Kandahar 6

Joe has been excited about getting me on one of the aerovac flights here in country. Aerovac is basically medical transportation for wounded kids or others with medical issues that need more workup than we have the capabilities to perform here at KAF; we also call them "bandage flights." So the other night, he sends one of the techs from the clinic to find me at around 9pm. I was a little worried that something was really wrong, but Joe tells me that they have a bandage flight the next morning and one of the patients needs a medical escort, which I can do even though I'm not a flight doctor (though I'm probably still overqualified - they usually they send a nurse). The guy's condition wasn't real serious or anything, and more than anything, it was an excuse to get me on a flight. So I said OK and left to get things ready for the next morning.

Show time is 2 hours before the flight is supposed to leave, even though I just ended up sitting around with one of the other flight docs talking for an hour and 50 minutes. The guy I was escorting was a 40-something year old Army troop who was complaining of chest pain. He maybe had some minor abnormalities on an echocardiogram, and the cardiologist at our hospital didn't have some of the equipment to do more sophisticated testing, but which they do have up at Bagram, which is where we would be going.

Another 2-3 guys with relatively minor injuries were also loaded up into the C130. They've outfitted them so that stretchers with patients can be stacked up inside. The C130s have been around forever, and have been the work horse cargo airframe for the Air Force for relatively short distance transport. They're propeller driven and the trip is noisy and often bumpy.

C130 Hercules

We first headed over to another nearby FOB (forward operating base) and there picked up another couple of patients, one of them attended to by the CCAT team: critical care air transport. Those patients are usually very seriously injured and they're intubated and on a ventilator. We took off again from there and then flew up to Bagram, which is located up farther north and is nestled in on three sides by mountains. I'd heard about that and was actually hoping to have a clear view, but it rained all morning, the first rain I've seen in two months, which was actually a welcome change.

The nurse on the flight told me that I should hop off in Bagram and stick around with the patient. The C130 would be going back to another FOB, then return back to Bagram before we'd fly back to KAF and hopefully be back around 230-300pm, about the time I start work at the clinic. The lesson as always: don't listen to nurses. If the cardiologist decided the guy needed still more workup, he'd be sent on to Landstuhl, Germany, in which case I wouldn't be going with him; on the other hand, if he was cleared to return to duty, he wouldn't need me to fly back with him because he would have been declared healthy.

I did get to eat lunch there, and they have real Baskin Robbins ice cream there. I had two bowls of caramel and pralines for lunch, and it was delicious. I know I have an ice cream eating problem (actually, I have no problem eating it, I have difficultly stopping myself from finishing the carton in one sitting), but I haven’t had any since I first arrived here at KAF. We have soft serve here at KAF, but it's horrible - the flavors are off. And the irony isn't completely lost on me that I'm complaining about having ice cream in the middle of a third-world wasteland in the middle of a war zone.

As it turns out, the weather caused some trouble for the airframe on which I originally flew, so they had to divert back to KAF, stranding me in Bagram. Luckily, with Joe's help and some persistence, I was able to arrange a way back; the passenger terminal initially told me that there wouldn't be another flight until the next evening. The lesson as always: don't listen to those people ... or nurses. I talked to another senior enlisted lady, who was really helpful. I explained that I'm one of the two doctors that takes care of all the Air Force peole down at KAF. Fortunately, an Air National Guard C27, sort of a "shortbus" version of the C130, out of Mansfield, Ohio, landed in the early afternoon and allowed me and a couple of other guys trying to get back to Kandahar to travel back with them.

We first had to fly to another FOB and pick up some Army general. We were supposed to be there for 20 minutes or so, but it ended up being almost an hour. That's how it goes with those guys. When he asks, "Hey boys! Am I late?" the answer is, "No Sir! We arrived extra early." Anyway, this FOB was in the middle of nowhere and was the one I mentioned before that is currently under construction, by all appearances fairly recently begun. We're talking still-open trenches and recently poured concrete block to support fence poles. As I've said before, for a conflict that's supposed to winding down (MISSION ACCOMPLISHED) it seems curious that there are currently brand new bases going up.

It ended up being a really long day. Woke up around 4am and didn't get back until almost 9pm. I'm glad I went and experienced it, and I'm glad that it made Joe happy to make that happen for me. The reality is that it wasn't really all that great, and not just because I was stranded. I mean, it's not really all that much better than flying on any other sort of transport or commercial aircraft except that maybe you have a little more leg room. But, there was no one bringing me little snacks or drinks. I guess I'd go again, but it's not something that I'm just dying to try once or twice a week like some of the other flight docs here. While I was talking to Joe on the phone, trying to figure a way back, I actually heard myself say, "You know, I just want to get back to Kandahar." Hearing myself say that, and maybe even meaning it, was by far the most distressing part of the day.

Kandahar 5

Things are supposedly beginning to wind down here. The Canadians are already starting to pack up some of their equipment, and indeed, when I spoke with some of my combat engineer spin-class friends, they told me that they don't go outside the wire anymore because their job now is primarily clean up. They have just under 90 days in country. Most of the Romanians very recently left. They stayed in sleeping barracks along the way to the dining facility that I usually go to, and they were always hanging around outside, smoking cigarettes and drinking orange Fanta, in their shorts and/or shirtless (they must not have gotten the NO SUNBATHING ALLOWED! memo), giving each other back rubs, seemingly having a relatively swell time of things, all things considered. And then, POOF!, they're gone. I think that the reality is that we're not really going to wind down as much as it might seem - the US at least - and our military will remain here in not insignificant numbers for many years. For one, I still hear about bed shortages for new incoming troops; also, there's still a lot of construction going on around here on KAF. I was recently on a new base that was in the midst of construction. We're talking newly dug fence lines with newly poured concrete and newly set fence poles in them - they haven't even gotten around to stringing up the Concertina wire along the top.

Very recently the Stars and Stripes, one of the military newspapers, has been reporting that both the Iraq and Afghanistan governments have been "requesting" that US forces remain in their countries in greater numbers and beyond the timelines officially stated. If we do leave en masse, without significant financial and other support, I think this place is going to fall apart again into various factions and under the influences of other players, some not so friendly, e.g. Pakistan and Iran. It burns me that we have made a Faustian bargain where we give Pakistan billions of dollars a year in order for us to continue this war (transporting materials overland and some intelligence assistance). Meanwhile, the ISI, Pakistan's equivalent of the CIA, is channeling that money to the Taliban and al-Qaeda, not to mention they harbored bin Laden for years despite being our "friends."

Post WWII, the US spent the modern day equivalent of hundreds of billions of dollars to help Europe rebuild. As much as I enjoy living in Germany, we really shouldn't be there anymore - certainly not nearly in the numbers we are - almost 60 years after WWII and nearly 20 years after the end of the Cold War. And yet at Ramstein they opened a monstrosity of a mall - a gaudy abomination, really - just a year or two ago. Certainly Geilenkirchen, where I am, and all the tiny little bases and outposts should be done away with.

