breakfast used to be the best meal I ate, but, it has gone to crap too. They used to have fresh fruit, cantaloupe, honeydew etc. But, now they have canned fruit-which defeats the purpose of eating fruit for your health when it is drenched in syrup. I was eating a hard boiled egg too, but, then those were getting overcooked and tasted weird. Which then left a bagel-I like the blueberry ones-but, now they are either not there or the ones they do have are stale. Then it is left to cereal. Which I wouldn't mind too much, but, the milk is this weird long life milk. Long life and milk don't go together. Milk shouldn't have a year long shelf life. It tastes so weird, but, what other choice do I have? I will have high cholesterol if I have cooked eggs and bacon everyday. For lunch, I usually eat soup, salad and a sandwich. Even canned cream of mushroom soup that they serve in a giant pot. I usually eat salad, but, now they are down to two choices of dressing-ceasar-gross or blue cheese-grosser!! Nothing is sacred. I sometimes will eat off of the main line if they have mexican fair-then I can make a taco salad. The mozzarella sticks are good too. For dinner, they seem to like to serve fish a lot and some other type of mystery meat-there is always mystery meat. Spaghetti it hit or miss-noodles have been dreadful lately. I eat a lot of vegetables. I have lost weight simply from not eating well at all. Now I have meals from Kevin so it is better. I eat a lot of toasted bagels with turkey and cheese on them. The DFAC is our only dining choice. Nothing, zero, zilch else. We can go to KAF, which used to be easy to go to. KAF is Khandahar Air Field, it is only about 5 minute drive to the gate, but, it takes an hour or more to get on the base. KAF has everything, it is the big city living. It is a million people over there-too many. I don't go there unless I have to. It is such a pain in the but and for what-a better meal or a good cup of coffee? Maybe once a week. I went one day last week and it was the first time in 3 weeks.
Dynamics of living on a FOB. First this ratio, there are now about 600 people here. Of those 600, maybe 50 are female. That is a huge MAYBE. So, anywhere I go I am a giant slab of meat walking. I am not a model, I am not drop dead gorgeous, I am not 21, I don't have a rock star body. I am a female and they stare. I can look like garbage (remember the rather not shower in the cold water comment) and I still get stared at. I go to the gym and I might as well be naked. The staring is unreal. I just want to pick my nose or something to make them stop, but, they may stare more or not even care and still stare. It is sooooo annoying. The FOB is also like being in high school again. There are cliques, there are groups established of who hangs out with who, who sits with who, who works out with who. I wasn't popular in high school and I am not here. I don't eat in the chow hall unless I am with my co-workers. The people checking names at the door at the chow hall know I don't stay and give me a to go box. I haven't made that good friend here that you go hang out with and eat with. I am solo. I go to the chow hall alone, eat alone. I go to the gym alone and sweat alone. Why, because everyone has their little friend circles made. I am the first female mentor in my job, no other females. We just got a new girl, but, she is in medical supply and has her medical friends already. So, I spend my time alone. We do have an Army girl that works with us, but, how do I put this. I think she has a crush on me. A bit weird and she lives next to me.
There are days where the being alone gets me down, then I think I am going to be okay. I mean I am okay in my own company. I also know I may not have someone physically here to eat my dinner with and whatnot, but, I am not alone. I have Kevin, my family and friends with me in my mind and my heart always. Kevin is my strength that is getting me through this.
About my job. My job is to mentor the Afghan National Army (ANA) on how to do their job. I am a mentor for Munitions and for Weapons. I mentor Captain Satar and his crew (11 soldiers) on the operations. Not sure how much longer this position will be filled, Satar and his crew get it. I am here as a worker and help to get things done, either by showing them, suggesting it to them, making it their project and decisions. I am learning a lot about foreign weapons and ammo. I don't really work with weapons at all, so it is a totally new experience. I especially don't work with foreign ammo, so that is new too. The biggest thing I plan to accomplish is safety and a better awareness of it. To get them to stop smoking and using cell phones around ammo. To handle the weapons safely with muzzle down. To get them properly trained on the weapons they are using when pulling security. To have 100% accountability of their assets and store it correctly and safely. All of this is very tricky with the language barrier and the female barrier. We have interpreters we use and for the most part they are very good. The one I interact the most with is Niazy, but, he may end up leaving with the Army guys-which will suck. My other choices suck. Norri-his English is horrible, I need someone to translate what he says. Popal is a pervert and gives me the creeps-feel like I need to scrub my body with bleach after just being around him, then there is Rockman, he is okay, but, lazy and unreliable. So, if I lose Niazy I am going to use Rockman. Norri is in love with the Major and stuck to his hip like super glue, he is supposed to be with me, but, has glued himself to the Major-fine with me. One of the hardest parts about my job is that I was born a female. The ANA stare worse then the people on the FOB. They are unsure of me. But, want to shake my hand all the time. Want to take pictures with me. They talk about me, I have been here long enough to pick up on things. They remark on how tall I am, what big feet I have. They are not used to seeing women in uniform, so I know it is a new thing to them. They regular ANA I am around are better about the staring etc and will joke around with me. When new ANA show up, they are the worst. I might as well be standing there naked again. It is very uncomfortable. But, I smile, shake their hands and take pictures. I have my weapon on me always, a knife and my gerber on me all the time. I also have a whistle on my keys, a cell phone too. I am never in a situation without my regular ANA with me if stranger ANA is there. If I am going to be caught up in stranger ANA around me, I leave, if I have no choice, my weapon is loaded and my hand is resting on my knife in my pocket. I pray I never have to use anything, but, if I do, I am prepared. My regular ANA guys are protective of me though. They will come and stand next to me if there are new people around. Satar carries a 9M also and it is loaded. His guys know that and he told his guys that if they tried anything with me he would shoot them dead. So, they don't mess with me and they joke with me. I have nicknames for most of them because I can't say their names. Big Show-he has huge hands and feet, 50-50-he is all about having help to lift things, Teryaki-close to his real name, The Joker-has a smile like the joker, Necklace-named earlier for the necklace he always wore, Mr Silent-never says a word, and various other names. They are good workers. Satar is a good person. He wishes me well health always and wishes I have a son one day and marry Kevin and have a long life of health and happiness along with my whole family. He has 2 wives for sure, I think a 3rd. His family, just like family is to everyone in the Afghan culture is very important to him. I give him candy and gum and he gives it to his children. Family in Afghan isn't like American families. It is everyone, Grandparents, Great Grandparents down to the nieces and nephews will all live in the same home even. When you ask how is your family, they could tell you their Aunt is unwell. If you ask an American how their family is, they will think just husband, wife children family and not really about that Aunt with a cold. If I need to hit home a point about safety I tell them what will their family do without them making the money they are making if they get hurt or get killed for not being safe. It tends to hit home the point and they rethink their actions.
I have experienced a lot of things here that I wouldn't have expected or ever thought would happen. I will cover those in my next posting tomorrow.
No comments:
Post a Comment