Uncle Cobs joins the Narmy

Day 5: Jacoby Update #11

June 12, 2009 BOG Days # 3-5 Sandstorms, ungodly high temps, trudging to the showers a walk from your bed outside down a dusty road, toilets stinky and a walk across that same road, sand in your tent and your clothes and your food and your bed and in your eyes, a bed actually and army cot, a tent full of snoring men, living out of a sea bag for a bureau that sits on the sandy floor… all things that can be sorted out when surrounded by good [new] friends, an air-conditioned Starbucks and the knowledge that HEY, SUCK IT UP BABY, THIS IS A WAR ZONE. But damn-it, when I walk into a Starbucks I expect a Chai Latte. Is that too much to ask for? The Vivano’s are pretty good, though, and the chow is outstanding and the warm night breeze is actually pleasant. But the best part is the atmosphere; we’re here to fight and we’re here to win – to finish the job handed to us that started almost 20 years ago. After a month of training and preparing, I’m pretty ready to get started. My “clock started ticking” on Monday when we touched down in Kuwait. Everyone is given a magic number that corresponds to the number of days you are here, called BOG (Boots on the Ground). Mine is 350, which is common. Other common numbers are 270 and 180, and I’ve heard as many as 420. I think that was crap, though, since we recently learned that no one can be forced to stay in theater beyond 365 days without written approval from the deployed person and the guy who said he had those orders was relieved after 350 days. There seems to be a history of people getting relieved early, 30-40 days early seems common, so maybe I’ll be so lucky. If not, I’ll be able to leave my job by May 20, then about four days in the Returning Warrior Program here in theater, a couple days travel back to the States, a couple days in Norfolk and a day to get back, and I should be back home the end of May, 2010. Maybe earlier. Tick-tock, tick-tock. Udari Range was our home from Wed morn to this afternoon (Fri). They call it “the Camp Virginia Appreciation Program.” Now I know why. No beds, no cots, now showers, no running water, no prepared meals, no desks, no coffee, no separate quarters for male and female, no chow hall, no real teachers to teach (although we did have class) and worst of all, no Starbucks. You take class in plastic chairs that you stack up at night and push to the side and sleep on the floor, all 40 members of your new unit, men and women, snoring machines and whiners, all in one room with lights out at 8pm, back on at 4am. I think I got a total of 4 hours sleep all together for both nights there. All meals were MRE’s taken sitting on the sand under whatever shade could be found, mixed with sand blown around and into your food, your mouth, your eyes and your nose. Most of us cheated during a sand storm and ate inside and I had snuck in a supply of power bars and Wheat Thins. Class was instructed by a “non-educator,” if you catch my drift, and if you nod off, you walk to the back of the class and stand. It wasn’t long before most of the class was standing. Thursday was a full day of a morning shoot and afternoon rehearsal, interrupted by some more class time and MRE consumption. Toilets were por-a-pots around a sand berm. Water was cool when you got it, but warmed up fast. MRE’s were always warm, which was usually a good thing. I liked the Veg. manicotti, the Cheese Tortellini and the Chicken Fajita best. When I started saying “this is GOOD!” I knew my standards had officially bottomed out and they’d finally broke me of all proper sense of judgment. I’ve become indoctrinated into the Army, finally ready to be a warrior. Hua! If I seem like I’m complaining a lot, I don’t mean to. I do like what I’m doing. Don’t get me wrong, it’s hard for me, but not a BAD hard. I like hard work – it makes me more satisfied with life. And this is hard, so I’m pretty satisfied. But I feel like a better, more well- rounded person for doing it, and I feel a camaraderie with every other person that we see here. It seems that no one gets to enter the region as a fighter without this training; it’s like the pledging of a fraternity. Our final “heavy” training is Sunday, more training on emergency egress from a flipped vehicle. Udari shooting was the best yet. We got to shoot several types of scenarios: on the run, while waking toward and walking in front of a target in line – pretty dangerous for a novice, so I felt pretty special that they trusted us to not shoot each other. Udari Convoy Training was very cool – mock villages and mock insurgents with some real reinactors mixed in. Some threw rocks, some set off IED’s, most were just placed their to draw our attention from the road. And along we trudged, sometimes off roading and sometimes facing the challenge head on. Yesterday we practiced “slick” (no armor), then this morning was “heavy” with blanks in our gunner’s rifle. We learned a lot and while it’s likely we’ll seldom, if ever even be IN a convoy, if we are, we know what to look for and do. It was verified that the temp. did rise to 130 yesterday. Imagine a hair drying blowing in your face feeling cooler than the air around it. Or think of that flow of hot air that hits you in the face when you open a hot oven. It’s like that when there’s a breeze, and when there’s not, it feels like the air over a toaster. No trees can survive in this environment, at least I’m yet to see one. Not one. Not a bush, not a blade of grass. The only green is the limpy broccoli in the chow hall. Yesterday it was 120 by 8am and dropped only to around 90’s last night – not all that cool. As they say, Hell is 20 degrees cooler than Udari. Nothing lives around here. No vegitation, no animals… we see occasional birds and some flying bugs but I have no idea what they survive on. One of our guys said he saw a dung bettle scurry by at Udari, but no green, and the sky is never blue. Instead, it’s a grayish tan that seems to be the result of the blowing tan sand. This is an oppressive ecosystem that is just unforgiving. I’m glad we have it so good on our base in Kuwait, and also where I’m going.