The fact is that the US isn't leaving Germany anytime soon, however, and we've been at peace with die Germans and generally like them. Although I did just read an article that the US will be decreasing the official number of troops by 5,000, down to 37,000, from a high of over 200,000 in the early 1990s. The 37,000 number is deceiving, though, as it doesn't count all the civilians living there and being paid by the US government (also very generous compared to what they'd make in the States - your tax dollars at work) in various support and other roles, including medical and education (i.e. teachers), not to mention those affiliated with weapons systems and the like.

In fact, people of German ancestry make up the largest single ethnic group in the US, and, during World War I, German Americans predominantly took a neutral position to US involvement in the conflict. During WWII, US soldiers actually liked the German people with whom they came in contact (at least when they weren't shooting at "our boys") moreso than even the English, and certainly more than those prickly French. Stephen Ambrose, in Band of Brothers, noted that of all the peoples the American G.I.s encountered in Europe during World War II, they identified most with the Germans, whom the American soldiers regarded as "clean, hard-working, disciplined, educated, middle-class in their tastes and life-styles ... just like us."

The point is die Germans happen to be a hell of a lot more like "white Christian" America than "white Christian" America is similar to Afghans. I don't see even a tiny fraction of the money and effort the US gave to rebuilding Europe going into helping Afghanistan rebuild. Also, there's just not as much incentive for us to be here. Yeh, sure, they grew some terrorists here while the Taliban had control, but overall, the country is horribly underdeveloped, and although there are some mineral resources that could apparently be exploited, there's absolutely no significant infrastructure to collect and transport it, not to mention the persistent security issues.

This seems particularly unlikely what with the financial concerns our country has gotten itself into, in no small part because a decade ago our country's leaders thought it would be a good idea to start the two longest running overseas wars in US history. Also, they decided that it's better to spend trillions of dollars blowing the place up - contractor profits at least grow that way, as do the subsequent campaign donations - rather than helping a failed state rebuild so that ordinary people can try and live ordinary lives. It really hurt that the Bush administration neglected Afghanistan in favor of starting another war in Iraq, which was unsubstantiated, Dick Cheney's recently published autobiography be damned. The Congressional bipartisan September 11 commission found "no credible evidence that Iraq and al-Qaida cooperated on attacks against the United States." The rest of the international community was of the same mind, and the US squandered much of the good will we'd received after the events that occurred in 2001. After the initial, and relatively modest, effort here, the Taliban had basically been run off, and the US forces had the general gratitude and good will of the Afghan people. Helping Afghanistan rebuild at that time would have most likely come out to a tiny fraction of the cost in blood and treasure of the conflict that's been ongoing since, and many experts think that the rebuilding would have had a very good chance of being successful, assuming the support and attention from the international community had remained focused.

I just finished reading an interesting book about the cultural and political history of Afghanistan, and particularly liked one short anecdote the author told. He was living and studying in Afghanistan during the 1970s. People in the rural areas of Afghanistan had recently gotten access to radios and heard reports about the Vietnam war. He then relates, "When I was informed about the end of the Vietnam War by some nomads who had heard about it on the radio, they insisted that Vietnam bordered the United States. When I objected that the immense Pacific Ocean separated the two by many thousands of kilometers, they said I must be wrong because you could not fight a war with a country unless you were next to it. They were wrong on the facts but perhaps right on the principle." While I understand that things are more complicated than that, it seems like that would be a very good place to start with our foreign policy, particularly as it pertains to waging wars. (You hear that Canada? Eh? You guys are next!!)

One of the main concepts that ran through the book was the idea that Afghanistan has been a difficult country to rule, for their own rulers and for foreign powers who have tried. The moniker "graveyard of empires" has been used to describe this characteristic, though it's not entirely accurate. The author of the book I read says, “Afghanistan uses the hyperbole of history (unconquerable and a graveyard of empires) to exaggerate its strengths in order to deter invaders. It has relied on its indigestibility to get them to leave. But like the puffer fish, this is a tactic employed by the weak and vulnerable, not the strong and secure. It comes with a high price tag too, since when deterrence failed, the ensuing conflicts, particularly over the past thirty years, devastated both the country and its people.”

One reason it's been difficult is that the Afghan people have been pretty independent-minded, particularly in the rural areas. Afghan tribal customs are fairly egalitarian in the sense that anyone could envision his own rise to leadership. The traditional saying goes something like, "Me against my brothers; my brothers and me against our cousins; my brothers, cousins, and me against the world.” Sort of how it's OK for me to beat up my little brothers, but no one else is allowed (and you know I can still take all of you, so don’t even think about trying anything). So they don’t really like being controlled by others all that much, not least of all each other.

If a foreign, particularly non-Islamic, state tried to control Afghanistan, different groups might all come together to run them off, but tended to immediately resume old rivalries once the common enemy was run off. Whereas to outsiders they might seem very patriotic to the idea of an Afghanistan nation, they are actually hindered by various internal divisions. Historically, as long as the central government in Kabul met basic expectations (e.g. basic security), didn't demand excessive tribute, and then left them alone, the population living outside of the capitol cared little what the ruling elite chose to do.

For a lot of its history, this country has been valued primarily for trade routes (the "Silk Road" network) linking the Far East, primarily India and China, to the Persia/Iranian empire, the Ottoman/Turkish empire, and eventually to Europe. Particularly during the colonial era it was seen as a buffer state between British-controlled India and the Russians, the so-called Great Game (or Tournament of Shadows as the Russians called it) for control of Central Asia, all those "Stans" down there. In fact, this has been the real difficulty in subduing the country - fighting off the other empires and countries that have wanted to control this area, rather than the rebellions by the inhabitants or the legendary fierceness of the Afghan fighter. I guess the other reason is the "because it's there and because I'm a megalomaniac" factor of emperors and conquerors.

I mentioned some of my concerns previously with contractors being so significantly involved in the business of war, and it is a business. And in our country, where CEOs and boards are more or less legally obligated to only maximize profits without concern for the greater public good, I find that more than a little disturbing. It's not enough just to make money, however. We hear all the time on the news how relatively successful Company X has made millions, even billions, of dollars in profits, but because the company didn't make as much as they projected, or as much as shareholders think they should have made, Company X gets taken over, or the CEO gets replaced (but not before getting a lucrative severance package) by some other psychopath who will fire as many people (who don't get lucrative severance packages) as it takes to make the books look better. A business that's organized around providing services for military endeavors is still a business, and they want to, at the very least, maintain profits, if not grow them. So it begs the question ... who's next? Iran? Somewhere in Africa? We still will have people here in Afghanistan, so at least there's that, but "growth" is the operative word in all of this. (You hear that Canada? Eh? You guys are next!! I'm serious!)

Kandahar 4

Brett asked that write shorter updates. I'll see what I can do. This won't be one of them. I've been writing down thoughts here and there for the past few weeks, and sometimes they accumulate. I apologize if some of this is not interesting, but these updates are as much for me than they are for you. Maybe more. If you'd prefer I not clog your email Inbox anymore, let me know and I'll stop.

