30 JUL
2015
Only the military could make things so drab.
Through the check-in process I have been sent back and forth, forwards and
backwards. Endless acronyms. Endless paperwork. Every minutia covered. Inflexible and inefficient.
I am getting my “CIF” gear. A laundry
list of military supplies. Hijame, a
local who resembles Johnny Tsunami (everyone here sort of does) helps me fill
my shopping cart, drawling out item after item.
“Assault pack… tactical hydration pack….laundry bag….” Hijame I think you mean bookbag. And Camelbak… and okay that IS a laundry bag,
you got that one right.
An endless list of things, a microcosm of the time since I’ve been on
island. Checklists. Lines. Nothing productive.
“…tactical helmet… trench tool…gas mask….” The shopping cart, which is Shrek
sized, is almost filled to the brim.
“…grenade bags….m16 ammo…Kevlar vest.” Wait… WHAT? No, Hijame still made those sound
boring. Like he was a grocery clerk and
he just scanned my charmin and my lean pockets.
It reminded me of one of my favorite scenes of all time.
Onto pursuing my “FMF” – essentially a badge that says, “I’m actually in the
military, I’ve shot a gun, and I have an inkling of what being a marine is all
about even though I’m an idiot Navy dentist.”
Essentially, becoming John Cena.
Thursday, July 30, 2015
Saturday, July 25, 2015
22 JUL 2015
A Not so Brief, Brief
8 hours have passed and so have my hot snakes. I sit down for a brief at 0700, except this brief is not so brief… it goes until 1500, and is followed by a driver’s exam. I note everyone around me is a marine with much more experience than I have. I can tell by their aggressive haircuts, the language being used (80% acronyms) and the fact that it looks like they’re carrying toilet paper rolls underneath their armpits when they walk (aka the quarterback walk). I am a “Gaijin” in more ways than one here.
Wait…Driver’s exam? Should be easy, I don’t need to study…. right? I note everyone around me frantically studying. I overhear a military spouse nervously muttering to her neighbor, “…this is my second time, only 5 people in the auditorium passed yesterday…”
Shit.
Japanese people drive on the left side of the rode. Their rode signs are in Kanji. You know Kanji, right? The funny symbols some crazy person puked out of their brain onto paper and said let’s read this right to left and develop two thousand characters that turn into sounds that confuse white people?
The test is all in metrics for distances. There are strange laws and age restrictions. A DUI is 0.03 BAC. Everybody who drives is stereotypically terrible at it cause, you know, Asians.
I join the frantic studiers, who have made handwritten study guides after their previous failures.
After a magical lunch spent walking Camp Foster, and explaining my haircut to a 70 year old Japanese woman who keeps nodding and uttering “Hai….Hai….Hai!” every few seconds (best military haircut I have ever received, and 7 dollars), I return to my dreaded exam, feeling lethargic from my jetlag.
The examiner calls the names of those who didn’t achieve the 80% passing score, publically shaming them for all to see. He calls off a lot of names. Alot.
Mine isn’t called.
Arigato! Thanks to the Shinto, Buddhist, Catholic, Mormon, and Jewish Gods.
The day ends with maintenance problems in my grim, 750 sq foot apartment, and the classic signing of a phone contract where you feel like you’ve just sold your soul to the Japanese devil.
Still, the day could have been worse.
A Not so Brief, Brief
8 hours have passed and so have my hot snakes. I sit down for a brief at 0700, except this brief is not so brief… it goes until 1500, and is followed by a driver’s exam. I note everyone around me is a marine with much more experience than I have. I can tell by their aggressive haircuts, the language being used (80% acronyms) and the fact that it looks like they’re carrying toilet paper rolls underneath their armpits when they walk (aka the quarterback walk). I am a “Gaijin” in more ways than one here.
Wait…Driver’s exam? Should be easy, I don’t need to study…. right? I note everyone around me frantically studying. I overhear a military spouse nervously muttering to her neighbor, “…this is my second time, only 5 people in the auditorium passed yesterday…”
Shit.
Japanese people drive on the left side of the rode. Their rode signs are in Kanji. You know Kanji, right? The funny symbols some crazy person puked out of their brain onto paper and said let’s read this right to left and develop two thousand characters that turn into sounds that confuse white people?
The test is all in metrics for distances. There are strange laws and age restrictions. A DUI is 0.03 BAC. Everybody who drives is stereotypically terrible at it cause, you know, Asians.
I join the frantic studiers, who have made handwritten study guides after their previous failures.
After a magical lunch spent walking Camp Foster, and explaining my haircut to a 70 year old Japanese woman who keeps nodding and uttering “Hai….Hai….Hai!” every few seconds (best military haircut I have ever received, and 7 dollars), I return to my dreaded exam, feeling lethargic from my jetlag.
