January 6, 2010
0850
Camp Lejeune
Hey everybody, so sorry once again for slacking. I should get paid to be a slacker, then I'd be rich. Anyway, here's the deal. I'm going to Afghanistan a week from today, so I'm putting this blog on hold (as if I haven't 90% of the time since March). I'm going to be starting a NEW BLOG *coughagaincough* and it's going to be called "Afghanistan Journal." A spinoff, if you will. I'll be chronicling my trials and tribulations overseas.
It's a once or twice in a lifetime experience for someone only enlisting for one term, so I feel it's more important to document that then to talk about the past year for now. I will return to this blog when I get back home, but I'm planning on making the new blog a regular thing, possibly daily, or every other day to keep people updated, informed, etc.
So, head on over to that, I'll come back here and post a link when I actually create the blog and this post will serve as the introduction, so I'll just jump right into it there.
EDIT:
Here is the link to the new one.
As always I welcome comments and suggestions. The color layout of it right now might be a little funky, let me know.
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Unfortunately Famous Marines
October 29. 2009
Camp Lejeune
21:33
I was just kind of wasting time online today instead of actually creating a new entry. My apologies. I decided to compensate by compiling a brief and embarrassing list of famous former Marines. Take it as you will, but this short list may have more to say than a longer list of positively influential people. Though I'm sure the USMC tries hard to forget these names, they still maintain a reputation. Their memories hover like a dark cloud.
F. Lee Bailey
Charles Colson
Hussein Muhammed Farrah Aidid
Mark Fuhrman
Don Imus
Clayton Lonetree
Joseph McCarthy
Lee Harvey Oswald
Randy Orton
Joe Pyne
Charles Whitman
Ed Wood
Camp Lejeune
21:33
I was just kind of wasting time online today instead of actually creating a new entry. My apologies. I decided to compensate by compiling a brief and embarrassing list of famous former Marines. Take it as you will, but this short list may have more to say than a longer list of positively influential people. Though I'm sure the USMC tries hard to forget these names, they still maintain a reputation. Their memories hover like a dark cloud.
F. Lee Bailey
Charles Colson
Hussein Muhammed Farrah Aidid
Mark Fuhrman
Don Imus
Clayton Lonetree
Joseph McCarthy
Lee Harvey Oswald
Randy Orton
Joe Pyne
Charles Whitman
Ed Wood
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
A Map
This is a general map of the Edson Range area. "31 Area" as I think it's referred to. You can clearly see the four barracks buildings and the shooting ranges in the top right corner. The medical building is somewhere around the bottom right and the chow hall and PX is on the bottom left. You can see an interstate on the bottom. Like we could always see the skyline and rich neighborhoods of San Diego from MCRD, we could always see passing traffic at Edson Range.
Also...notice how depressing this place looks, even from above.
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Boot Camp Part 19
October 14, 2009
Camp Lejeune (BLDG FC 504)
10:37
T22 - "Marine Corps History"
The matrix says we did history today, but I know the combat conditioning course happened at some point during first phase, so I'm going to put that here.
The combat conditioning course is a really lame course where recruits carry rubber rifles with blue bayonets on the end (the same ones we use for MCMAP) and run through these "obstacles" while war-crying. Fake war noises play over speakers that are overlooking the course. I'm pretty sure it's just sounds from the opening of Saving Private Ryan too. Ghetto Marine Corps.
There's not too much to say about it. We run the course in groups of four after four Drill Instructors demonstrate the entire thing for us.
I remember a few of us were laughing at Sgt. Parada because he just looked funny in his kevlar. We never see DIs wearing anything other than a campaign cover unless they're not wearing their campaign cover.
When we complete this course, I've gained and accomplished nothing.
T22 - Movement to WFTB
For the past week, Sgt. Virto has been giving us introductory "classes" when we do our guided discussions. He talks a little bit about what 2nd phase is going to be like, he talks about Edson Range (the area of Camp Pendleton where it takes place) and some of the things we'll doing.
He explains the procedures of going through the chow hall there and setting up the armory formation for weapons maintenance in the squad bay. We're also shown how to make our racks differently. We use our second green blanket as a "dust cover" for out pillow, as it's apparently dusty and dirty where we're going.
Note: It is VERY dusty at Edson Range.
Today is the day where we move to Pendleton for the next three weeks. The previous night, we had to pack our seabags. Every time I do this during Recruit Training, I get really worked up and pissed off because It's always a real hassle to get everything in a seabag and close it. I don't remember all what I have to throw away, but I know I end up losing some stuff so I have room for the essentials.
I never throw away a single letter I received at Boot Camp, and I still have them all at home.
October 27, 2009
Camp Lejeune
9:51
I took a break in the middle of this entry, my apologies.
Where was I? Moving to Pendleton for 2nd Phase?