I wrote in my last little update that my curiosity was "peaked" rather than "piqued". I apologize for any confusion caused by my mistaken homophones.

It has yet to rain, and I don't think it's done so for months prior to my arrival. There's dirt and dust everywhere. Fortunately, we haven't had any of the sandstorms that you sometimes hear about, especially in Iraq, but all the vehicles are covered, inside and out, with a fine layer of dirt. The sides of the roads are powdery little berms of the stuff that get easily stirred up by the passing 4x4s, Humvees, armored vehicles, and lorries; often the sky is hazy with it. It's relatively better in the early morning and later in the evening before and after the main traffic of the day occurs, but I still refuse to run outside, as much as it pains me to run indoors. Some Airman (low-ranking enlisted) contacted the clinic a few weeks ago saying that he wanted to organize a marathon on base for one charity or another. There are lots of such events to raise money for cancer research, wounded warriors, POW-MIA, down on their luck strippers with hearts of gold, etc., etc. The Canadians seem to sponsor a lot of them, but the Aussies are organizing one here in the next few weeks, and the US has its fair share.

Most of them, however, are 5k or 10k in distance, which is manageable. Rarely there has been a marathon/half, which is what this kid proposed. He contacted us because they need medical support for the event. He didn't have very many details, however, about the exact route with mile-markers, where they've set up aid stations in the past and how many they'll need, etc. Not very well planned. I mean, if you're going to ask us to support your run so that you can put a little bullet point on your deployment commendation letter, you really ought to have the details worked out as much as possible beforehand. Fortunately, Joe was able to talk to the kid's supervisor and have them lower it all the way down to a 5k/10k run. Usually, these things have to start early in the morning - between 0530 and 0600 - so they can finish up before most of the traffic starts, avoid some of the extra dirt and dust, and, of course, the heat as the morning progresses.

A marathon would have meant a start time of probably 0500 and required that we stick around until 1000 or 1100, which just can't happen when we have morning clinics to see and when there are still airframes to be serviced and missions to be performed. KAF is supposedly the busiest airfield in the world with something like one airframe taking off or landing here every 30 seconds. It's quite an orchestrated operation: fighters roaring and drones buzzing off, helicopters hovering down, kicking up all kids of dirt and debris in their downwash, and ambulance Humvees going out to meet them to pick up casualties, fuel trucks ceding the right of way to cargo and passenger planes taxiing to the take-off location. A couple of us sat out by the flightline last weekend one evening, just watching the traffic, and while that number may be a bit apocryphal, it can't be too far off the mark.

Since I'm talking about the how dirty this place is, apparently the Kandahar poo-pond is world famous. A quick Google search will bring up loads of mentions from personal blogs and respectable news organization websites alike. I know Jon Stewart mentioned it on the Daily Show after his visit here. Thankfully, our compound is more or less on the other side of the base from it, but some of the main living areas are located fairly close, and if the wind comes in from the west, it blows the odor right over these sleeping modules. One of the dining facilities is over that way, and it doesn't exactly whet one's appetite to walk through that on one's way to eat. There used to be all kinds of signs up nearby, and I wish I'd have gone over and taken pictures of them because some of them were clever and funny. I mentioned my favorite one before, "Don't eat the brown trout." There was another one offering Scuba lessons and "No Lifeguard On Duty: Swim at Own Risk." Apparently, however, some general didn't approve (probably an uptight Army guy) and had all the signs taken down. I think that's ridiculous. This place not only has a literal shit-hole within a few hundred yards of living quarters, but it's a shit-hole in a metaphorical sense. Those signs were a harmless way of injecting some harmless humor into what really is an absurdity of living a few hundred yards from a pond filled with human and other industrial waste.

With so much heat and dust, it's important to get enough water to drink. There is a treatment facility on base which provides water clean enough with which to shower and brush your teeth, and it's also suitable for cooking, but we're not supposed to drink it in any large quantity. Instead, huge palates of bottled water are shipped in and then placed around the base. I've been very anti-bottled water for years now. First of all, I think it's a huge scam. At best, it's already safe-to-drink tap water that's been run through a big industrial filter, if even that. Plus, the amount of oil that is wasted in distributing this product is absurd. Not only are you using oil products to make the plastic in which the water is held, but you're also using huge amounts of fuel to ship it. Unfortunately, we don't have that choice here. The recommendation is to drink at least 5-10 bottles a day. If there are 30,000 people on base drinking the minimum of 5 bottles, that's well over 150,000 bottles per day. It's just disappointing. Most of the bottles aren't recycled, either, but rather burned with the rest of the trash. Word is that another treatment plant has been under construction and should be up and working soon, but I don't think they have the waterlines built yet to distribute it, which they're supposedly planning on doing, i.e. more construction in a warzone from which we're supposed to be drawing down.

http://storyofstuff.org/bottledwater/

http://www.onlineeducation.net/bottled_water

http://www.ewg.org/reports/BottledWater/Bottled-Water-Quality-Investigation

One day I returned from the Canadian gym to discover that the water in our compound wasn't functioning: showers, taps, toilets. There was some issue with some of the water lines out somewhere. I admit, I sweat. A lot. I'd like to think it's because I exert myself more than everyone else, my body is more efficient at cooling itself and produces more sweat to that end than ordinary humans, and, to paraphrase Uncle Mike's line about how his bald head is like a solar panel, my sweating is a high-powered water cooling system for a high-powered love machine. My shorts and shirt were completely drenched through, and the walk back in the dry, dusty hot air was enough time for some of the sweat to evaporate, leaving my skin feeling kind of sticky and grimy.

I didn't know at the time that the water shortage was not base-wide and that there were working showers at one of the other nearby US compounds, so I made due with a combat shower. Now, I'm not sure what the exact definition of a "combat shower" is, but it seems that it's more or less an improvised and/or partial shower. So, just getting your hair wet in the morning can count as a combat shower as can, let's say, grabbing 5 bottles of water and a bar of soap to clean yourself up as best you can. I will admit that 2.5 liters is probably less than ideal, but if you use it sparingly and concentrate your soaping and rinsing to your armpits and ... since we're in a combat zone, let's call them "strategic areas," you may not feel quite as clean and fresh as you'd like, but at least you won't offend your co-workers and other innocent bystanders.

Unfortunately, one of the docs here does have a wee bit of a hygiene problem, and "wee bit" may be the understatement of the year. He's a LtCol flight surgeon and, with his bushy deployment-mustache, kind of looks like Magnum P.I., though Magnum P.U. might be more apropos (thank you, folks, I'm here every day from 3-11pm). He works with one of the flying squadrons, so he's not here most of the time, but does come in and works one, rarely two, mornings a week when Joe flies with one of the aircrews. He's a genuinely nice guy, brings over perfectly fine leftover fruit from the aircraft maintainers' morning food deliveries (so much food is wasted here), and he really went out of his way when I first arrived to show Joe and I around the part of the flightline where he normally works. But he smells. Bad. Epically so.

