I have been working the night shift, which means I sleep all day (well, I try to anyway). These days, I am thankful I am sleeping during the day. It started with the earthquake. I was asleep in my bunk when I was awoken to a gentle rocking. I was confused; why was I rocking from side to side? Was I having a seizure? I rolled over and it stopped so I went back to sleep. I thought maybe my stomach was grumbling so much that it was making me rock. A quick flip to my back and the problem was solved. However, this was not the case. When I got to work, the first thing I was asked was “How’d you like that earthquake today?” At least I can check that off my bucket list…Survive an earthquake…check!
A few days later, I was walking back from the Military Police station (that is closed on Sundays apparently) after a failed attempt at taking care of a parking ticket. On my walk back, I decided to stop for a banana milkshake. I am not sure why I enjoy these banana milkshakes so much, perhaps it is because I have only seen a banana twice since I have been here or maybe because my body craves the potassium. Either way, they are fantastic and I urge you to go out and try one! It was hot that day and the Police station was not as close to my room as one would hope. Enjoying the nice, cold milkshake on the walk back to my room, I looked up at the sky. On the horizon was an ominous group of clouds. Definitely storm clouds, but they were not the right color for a thunderstorm. They contained a red tint to them which told me this might be a dust storm. I returned to my room to find my roommate was there taking a nap. Ten minutes later we could hear the wind whipping outside and the sound of sand hitting the metal building. My roommate asks if that is rain hitting the building. As puffs of dust enter through our unsealed window, I reply, “Nope, I think that is all sand and dust.” We both went into the hallway to peer through the windows. Outside is nothing but dust and the hallway is quickly filling with dust spewing in from the windows. We both went back to bed and covered our heads to keep as much dust out of our lungs as possible. When the storm was done and we awoke, everything was covered in a thick layer of dirt. That was not fun to clean.
That Tuesday, two days later, while I was working nights, I heard what sounded like a train outside our building. This was odd because we don’t have trains anywhere close to where I work. There is the possibility that there may not be a single train located in all of Afghanistan, but I do not have that knowledge to confirm or deny this fact. Upon further investigation, I discovered that it was a thunderstorm complete with moth ball sized hail. This was fantastic, as everyone knows I like a good storm, however, this was four hours prior to my PT test. Thankfully it cleared up two hours later, and by the time the PT test started, the field was mostly dry.
That same day, as I was trying to sleep to a nice pitter patter of rain on the metal roof, I was abruptly awoken to what sounded like gravel being poured on top of my MOD. My roommate and I went to the hallway to check if we were being buried alive in gravel or if we would live to see another day. We were being attacked by golf ball sized hail! The ground still has dimples from where this hail hit the ground.
The very next day, I had fallen asleep to the relaxing sound of rain hitting the roof. I jumped as the loudest boom of thunder sounded and shook the building in which I lay. Luckily, the relaxing rain continued and I was able to roll over and sleep once again.
Hmmm, I feel like I am missing something…oh yea, the girl fight. I didn’t see any of it, but I have heard
several witness accounts. It was
Saturday night. It was movie night for a
room of females in my unit. They live in
a separate MOD as enlisted and officers are normally separated in living
situations. The fight broke out because
one room of females was trying to sleep while another room was trying to watch a movie.
The sleeping room knocked on the door to the movie night room and asked if they would
turn down the volume of their movie. They agreed and turned down the volume. Moments later, the sleeping room knocked on
the wall (I assume this was their way of saying, “Hey, your movie is still too
loud”). The movie room knocked right back and I think
this is how tensions were elevated. After
a series of knocking, the sleeping room went to confront the movie room once
again. The movie room claimed that the
sleeping room was always loud and that if they turned down the movie any more,
no one would be able to hear it including those trying to watch the movie. In short, the movie room told them to deal
with it because the sleeping room was normally the loud room. I know, this doesn’t really make sense in
justifying the noise, but that is what was said prior to the door being closed and
locked in the sleeping rooms face. The
sleeping room didn’t like this and kicked the door in to the movie room. The movie room went to push the door closed again
and slammed the sleeping rooms arm in the door; injury number one. This is when the ghetto girl fight began; four
females in the hallway attacking each other with fists, elbows, hair pulling,
and kicking. Any female that tried to
break it up was pushed in the face or cussed out. It was so bad the First Sergeant and the
Company Commander were called in to deal with them. A female in the MOD, an innocent bystander,
is an MP who called the station. So not only was the entire
Chain of Command aware, but the MPs are now involved. I spoke to several of the females living in
the MOD to make sure they were ok mentally.
One said she felt like she was living in the ghetto and another had to
be completely removed from the MOD for a few nights because she felt threatened
and unsafe.
All this to say, it is time to go home to the States! 47 Days!
OH I think I would at least be menatally packing after all of that! Also I guess all that fight/hand to hand training came into the ghetto fight.
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