I remember each of us having one seabag. In the morning we have to go outside to stage these seabags in formation either before or after we eat, but it's still dark out.
I tightened the straps on my seabag completely, which is a mistake because the seabag is totally full. What does this mean? This means that when I put the seabag on (how I did this I don't know) that it was so tight, the circulation in my arms starts getting cut off immediately.
As we're walking in formation I start getting a little distressed here. It took me a second to actually get my arms through the straps. How am I supposed to get them off? ("Good question," I think to myself.)
The circulation in my arms starts getting cut off so bad that my hands are tingling and it gets difficult to reach my shoulders with my hands. I think I panic a little more than what is reasonable for something like this to happen, but it's more due to the attitudes of everyone else. If I was with a group of friends, I probably wouldn't worry about it, but since I'm around essentially a large group of vultures who don't care about anyone but themselves, I get a little worried.
I know I asked Montgomery, who at this point in time had a designated spot near me in formation, to help me out. He gives it a go but gives up. I think finally I asked him again and we got it off my back.
This sounds silly looking back on it, but if a DI was to notice me struggling with something so minuscule I probably would've been given a hard time.
After we stage our seabags, some other stuff happens and when the sun comes out, a few white trucks pull up. At this point we've already stacked our weapons in formation perfectly since our drill is crisp fresh out of Initial Drill.
The white trucks are to load all our seabags onto. This happens by many platoons combining and making a chain where we roll the seabags down the middle and then throw them into the trucks. This takes maybe twenty-five minutes and the trucks are loaded. The trucks leave and then we have to go back, get in formation, grab our weapons, and go to the buses.
Names are read off and our platoon is chopped into at least two buses by alphabetical order. I'm on Sgt. Saldana's bus, and this doesn't exactly thrill me. If you haven't gathered this yet, he is the most strict of the DIs. He's the designated monster.
We get on the buses, which are the same buses that picked us up from the airport on the first fateful night. I don't recall who I sit next to, but I'm sitting right behind Sgt. Saldana, who's in the front row. No one is allowed to sleep on the bus, in fact we have work to do.
A few days prior, we'd been givin a brief period of instruction on sewing.
Our task to accomplish on he bus ride is to sew on a laminated "name-tape" to the back of our cover.
I'm not sure if I've covered it or not, but I'm constantly making name-tapes laminated every week and using my marking kit to stamp my name on it. It reads "MILAS, JS" in elongated letters. It's stamped into a 1x6 inch strip of paper cut from a note card and then laminated with clear packing tape. This is what I have to sew onto the back of my cover.
Specifically, it needs to be sewn on so that there are six x-shaped string patterns on the outside of the cover. Also, we have to sew a button onto the inside on the top of the cover.
The entire ride, I basically bullshit this so I can look out the windows of the bus. This is the first time I've seen the outside world since August, and it's now October. Let me tell you, southern California is a beautiful area despite the fact that so many people from there are assholes. The scenery and countryside is quite breathtaking.
The ride lasted maybe an hour from MCRD to Camp Pendleton, which I was a little excited to see, and a little nervous about. This would mark my first time on an actual Marine Corps Base. Pendleton marks a change in scenery. The area is a little more desert-like and more natural. There's less development. This of course is totally re-inforced when we finally reach the gate to Edson Range: one of the most desolate and depressing locations I've ever been to.
Do me a favor and search "Edson Range" on google and go to the images. It might not look so bad, but imagine living at this place. Everything is constantly dry and dusty. One of the three days there was rain during my time in Boot Camp took place at Edson, but the water evaporated so fast it was like it never happened. The place has no color. Everything's just kind of a sickly brown, and the buildings are white. I bet if you went a week without showering there you'd have a coat of dirt on your skin jut because there's so much in the air.
Well, moving to a new place obviously means we're going to get screwed with. There's too much stuff for us to do in a short period of time for things to go smooth. The buses all end up in a large parking area, which doubles as the parade deck here. We get off with our rifles and start unloading seabags, then we go to our barracks. These buildings only have two levels and eight squadbays instead of twelve.
When we get inside our second floor squad bay (my platoon never catches a break, we moved out of a third story squadbay to a second story) I realize how life is going to be here: dirty. The floor looks really dusty. Everything just hits me in a way that brings me down.
We throw the seabags onto a pile since not everyone has theirs and we start doing something dreadful:
"Wagonwheel formation!"
"Wagonwheel formation, aye aye, sir!"
We start walking in a circle around the squadbay and when we get to the quarter deck we grab a seabag. Still, not everyone has theirs. We're walking while bear hugging these seabags and Sgt. Virto starts playing games. We have to stop and squat with the seabags, legs parralel to the deck. This means that our knees form a 90 degree angle. This, you know, is fairly impossible to do while bear hugging a sea bag for a long period of time, so naturally:
"Good, Fletscher doesn't want to have his legs parallel to the deck! Wagonwheel formation!"