Now, I will admit that I'm not the most clean person out there. I shower regularly, wash dishes, etc., but, I'm a little cluttered at times, especially my desk. Although that may not be such a bad thing. More and more research suggests that the rising incidence of asthma and allergies in kids may be due to too little exposure to microorganisms that humans have typically experienced - the hygiene theory of allergies and asthma. The cutesy, media, headline-grabbing expression is "EAT DIRT! PREVENT ASTHMA!" This is not what any of those researchers literally mean to say. But, apparently, kids who grow up on farms seem to have fewer allergies and less asthma. It may be that the greater exposure to more of the bugs and allergy-causing particles with which humans/humanoids have evolved over millions of years help our immune systems to learn how to function, build up immunity against harmful bugs, and also learn how to not over-react to bugs and particles that are not harmful (that is, not over-react to pollen in the air in the form of hay fever and hypersensitive airways in the form of asthma). What I'm trying to say is, my lungs are nice and strong, and I try to keep it that way. This is not to say that hygiene isn't important. Clean water, effective plumbing and sanitation systems, and better food preservation/refrigeration have done more to increase our average lifespan than all the subsequent medical efforts since. And living in total filth is problematic, e.g. perhaps a third of Europe's population was killed off by the plague, a disease spread by fleas living on rats living on garbage and sewage in medeivel cities. But cleaning every surface in your house with bleach may actually be doing your children less good than you think, and maybe some harm.

Another factor that may be helpful in preventing allergies and asthma is having older siblings (Brett might live forever if that's true). It also seems that more time spent indoors may increase a kid's risk. It might be that exposure to inside bugs and particles (or being exposed less to the outside stuff) might somehow be more harmful, but it could also be a proxy for kids getting fatter, which could be a factor. It could also be that being outside implies more physical activity and more expansion and exercise of a kid's lungs, which might make them more resistant to getting inflamed and from narrowing too much (which is what happens with asthma). Maybe it's a bit of all of those things. Another thought is that antibiotic use in kids may actually have a negative effect for asthma and allergies. Obviously there are situations where they are life-saving, but not nearly as often as most people think. It is probably only a very tiny fraction of ear infections that require antibiotics, even when a kid has a fever and a swollen ear drum.

As I mentioned, and in the spirit of full disclosure, I am not always the most tidy. There was the time I left for Guatemala a few years ago during residency, and my friend, Brian, kindly offered to start my car and drive it a bit while I was away in order to keep the battery charged. We drove my car to the airport, then he drove it back to Vacaville. Brian's a great guy, a guy's guy, if you will. And he's extremely clean. We're talking this guy brushes his teeth with AJAX and gargles with Clorox as mouthwash. So three weeks or so later, he stopped by the apartment building and got in my car, and almost barfed by how bad it smelled. If I remember the details correctly (and if I don't, it doesn't matter, it's my story and I can tell it how I like), he told me later that he literally was looking under the seats and in the glove compartment, searching for whatever small animal it was that had snuck in and died. Said he opened all the doors, and then found the culprit when he opened the trunk - a three week old bag of garbage that had been liquefying, brewing and fermenting in a dark, closed trunk, heated daily by the hot California sun. I don't remember if he told me that he passed out or not, but when he recovered from whatever initial shock he suffered, he graciously threw it out and did what he could to sanitize the site. As it turns out, I'd cleaned my apartment before leaving for Guatemala and intended to throw out the garbage as I drove out of the complex. I stuck a full bag in the trunk on one of my trips to load the car, but, in the fluster of leaving, forgot about it.

And then there was the time this year when I left for Nepal for three weeks. I'd cleaned my apartment and was ready to leave. I figured that I should just turn off the power in my apartment because I try to do what I can to not blatantly waste electricity. Well, I accidentally didn't flip back on the breaker switch that powers the refrigerator. And while it's not tortuously hot in Germany in April/May, "temperate" is still not an appropriate temperature at which to store food intended to be frozen. When I arrived back three weeks later, the plastic wrapping around a whole frozen chicken in the bottom drawer of the freezer was bulging, filled with decomposition gases, and there were at least two dozen flies either having already lived out their lifespan and lying around dead or buzzing around the scene. There were some other bags of rotten vegetables and other food stuffs that were equally rancid. And then there were abandoned maggot cocoons scattered about the floors. Took me forever to clean things up. Yech.

But those were mostly accidents. And while I wouldn't say that Magnum P.U. is intentionally offensive, he's at least committing a crime of hygiene-omission, if not against humanity, certainly to the medical technicians who work with him in our clinic, to the patients who come into the clinic, and to his roommates. Now, I get it - some people are more pungent than others. I mean, I can't help it that my man-musk makes the ladies go crazy. And a guy I used to work with doing construction back in the day could shower and deodorize in the morning and reek to high heaven by lunchtime. In fact, the guys at work used to him Onion Boy. "Hey Lance?! Where's Onion Boy today?" It wasn't that they couldn't smell him and that's how they knew he wasn't around, but rather that they could smell anything at all that tipped them off. Anyway, this guy's skin was a little more oily than normal and there must have been some secretion in it that was like creatinine for stench-producing bacteria.

I'm not usually here when Magnum works, so I mostly just hear about it later from the technicians, but boy do I hear about it. One of the techs sprays air freshener every time he leaves a room and once she even less-so subtly followed him around a bit and sprayed while he was present in the same room. One day, three people who came to clinic were overhead saying, in one way or another at various times and various places, "it smells like dirty ass in there." Maybe those weren't their exact words as I may have toned down the language for our under-17 readers. Another tech today told me that he has "not exactly a sour smell, but it burns your eyes when you walk in the room". She also told me that he "peed with damn door open," the thought of which made me laugh. I just imagine strolling by the bathroom here in the clinic, looking over, and seeing the back of some dude with his flight suit unzipped, sleeves hanging down by his side, looking up at the ceiling and letting out a sigh (and maybe even doing the pee-shiver) while he splashes toilet bowl water all over the place. And it's not like the bathroom is in an inconspicuous corner of the clinic somewhere. Not quite as funny as the time in college when we overhead a couple our roommates, one of them 6ft 9in tall, have a pee-stream sword fight. A guy that tall should be careful - he might shoot someone's eye out, or worse, poke their eye out. Yikes!

It doesn't stop there. He also rummages through people's things and eats their food. I had to stop by one morning while he was working in order to unlock the narcotics and controlled medications cabinet. I looked for the spare key in one of my desk drawers, which also has water-flavoring packets and other snacky-snacks in it. Well, while I was searching for the keys, he reached in, grabbed a packet, looked it over to see if it was an acceptable flavor, and just took it. Now, I wasn't angry and didn't really care that much, but he didn't even give a "hey man, you mind?" I guess he rummaged through another one of my drawers before he left and grabbed some stuff. And he claimed to be looking for movies to borrow from the collection in back, which is located next to the large main refrigerator (recently emptied), but apparently came back without any movies. He'll walk into the small lobby, grab a magazine, usually one of the gossip rags, and talk about how those magazines are "deployment porn." Every time. And after he leaves the clinic for the morning, the techs open all the doors and windows in an attempt to get a cleansing cross breeze going, despite the fact that it's often over 100 degrees outside. One tech told me, "I like it better when he emails me."