The examiner calls the names of those who didn’t achieve the 80% passing score, publically shaming them for all to see. He calls off a lot of names. Alot.
Mine isn’t called.
Arigato! Thanks to the Shinto, Buddhist, Catholic, Mormon, and Jewish Gods.
The day ends with maintenance problems in my grim, 750 sq foot apartment, and the classic signing of a phone contract where you feel like you’ve just sold your soul to the Japanese devil.
Still, the day could have been worse.
Friday, July 24, 2015
21 JUL 2015
Bubble guts and hot snakes.
I’m writhing on the final leg of a 22 hour journey – there’s a shooting pain in my lower right abdomen. I’m diaphoretic. My calm Okinawan neighbors are probably more than a little concerned… but let’s back up a bit.
Leaving for a 24 month deployment is like leaving for college for the first time… except nobody speaks the same language, you don’t have a working cell phone, you are 8000 miles from everyone you know, and there is no timeline on your return.
The flight to Tokyo, lasting all of fourteen hours was uneventful. My row mates and I had an unspoken solidarity, getting up and using the restroom at the same time, gathering food and supplies when the others were asleep, and suggesting movies like “Ex Machina” or “Gone Girl” to freak eachother out while exchanging topical small talk that didn’t matter and won’t be remembered.
Fast forward 27 hours into the future (wha--?!? Oh yeah I’m now 13 hours into the future, due to the whole earth being round thing) and I’m on the ground. Everyone is staring at the standing, walking, talking advertisement that is me, which screams “I don’t belong here!” I’m at least 8 inches taller than everyone around me (click hyperlinks in this blog to enhance experience!), and if skin color is 50 shades of grey, I’m in the lighter 5 shades.
I gaze at all the poorly translated “clever” t-shirts of the Tokyo natives around me and realize that my shirt is the cleverest. Good.
After a stressful transfer where I asked where to go and was answered in broken English by several helpful locals, I get on the final leg of my journey. The plane is clean to the point of sterility. The stewardesses are friendly and professional to the point where I’m wondering if they have on and off switches and are cyborgs developed from the first Rumbas. Two hours left, 19 hours into my journey, and that’s when I feel it. My body can’t take it. Bubble guts and hotsnakes. My GI system has finally rejected me and has gone on strike, and I need an old priest and a young priest. I “expeditiously” get off the plane, and by that I mean I fucking ran, and find the nearest toilet which has more buttons on it than a Gameboy. I “release the Kraken” so to speak. After several moments, I hear a kindred spirit dealing with similar demons in the next stall. I finish my business, and calmly say “We made it,” to my anonymous stallmate, and we laugh.
We had indeed made it.
Bubble guts and hot snakes.
I’m writhing on the final leg of a 22 hour journey – there’s a shooting pain in my lower right abdomen. I’m diaphoretic. My calm Okinawan neighbors are probably more than a little concerned… but let’s back up a bit.
Leaving for a 24 month deployment is like leaving for college for the first time… except nobody speaks the same language, you don’t have a working cell phone, you are 8000 miles from everyone you know, and there is no timeline on your return.
The flight to Tokyo, lasting all of fourteen hours was uneventful. My row mates and I had an unspoken solidarity, getting up and using the restroom at the same time, gathering food and supplies when the others were asleep, and suggesting movies like “Ex Machina” or “Gone Girl” to freak eachother out while exchanging topical small talk that didn’t matter and won’t be remembered.
Fast forward 27 hours into the future (wha--?!? Oh yeah I’m now 13 hours into the future, due to the whole earth being round thing) and I’m on the ground. Everyone is staring at the standing, walking, talking advertisement that is me, which screams “I don’t belong here!” I’m at least 8 inches taller than everyone around me (click hyperlinks in this blog to enhance experience!), and if skin color is 50 shades of grey, I’m in the lighter 5 shades.
I gaze at all the poorly translated “clever” t-shirts of the Tokyo natives around me and realize that my shirt is the cleverest. Good.
After a stressful transfer where I asked where to go and was answered in broken English by several helpful locals, I get on the final leg of my journey. The plane is clean to the point of sterility. The stewardesses are friendly and professional to the point where I’m wondering if they have on and off switches and are cyborgs developed from the first Rumbas. Two hours left, 19 hours into my journey, and that’s when I feel it. My body can’t take it. Bubble guts and hotsnakes. My GI system has finally rejected me and has gone on strike, and I need an old priest and a young priest. I “expeditiously” get off the plane, and by that I mean I fucking ran, and find the nearest toilet which has more buttons on it than a Gameboy. I “release the Kraken” so to speak. After several moments, I hear a kindred spirit dealing with similar demons in the next stall. I finish my business, and calmly say “We made it,” to my anonymous stallmate, and we laugh.
We had indeed made it.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)