Saw another guy from security forces in my clinic the other day, so I asked for an update. He had some interesting stories to tell. He does a bit of traffic-related stuff here and there (says they caught someone doing 65mph and the max speed limit is 40kph, or about 25mph), but tries to avoid that as much as possible; much more interested in doing base security, snagging bad guys and all. As I mentioned previously, there's a lot of contraband, so he catches plenty of people with alcohol, primarily contractors.
There are drugs as well, and he busted a tent full of Army guys one night who were smoking Spice ("They'll let anyone in the Army," in his words). Spice is an umbrella term for various synthetic canniboids, chemicals related to THC, the psychoactive substance in marijuana. It doesn't show up on routine drug screens, and apparently the K9s either can't or are not trained sufficiently to sniff it out. It's garnered quite a bit of attention over the past few years and initially was sold legally in smoke shops, though it has since been ubiquitously controlled and/or banned internationally. He said he found 7-8 lbs of the stuff, which suggested they were probably trying to distribute it.
He randomly goes to the dining facilities where many of the TCNs (third-country nationals) usually eat. They conduct line-ups and random searches at that time in addition to the other more targeted searches they perform based on intel received. Occasionally, they've found TCNs with components to construct IEDs and every so often there are reports of suicide vests; fortunately, none of them have been used. Every now and then they'll confiscate USBs and cell phones, too, which the TCNs are not supposed to have with them. Someone will use a camera to take photos or video of whatever it may be they or others might want to know (the flight line is a definite "no pictures" zone), and then they transfer it to the USB in order to smuggle it off base since it's much easier to hide a USB drive than a camera.
Vehicles go missing at times, usually the Gators, little open-aired gas-powered golf cart like utility vehicles. Whoever steals them will paint them a different color, and although sometimes they find them and return them to their original owners, often they simply disappear. Other larger vehicles - work trucks with hoists and even heavy machinery - have been driven right off base and sold in downtown Kandahar. Some of these vehicles cost over $100,000 and are sold for $10-20,000. Apparently they just drive right through the front gate and no one stops them.
If you know what to look for or who to ask, there is a bustling prostitution industry going on as well. Some of the women who work as vendors at the boardwalk are from the Philippines and Kyrgyzstan, and I guess there are some military women who occasionally offer their services as well. The vendorettes make something like $500 per month, but can pick up an extra couple of hundred bucks a week for a few minutes of extra work, or seconds, depending on the guy's stamina, I guess. As an aside, and speaking of stamina, I had a friend back in Boston who told us that her husband sometimes had to stop and take a couple of hits off his asthma inhaler before he was able to continue with their sweet sweet lovemaking. That should be a scene in an R-rated comedy if it isn't already.
Anyway, he told me that one girl lost her job and had to head back home. Airport security inspected her things and found $50,000 in cash in her luggage. I wonder whether she wasn't transporting money related to other illicit on-goings for other people, but she said it was all from prostituting herself. I'm no mathlete, but even if she was charging $200 per poke (probably a generous estimate), that would be 250 pokes; if she gave any discounts or "Buy 4 Get One Free” coupons, that number goes up even more. That's a lot of pelvic exertion. Hope she's keeping up with her Kegels.
This guy says he loves his job. "It's my favorite deployment by far. It’s like the Wild West out here." I admit that I live in my own head a lot - I'm the guy with his nose stuck in a Kindle, reading while walking to and from the dining facilities, boardwalk, etc. - so I'm usually not up on a lot of the gossip that goes on wherever it is I work. But, that we don't hear about most of this stuff that goes on suggests that these guys are doing their jobs fairly well, and I respect them for it.
I have my own struggle for survival going on every day – me vs. the Taliban flies. I hate those little effers. They sneak into our clinic and seem to congregate in the office I share with Joe. They're not like our American flies, either, and not just because they don't speak any English. American flies are, well, more like Americans - pretty content to just hang around your food, get fat, and then develop diabetes and die. The Taliban flies are wily and wiry. They buzz around your head and bite at you. I swear they've declared jihad on my face and the back of my head. I've become pretty handy with the fly-swatter.
And speaking of pesky bloodsuckers – contractors. I'm not a very big fan. They've been on our compound over the past couple of weeks. The American contractors mostly just stand around and watch while the TCNs do all the work - electrical wiring, new lighting, and cleaning air-conditioning filters. I saw one guy in our computer room for hours many days, drinking coffee and surfing the internet, and it seems they’re always on break. One morning I was "minding my own business" in one of the bathroom stalls and the door opens. Whatever - it's a communal male bathroom, no big deal. Then a female voice asks, "Is anyone in here?" - Um ... yes. - "Oh, well why didn't you say something?" and she headed back out.
Why didn’t I say anything?! Who says anything every time a public bathroom door opens – or ever, for that matter? I don't know how it works in female restrooms, but there are rules when more than one guy is in a male bathroom at the same time: for instance, no using the urinal just adjacent to another guy if it's possible to leave one open (only possible if there are three or more urinals); keep your conversation to a minimum - a simple "Sup?" with a slight head tilt/chin lift will usually more than suffice; and, as with gorillas, use extreme caution with making prolonged direct eye contact as it can be interpreted as a sign of overt aggression. The only people who tend to break these rules are drunks at a bar or club and “anti-homosexual” Republican congressmen in airport bathrooms. Just saying.