Our logistics guy who left about a month ago was roommates with Magnum. He stuck it out for most of the year, but it got to the point where he couldn't tolerate it anymore and the last month or so he was here he lived in the clinic. He found a cot, made room to store his things, and showered here. For a month. Part of what makes the situation a bit delicate is that Magnum is a lieutenant colonel, so many of the enlisted people are hesitant to say anything to him. But, the previous doc here was also a LtCol, and he actually did say something to Magnum about his hygiene, but it would seem that council fell upon deaf ears. Maybe he needs to clean the wax out of them. He leaves soon, but probably not soon enough for some people.

Then, the other day, he graciously offered, unsolicited, to work one of the mornings for me since Joe had to do an investigation, short notice, for a couple of days. He came in and was at peak pungency. Well, the chaplain, who's a LtCol, came in and noticed it. He asked one of our MSgts about it and she explained the situation. The chaplain said it was unacceptable, asked who Magnum's supervisor is (probably the general), and said he'd take it up with that person. We're assuming some correction was given because he hasn't been quite as "sour smell that burns your eyes"-pungent recently. It reminds me of the scene in Anchorman, where Paul Rudd's character puts on the cologne, "Sex Panther - 60% of the time, it works every time" - then walks through the office to cries of, "it smells like, like a used diaper filled with Indian food", and "this is worse than when that raccoon got in the photocopier", and it "smells like a turd covered in burnt hair." It's that bad.

Stay clean, but not too clean.

Kandahar 3

I was at the Canadian gym, which is where I go just about every morning, and a couple of the trainers and I started talking. I don't remember exactly how we got on the topic, but one of them began telling me about how he's seen a bunch of US military guys down at the boardwalk who have gang tatoos: Latin Kings, Crypts, Bloods, MS13, etc. He plans on becoming a cop after he returns back to Canada, so he's a little more current on his gang ink than I am.

I guess he's been here before and worked as a medic at the hospital. Says that every couple of weeks someone would come in, worked over pretty good, usually females, but also some guys, who'd been raped and/or beat up, some of them gang raped. Turns out that South Park, as it's called, is one of the camps/compounds here on base. It's almost entirely Army troops, and it's where most of these assaults have occurred. He suggested not going down that way alone at night.

My curiosity peaked, I started reading some more. As it turns out, there is something of a gang problem in the military, mostly Army. In general, something like 0.02% of the US population belongs to gangs; in the US Army, it's thought to be between 1-2%, 50-100x as high and that estimate was 4-5 years ago. It's reasonable to think that it could be higher than that now. From what I read, there have been reports of drive-by shootings, drug trafficking, and other gang activity near some military bases, and even some gang activity that goes on overseas - setting up "franchises," if you will. There have been reports of some of these gang members who have stolen body armor and mltiary weapons from warehouses and sold them.

Now, I really try to be sympathetic to the idea that a lot of kids who grow up in unfortunate situations join gangs for various reasons, not least of which is a sense of belonging and family that they might not otherwise experience in their lives. And I know that many go into the miltiary because they don't have better options, which I think reflects poorly on a society that gives hundreds of billions in bailouts to already wealthy bankers rather than invest more in schools, infrastructure, after school programs, affordable daycare, student loans for college, and living wages so that parents don't need to both work, nor work so much, in order to make ends meet. I also think that military service can be a way for some people who don't have other options to get a job, pay taxes, get education, stay out of trouble, etc.

And I'm all for rehabilitation programs for all kinds of criminal offenders, particularly for those of lower socio-economic status and for nonviolent offenses. But, I'm not sure I'm OK with the idea of military service as a form of rehab for someone who's just been convicted of a crime and has gang affiliation. At least not immediately as a trade-off for jail time (although jailtime has its problems - I think I'm more in favor of work/education type programs).

Some of the articles I read further described how some of these guys get out of the military and now have training in warfare, particularly close quarter urban warfare considering the recent wars that have been fought, and they have some sense of discipline, all of which can be taken back and used to better organize and train other gang members - some gangs reportedly even actively send members into the military to that very end.

Some of the fault also lies with recruiters, many of whom are, if not outright liars, certainly less than fully honest, saying pretty much whatever it takes to get kids into the military and meet their quotas. They often don't inquire about or report gang membership of potential recruits if they think it would prohibit someone from joining. I'd say that's a very sinister and dangerous form of "don't ask, don't tell." For what it's worth, I'm infinitely more worried about gangbangers in the military than I am about gays banging in the military.

Kandahar 2

Early one morning last week, I was awoken by a loud rumbling sound that lasted 4 or 5 seconds, accompanied by a heavy vibration that traveled through the whole unit of our block of rooms. My very first thoughts, PG version, were, "Holy crap! A mortar must have gotten through the early-warning detection system and landed nearby." The way it's supposed to work is that an alarm goes off when the detection system senses a mortar in the air, then there might be a thud or explosion sound, etc., then you haul ass over to a hardened facility and wait around until the female British voice gives the "all clear", and you return to whatever it is you were doing before - usually back to sleeping since the fuses are inconveniently often timed to go off in the middle of the night.

So the PG version of my next thought was, "Oh crap! It's really early and now I've got to get out of bed. Thanks, Taliban!" You have to understand that the domicile block walkways and stairs are made from pressed sheet metal, the scaffold is constructed from crosslinked metal beams, and the walls are very thin. So I waited for a minute or so, expecting the alarm, unable to fall back asleep, but it never came. Then Joe happens to walk in about that time (he had been on an overnight flight with one of the aircrews). I ask him what the sound was. He explains that one of the guys in the block of rooms, Lawrence, was leaving KAF, and Joe saw him dragging his big roller-bag of luggage down the stairs, letting it fall and slam onto each one of the steps as he dragged it down and away. Noise travels easily enough as it is, but when an inconsiderate idiot drags his bag down the steps at 445am, it's especially noisy; not to mention that it sounds and feels like I imagine a nearby mortar strike would. Damn you, Lawrence!

It's over a month since I arrived here in Afghanistan. Five months too many still to go. I wish I could say that the experience has somehow become more meaningful since my last update, but it hasn't. I can say that figuring out a daily routine does help pass the time. There's something to be said for that. My usual routine now is to wake between 7 and 8am and go to breakfast. I then head over to the Canadian gym and workout (the gym at our compound closes from 8am until 2pm). I still do p90x, but might try to mix in some TRX, a different workout. A couple of days a week one of the Canadian units has a spin group, and they let me sit in on that. It's nothing like riding my mountain bikes, and it almost makes me sad that I'm reduced to spin class, but I suppose it's still better than nothing. I asked a lady who participates in the class what the guys do, and she tells me that they're engineers. Most of the guys are shorter and squat, with shoulders half-again as wide as mine (which isn't necessarily saying that much) that taper down to waists half-again as small as mine (ditto), so I tell her they don't look like engineers and pretend to push my glasses up my nose. I look more like an engineer than those guys. She laughs and tells me that they're combat engineers, which means they build and/or blow up stuff as needed so that friendlies can move where they want and unfriendlies can't. Involves a lot of construction work, demolitions, etc., and they carry and sometimes have to shoot guns while they do all that.

Since I left Germany, I've lost about 10 lbs, so I guess all the working out is helping. After the gym, I usually go and clean up, then head back to the DFAC for lunch. After lunch, I usually just go and read or study, or watch Daily Show and Colbert Report online. By 3pm, it's time to head over to the clinic for my shift, which ends at 11pm. Most of the time only a few people will show up - a busy night I'll see 4 or 5, but occasionally, especially Friday through Sunday, there might not be anyone. If that's the case, I'll do more reading, or emails, and sometimes I'll have a movie going on one side of the screen. My shift ends at 11pm, but most nights I can leave a bit earlier. I tell MSgt Mason, the tech on evenings with me, that he can call me if anyone comes in and really needs to be seen (one night a guy showed up at 1055pm complaining of bloody stools - putting your finger in someone's butt right before your own bedtime doesn't exactly sweeten ones dreams). And then it's pretty much straight to bed. Not all that exciting.

Occasionally there are other things to break up some of the monotony. Greg Stecklow, from back in Ohio, is in the Army Reserve and happens to be here as well. I somehow found out through Facebook that he's here. Anyways, we met up for lunch the other day. Our lives have, for the most part, proceeded along very different paths since we graduated from high school, yet coincidentally have converged here 17 years later. I also heard from a patient that Jon Stewart would be passing through as part of a USO-sponsored tour of Afghanistan. Karl Malone and David Blane (the magician dude) were also along. I waited in line the next morning as they herded people to the photo-op area at the USO, 10 people at time. I know he's kind of a short guy, but I was surprised that he looked as little and skinny as he did. And to be fair, standing next to Karl Malone, we all look small. Shook hands, said a few words, then took a group photo (the guy to whom I gave my camera officially sucks at photography). Stewart was friendly and at least was trying to ham it up for everyone, which I appreciated. The other guys just sort of stood around. And tomorrow, there's a group of us going over to the K9 unit to get a look around there. Should be interesting.

So the uniform rules. Bear with me, this will take a while. The entire base is no-salute, which is fine with me. EXCEPT that apparently we're supposed to salute generals. Don't really understand that one. Saluting everyone gets really old really fast. You can wear your full uniform at any time (with the field hat or floppy boonie cap when outside), but if we're in our compound, we don't have to wear the hat, but you can if you want. No hats indoors, of course. You must wear your uniform when you're on duty. When you're not on duty, you have the option of wearing the official physical training (PT) gear, with or without the matching ball cap at any time, but I just learned yesterday that you may also wear the camouflaged boonie cap with your PT uniform, which is an exception here to the general rule that prohibits this, BUT, you can't wear the camouflage field cap. You must wear the official PT shorts or pants whenever you go to the gym, and there's a sweatshirt and jacket you can wear as well if it gets colder.

(Aside: I've been wearing my Five Fingers shoes to work out, which I've been doing for well over a year, but yesterday some guy, who was giving me the stink-eye for 10 minutes before he finally approached me, said that I can't wear them without socks. Well, they're designed to be worn without socks, and I've actually read that it's up to the commander as to whether you have to wear or socks or not, and so far no one else has said anything to me, including the chief master sergeant of the entire wing. So I figured it was OK. I start to tell him that I'd read you could wear them with or without socks, but he cut me off and assured me that the Air Force Instructions say that you have to wear socks. I wasn't going to argue with him there, so I just said, "OK. Thanks," and he left. Reason number 1024 that I can't stay in the military - idiots who think it's their personal, sacred crusade from God Himself to enforce stupid and/or nonexistent rules).

On Saturdays, there's a bazaar where Afghani merchants sell various souvenirs (although it's been suspended during Ramadan), and if you're going there in the PT gear, you must wear the PT pants - no shorts allowed. Other than that, there's nothing else you can wear outside of your room except to and from the bathroom/showers (I recommend flip-flops for the showers). As I mentioned before, we have to carry our weapons (I carry around an M9 handgun, but lots of other people have to carry larger machine guns) with us wherever we go - to the community room, to the dining facilities, etc., EXCEPT if you're going to the gym. Then you're allowed to go there and back without it; but, no stopping at the dining facility or the shopette or boardwalk on your way back from the gym, even if it's along the route back to your room. Rather, you must go back to your room, grab your weapon, and then go eat or shop (preferably after showering). (Considering that most everyone on base carries a weapon, it occurred to me after the fact that I probably shouldn't have yelled at that one dude playing volley one night several weeks ago and called him a "dick." Even though he was totally being one. Lesson learned.) And you're not allowed to carry bags of any sort into most buildings, including dining facilities, the USO, and the base exchange/shoppette. Some of the gyms require that you bring an extra pair of shoes - ones that you don't wear outside at all - in order to work out there. From dusk until dawn you're required to wear a reflective belt no matter which uniform you're wearing, even though the Air Force PT uniform has reflective material on both the shorts and shirt. Pretty simple, right?

Apparently, for a while there, they had security forces picking up people if they found them without their weapon, ID, or reflector belts, and placed them in a makeshift holding area in the center of the courtyard at the boardwalk until their supervisor came to get them (which I personally think is somewhat extreme and degrading - it was primarily an Army-inspired program, and the Army is, moreso than its sister services, an extreme and degrading organization in many respects). And through Ramadan, we are no longer allowed to wear our PT gear outside of the compound unless we're going to a gym to workout. Otherwise it's full uniform. Further, during Ramadan, there's no eating or drinking outside of the compound, including at the boardwalk, where nearly all the restaurants are located.

You probably heard about the Chinook helicopter that was just shot down and 30+ people died. That wasn't too far from here. Apparently the fighting season has been picking up; the poppy harvest was late this year. Afghanistan grows something like 90% or more of the world's opium that is then turned primarily into heroin, and the money they get from that crop is used to finance the al-Qaeda and Taliban forces against NATO forces here. It's also Ramadan, the month of fasting from dawn to dusk and of giving up certain vices and pleasures. It apparently is a time when some of the fighting further picks up: both between different groups of the Taliban and the various warlords and tribal groups, and between all of them and the coalition forces. We don't see much of the aftermath here at our little clinic since we mostly deal with low acuity stuff. Saw a couple of kids a few weeks ago after they were released from the hospital who'd been beaten up pretty good when an IED went off near them while they were attempting to diffuse a different one. One kid had some burns and a couple of them had ruptured ear drums. Their chief wasn't so lucky, apparently.