Keep direct eye contact to a minimum
And we certainly don't announce ourselves every time someone opens the door. I have to work with these people – I don't want them to know it was me blowing out my bowels on the toilet bowl, and vice versa. I don’t need to know that General Johnson or Colonel Smith was the guy in the stall next to me making noises from his “bum trumpet”, his “stench French horn”, his “ass saxophone” - you get the picture – noises so unearthly that they strain (no pun intended) the limits of what should be physical possibly. Really it comes down to a matter of maintaining proper military respect, bearing, customs, and courtesies.
In college one morning I dreamt about being back home. I was hanging out with Megan (my little sister), who plays the violin. I asked her to play something for me. She at first refused, telling me that she wasn’t any good, but I continued to encourage her to play something, anything. She finally relented, picked up her violin, then proceeded to strum a note on one of the strings. Duh-duh. The string was a little out of tune, so she told me she had to adjust it, and so she kept playing that one note over and over. Duh-duh. Duh-duh. Finally, I came out of my sleep and realized I was a dreaming; I also heard once again the sound of that un-tuned string – duh-duh – and at that time realized that my roommate was farting in his sleep across the room.
So I finished up my "morning chores" and walked out and past this woman, who was standing outside the door, leaning against the railing at the top of the stairs. She is a prime example of a "booty-do." If you don’t know, a booty-do is a woman who's so fat that her stomach sticks out more than her booty-do. The male counterpart is, of course, the dickie-do; not such a rare creature anymore, this species is so fat that he can't look down and see his own wiener (that’s my one allowed wiener reference for this update). I didn't say anything to her as I passed and walked down the stairs, but I heard her say "Hey baby!", and then she must have puckered her lips because I heard her make a kissing sound. Gross.
Since we're talking about the bathroom, the JAG here (his name is Lance), stopped by the other day to ask us some questions about sanitation and hygiene; specifically, they pertained to the implications of someone peeing in a water bottle at night in their room and then throwing those urine-filled bottles away the next morning in the bathroom garbage can. Yes, this is actually happening. And it's not a phenomenon isolated to a single pod. It’s not like our sleeping areas are located a couple of hundred yards away from the toilets, or it's freezing cold outside, or there are rabid animals prowling about (just rabid Taliban flies). Not that any of those situations would make it OK, but I might sympathize a little. Every single row and every single floor of our living pods has its own bathroom and shower room. If you're sleeping at the other end of the pod away from the bathroom, you might have to walk 20 yards to reach it, if that. Joe had to go to the commanders’ meeting and brief them about this. Most of them just started laughing and couldn’t believe it, either.
So accessibility is pretty good, but one problem once you reach the bathrooms is that the stalls are really narrow and short, not leaving a whole lot of room to maneuver. I don't know whether they were made for Chinese people, or just made in China, but it's a very tight fit in there. If I’m in there for more than a few minutes, my patellofemoral syndrome (runner’s knee) starts acting up a little. We usually call it the “theater sign” because your knee will ache if you’re sitting in a cramped movie theater seat, but I think the “Chinese torture chamber sign” works, too.
I’ve never had this particular conversation, but I’m assuming I’m like most people who like a little leg room when casting out one’s digestive demons. Being scrunched up prevents one from being able to relax all those pelvic floor muscles and associated sphincters in order to allow easy passage of one’s “dark passenger” (that’s a Dexter reference for those of you who watch). Tell me if I’m wrong about this, but I don’t think so.
Another problem is that there's very little head room in front of you. This makes maneuvering yourself onto, and off from, the toilet seats a bit challenging. One's natural inclination is to bend forward a bit to counterbalance and control one's downward momentum onto the toilet seat; likewise, it helps to have a little momentum, by throwing your head forward, when you stand up. But, with the door so close, you end up hitting your head on it, or you have to try and dead-lift squat yourself up from the toilet seat. This is especially precarious if you've been sitting there for a while, your leg falls asleep, and isn't back to full functioning.
And forget about it if you have your uniform and weapon with you. It’s a nightmare trying to take off my gun harness and uniform top and hang them up. Listen, I’m trying to take my talents to South Beach, not play a game of Twister. And while I don’t think “pooping dog” is the name for any real yoga pose, I’m pretty sure I’ve performed it and maybe even mastered it by now.
Things become especially dangerous because of hook-hangers on the doors. Not only do you run the risk hitting your head on the door, but also possibly poking out your eye-hole while tidying up your pie-hole; you know, jabbing yourself in the ear-hole while digging around in your rear-hole; hooking yourself in the mouth while cleaning up the dirty South. You get the picture. It does make it easier to maneuver if you leave the door open a bit when you sit, then close it once you get settled, as well as opening it again when you have to stand up to wipe. But, then you run the risk of someone opening the main door and catching you in a somewhat compromising position, which I'm sure violates some of those bathroom rules I mentioned earlier.