There have been quite a few announcements sent out about "distinguished transfers" which is a euphemism of sorts for putting dead kids on airplanes and sending the bodies back to the States. This is a bad war - always has been, even from the start. It's also become a contractor war in the sense that there are now more contractors working in this war zone than there are active duty military. Many of them are US citizens, and many of them get paid ridiculous amounts of money for doing rather menial work (e.g. post office workers making 6 figure salaries for helping me return my Kindle to Amazon after I dropped it and the screen broke). The TCNs (third-country nationals) come from all over: places like Nepal, India, Pakistan, other SE Asian countries, and other places as well. Many of them do even more menial tasks like cafeteria services, cleaning bathrooms/showers, and some construction work; they usually don't get paid so liberally, but it's still much better than what they'd get in their home countries.

While most of them are just guys trying to make some money to take home, and probably could care less about sides in this conflict, it does raise all kinds of issues. For one, while most of these guys are just trying to make some money off the US taxpayer, there are some among them who have malicious intentions against the people living here on the base. And it's not like they're thoroughly screened when they walk off the plane or closely supervised when they're digging ditches to lay new fiber-optic cable around our compound. There are efforts to find contraband, and there have been some "success" stories. For instance, one guy I saw in clinic told me how one of the K9 handlers was doing some training with one of the bomb dogs. The dog, however, didn't go to the place where the handler had placed the training decoy. When he tried to redirect the dog, it refused and stayed where it was. The handler then looked carefully and saw where something had been placed in the ground. As it turned out, someone had somehow planted and IED in the training area there. My point being, a contractor war significantly increases the risks on base, especially one as huge, disorganized, multinational, and crowded as KAF.

Bomb-sniffing dog. He must be able to smell guns as well cause that's the only thing hidden in my sleeves.

I think about the warning given by the Irish Replubican Army after the Brighton Hotel bombing in 1984. Margaret Thatcher came out of it unhurt, but 5 others died and many others were injured. Thatcher gave a rousing speech about not being deterred by terrorists, etc. The IRA responded with a statement promising that they would try again, and issued this warning: "Today we were unlucky, but remember, we only have to be lucky once. You will have to be lucky always." It really is such an asymmetric war here in so many ways, and asymmetric not in the sense that NATO forces have this ovewhelming advantage in technology, but that the relatively basic weapons that Al-Qaeda and the Taliban are using are as effective as they are. And for many of the Al-Quaeda and Taliban guys, they only have to be lucky once for it all to be worth it to them. And they're getting "lucky" quite a lot, unfortunately. I know I mentioned this before, but Al-Qaeda and the Taliban are destroying our armored vehicles that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and blowing up our kids with IEDs that cost as much as a pizza to make. These are lessons that our "great leaders" should have learned from Viet Nam and from the failed Soviet invasion here in the 1980s (although, to be fair, the CIA provided the mujahadeen with millions of dollars in aid and weapons, some of whom are the very groups that are killing our kids still today, so it's kind of our government's own fault to some degree). Though it may not be completely true, Afghanistan has been called "the graveyard of empires" for a reason.

Our clinic people on one of the MRAPs (Mine Resistant Ambush Protected)

Some of the guys I see are security forces, so I try to pick their brains about some of the stuff going on here. Spoke with one guy the other morning. He says that going after contraband goods keeps them pretty busy. The welcome letter to KAF actually says, "General Order No.1B (GO No.1B) is enforced at KAF. Among other things, GO No.1B prohibits the possession or consumption of alcoholic beverages and/or nonprescription drugs, possession of pornography and entering sleeping quarters of the opposite gender. These are serious offenses and the consequences are severe." Despite the general order for the base that prohibits alcohol, it still gets here. Some people try to have it sent via mail from distributors, and sometimes the glass shatters in shipping, so they can easily get those idiots. But there are some distributors who pack alcohol in plastic bottles or with well cushioned packing. One guy apparently received a case of Miller High Life, and I guess it looked and felt suspicious enough that they checked it. He said they caught another group of guys trying to use rubbing alcohol to make liquor, too. Not smart. Rubbing alcohol supposedly can cause blindness, and I say that the only thing that should be causing blindness on this base is .. Well, nevermind. And apparently a plastic half liter bottle full of vodka will go for about $70. There have even been a few DUIs. One Army girl partied until about 2am, then had to be ready to drive one of the armored vehicles by 6am. She was still drunk at that time and ran this $200,000-300,000 machine off the side of the road and into a ditch. I'm guessing she doesn't qualify for her next promotion.

Since we're talking about porn, liquor, and fornicating (no, I'm not confessing anything), one of the guys I know here is the SARC officer: Sexual Assault Response Coordinator. He says that there's been all kinds of crazy stuff that's gone on. Apparently, one women says she went to one of the gyms to workout, thinks that someone may have spiked her water, then doesn't remember anything after that until she woke up the next morning in a port-a-john. Oh, and by the way, with child. Pregnant. That kind of stuff. Now, I'm not saying that I don't believe her story, but that's pretty hard to believe.

I saw a woman one morning last week ago for "Plan B." She'd had sex the night before and I guess the condom broke. So it seems that most people interpret General Order 1 to mean that troops aren't allowed to have sex, but that's not true. It doesn't make any prohibition of sex, it simply makes it a little more logistically challenging. So, out of curiosity, I asked her where she goes for the festivities, and she casually answers that she and her boyfriend go over to the Kandahar hotel. As it's name implies, it's literally a hotel here where people coming through can stay. Makes sense.

Saw another woman a couple of weeks for sleep problems. Gave her some meds and a handout on sleep hygiene that I hoped might help. She showed up again the other night for the same problem, so we delved into things a bit more. Turns out she's pleasant enough, but admits that she's a little high-strung and nervous at baseline. When she deployed here (it just so happens that her boyfriend deployed here at the same time), she left her two kids with her ex-husband back in the States. He lives with his girlfriend, who my patient described as a "that bar-whore." So now her ex-husband just got deployed, my patient has two more months before she returns home, and her ex-husband left the kids with "that bar-whore." Now my patient says that when she tries to go to sleep after her night shift, her mind is racing, worrying about her kids, and she can't wind it down.

She also tells me that her migraines have gotten more frequent (most likely from the lack of sleep) over the past few weeks, and she's been getting nauseous. So I ask her, pertaining to the nausea, whether it's possible that she's pregnant. She quickly and emphatically tells me that that's impossible. I ask her why? Her boyfriend is here, after all. Well, she tells me that it's not allowed per General Order 1. Being the guardian of her overall well-being that I am, I explain to her the finer points of the General Order, and pass along the inside info about the Kandahar hotel. I suggested that maybe an energetic frolic in the sack might help with her stress and headaches (unless she's like most women and gets the headache right before the fun starts - so typical). As an aside, I haven't actually visited the Kandahar hotel, but I'm going to suggest you bring your own plastic mattress cover if you do. Well, she looked genuinely surprised and even a little upset as I related this to her. "You mean all this time ... ?" I sat there quietly and nodded, trying to be sympathetic. Her look seemed to say, "It's like being deployed with your boyfriend for four months, and only just now finding out we could have been doing it this whole time .... IT'S LIKE RAY-EE-YAAAAAIN ON YOUR WEDDING DAY. IT'S A FREE R I I I I I I I DE, WHEN YOU'VE ALREADY PAID." Not technically ironic, but definitely unfortunate.

Anyway, I wish I could say that I'm severely depressed being here, and maybe that way be able to leave this place. But I'm not. Just mostly bored and counting down the months. I'm mostly just trying to keep my mind and body engaged by exercising and reading/studying.

I've gotten a few questions about sending things here. Really, there's no need. I can get most things that I want and need here on base, and orders I've made from Amazon and New Balance have gotten here in less than a week. A couple of the other people here in the clinic get packages from time to time and there's way more junk food laying around here than is good for me. But thanks for the offers.

That's it for now.

Kandahar 1

I've been here a week now, and it's pretty boring. The flight here went through Turkey (where we had to stay on the plane while it refueled - the terminal renovations that were supposed to be done 4 months ago are still ongoing), then through Kyrgystan for one night, before arriving here in Afghanistan. In Kyrgystan I met up with my friend, Shane, who was on his way home from being here for 9 months. I met up with him and his wife, Danielle, in Florence a few months ago while he was on R&R. He was stuck there for 10 days, waiting for his flight. There are frequent flights that leave from there, and he was hoping to try and get on one of them, but the "rules" said that he couldn't, so he was stranded.

The base here is huge, some 30,000+ people, many of them contractors. There are Canadians, Brits, Slovaks, Belgians, and a bunch of other small contingencies of different nationalities. It's dirty, crowded, hot, and gray - all the way from the rocks, gravel, dirt, and roads underfoot, to the 12 feet high reinforced concrete barriers that form a huge labyrinth of alleyways and Concertina wired-surrounded compounds, to the hazy sky above. There are several gyms and a bunch of dining facilities. The process of feeding all these people here is immense. There are thousands of refrigerated cargo containers stacked all over the place. Apparently they ship them in armored lorries overland from Pakistan and then into Afghanistan. Apparently, the contractors who provide and serve it charge the government $25 a meal. The food isn't horrible, but for $75 a day it leaves something to be desired.

There's an area called the boardwalk, which is really a boardwalk, located in the middle of the base. There are some restaurants (including a TGI Fridays), gift shops, and other retailers, and in the center courtyard they have a couple of volleyball courts, a floor hockey rink (for the Canadiens), a small soccer field, and they're constructing a new sports field (it may even be indoor) there. Last night they had a band playing. Not sure if that's a regular thing or not.

The flight line is constantly busy with cargo planes flying in and out, fighter jets and helicopters going out, and various other types of planes coming and going. Even NASA has an airframe they fly at just under 50,000 ft that carries various instruments and experiments. The mission they're doing now involves using lasers to create various maps of terrain, etc., that they use to help with planning missions. Some of went yesterday and had a little tour of it. The roads and open lots are also full of humvees and massive armored vehicles. It's amazing to me that our military is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars, even over a million doolars, on each of these vehicles, and the insurgents are ruining them with IEDs that cost the price of a pizza to make. Of course, we have to keep people as safe as possible, but the asymmetry of it all is pretty stark, to say the least.

My job in the clinic is rather uneventful, for better and worse. I don't have to deal with lots of the BS that I do in a busy clinic, but I'm going to get stupider. I'm not seeing the blown up kids, which on the one hand is good, because I'm not some masochist or anything, but I also feel like I'm not really doing anything to really help. I may try and spend some time over in the trauma department, though. The other doctor here is a flight doctor, named Joe. He's also the head flight doc here. We split the days up (8am to 11pm) so don't really hang out any other time except if we're both in the clinic at the same time. There's a lot of downtime since most people come in during our sick call hours, 2 hours in the morning and evening), and even then, I'm seeing maybe 2-3 people at most, and a couple times one or even none.

Joe and I share a "room." They're actually relatively small cargo container sized boxes, maybe 8ft by 15ft. We have two bunk beds bed and a small wardrobe to hang and stack things, and that's pretty much it. I can't imagine having to sleep with 4 people in there - a claustrophobe would have enough difficulty living in one of them already. They're better than some of the other accomodations on the base, though, where they sleep 8-10 in a tent structure. Fortunately, we're also not next to the shit-pond, a large retaining pond where much of the human waste goes, as well as some other industrial waste. On some days it lets out a particularly tart stench. There are signs that people have put up that say things like, "Don't eat the brown trout," that kind of stuff. The story goes that some Marines bet one of their buddies $1000 to jump in it, which he took them up on. Apparently, he ended up with chemical burns all over his body. Let's face it, Marines aren't usually the smartest guys.

The other people here in the clinic now are also brand new - arrived just after I did. It's an older group - 3 Master Sergeants. They have way too much rank to be here, probably. I guess it's both good and bad, but I can't really see myself wanted to just hang out with them. I mean, I'm old and all, but not that old.

I also have to wear a gun around everywhere, not that I'll ever use it, but still. I almost forgot it in the dining facility one day - a big no-no.

Anyways, it's pretty boring here.

Air Show and Halloween

(These are REALLY old entries that I'm finally getting around to posting.)

It sucks anytime you’re told you have to work on the weekends, so none of us were very excited about the air show in October. Paul, in the Air Force for 20 plus years and having to be present at them annually, is pretty much sick of them. And yet, this one turned out all right in the end. Griff, the NCOIC over most of our techs and emergency services, arranged for Paul and I to be with him on the ambulance that went to the sea wall, where the audience would be for the show. The sea wall is an ongoing project where South Korea is building a wall in the ocean and is pumping out water while filling it in with landfill.

So there we were, walking around, watching the F15/16s and other aircraft fly over and do demonstrations, which was all right in its own way. That said, I live literally 100 yards from the flight line and see (and hear) those air frames take off every single day - the "sound of freedom" sort of loses its charm after a while, especially when they do night sorties. Later in the day, we decided to walk out on the backfill, right under where the jets were flying. One of the last air frames to demonstrate was an A-10 which flew down from the base in Osan. Paul and I were watching it and I was taking pictures and video on my camera. Here’s one clip that I thought turned out all right. An essential part of it, though, is listening to Paul’s commentary about the pilot. He was telling me about an experience he’d had when an A-10 flew right up behind him and passed just over him and he could barely hear it. Anyway, on to the clip ....

It turns out that was Halloween night, and the Juvats were having a party at their hooch. Well, one of the Juvat pilot’s brother was the pilot in the A-10 that was demonstrating, so Paul and I went and talked to him. When we told him that we were the guys out on the field, he said he’d noticed us and that he was targeting in on us. Said, “I started pulling out of my dive at about 300 ft, then leveled off at about 120.” The clip doesn’t quite do it justice, but that is REALLY close to the ground.

As mentioned, the air show fell on Halloween, so we put together some bad costumes and headed out. I'm a horrible procrastinator, so didn't plan ahead for a costume. I did get the last second idea to use my bathrobe, Speedo, dress socks (and maybe a regular sock to help “fill” out my costume,), and shoes to go out as a flasher. The dress shoes really added class to the ensemble.