And so on and so forth. This goes on for a while until Mellies becomes so tormented that he drops his seabag and goes to pound on the hatch to the duty hut, where SSgt. Arzola has been for a few minutes.
"Good afternoon gentlemen! Recruit Mellies requests permission to speak to Senior Drill Instructor Staff Sergeant Arzola!"
I haven't really covered it too much, but I did mention that I called it. Mellies was the Pvt. Pyle of our platoon, much like the one showcased in Full Metal Jacket. At this point, Mellies tries to quit. He actually tries to quit boot camp here. Of course the rest of us are still bear hugging sea bags or making our racks or whatever, but he's trying to quit.
Well, it doesn't work, so we go on tollerating him.
After the flip-flopping of Syer and Samuels as guide, it's become pretty apparent that Syer will be 1067's guide for the rest of Recruit Training.
The squad leaders have become Pavlik, Kinney, Uzzel, and the fourth's name is escaping me. It starts with a W and I can picture his face very well. Wilkerson? I don't know.
Rohl is the scribe, Ramirez J is the firewatch scribe.
I don't recall the Whiskey Locker recruits. I belive Power is still one of them at this point, but he is eventually replaced sometime during 2nd or 3rd Phase.
Camp Lejeune (BLDG FC 504)
10:37
T22 - "Marine Corps History"
The matrix says we did history today, but I know the combat conditioning course happened at some point during first phase, so I'm going to put that here.
The combat conditioning course is a really lame course where recruits carry rubber rifles with blue bayonets on the end (the same ones we use for MCMAP) and run through these "obstacles" while war-crying. Fake war noises play over speakers that are overlooking the course. I'm pretty sure it's just sounds from the opening of Saving Private Ryan too. Ghetto Marine Corps.
There's not too much to say about it. We run the course in groups of four after four Drill Instructors demonstrate the entire thing for us.
I remember a few of us were laughing at Sgt. Parada because he just looked funny in his kevlar. We never see DIs wearing anything other than a campaign cover unless they're not wearing their campaign cover.
When we complete this course, I've gained and accomplished nothing.
T22 - Movement to WFTB
For the past week, Sgt. Virto has been giving us introductory "classes" when we do our guided discussions. He talks a little bit about what 2nd phase is going to be like, he talks about Edson Range (the area of Camp Pendleton where it takes place) and some of the things we'll doing.
He explains the procedures of going through the chow hall there and setting up the armory formation for weapons maintenance in the squad bay. We're also shown how to make our racks differently. We use our second green blanket as a "dust cover" for out pillow, as it's apparently dusty and dirty where we're going.
Note: It is VERY dusty at Edson Range.
Today is the day where we move to Pendleton for the next three weeks. The previous night, we had to pack our seabags. Every time I do this during Recruit Training, I get really worked up and pissed off because It's always a real hassle to get everything in a seabag and close it. I don't remember all what I have to throw away, but I know I end up losing some stuff so I have room for the essentials.
I never throw away a single letter I received at Boot Camp, and I still have them all at home.
October 27, 2009
Camp Lejeune
9:51
I took a break in the middle of this entry, my apologies.
Where was I? Moving to Pendleton for 2nd Phase?
I remember each of us having one seabag. In the morning we have to go outside to stage these seabags in formation either before or after we eat, but it's still dark out.
I tightened the straps on my seabag completely, which is a mistake because the seabag is totally full. What does this mean? This means that when I put the seabag on (how I did this I don't know) that it was so tight, the circulation in my arms starts getting cut off immediately.
As we're walking in formation I start getting a little distressed here. It took me a second to actually get my arms through the straps. How am I supposed to get them off? ("Good question," I think to myself.)
The circulation in my arms starts getting cut off so bad that my hands are tingling and it gets difficult to reach my shoulders with my hands. I think I panic a little more than what is reasonable for something like this to happen, but it's more due to the attitudes of everyone else. If I was with a group of friends, I probably wouldn't worry about it, but since I'm around essentially a large group of vultures who don't care about anyone but themselves, I get a little worried.
I know I asked Montgomery, who at this point in time had a designated spot near me in formation, to help me out. He gives it a go but gives up. I think finally I asked him again and we got it off my back.
This sounds silly looking back on it, but if a DI was to notice me struggling with something so minuscule I probably would've been given a hard time.
After we stage our seabags, some other stuff happens and when the sun comes out, a few white trucks pull up. At this point we've already stacked our weapons in formation perfectly since our drill is crisp fresh out of Initial Drill.
The white trucks are to load all our seabags onto. This happens by many platoons combining and making a chain where we roll the seabags down the middle and then throw them into the trucks. This takes maybe twenty-five minutes and the trucks are loaded. The trucks leave and then we have to go back, get in formation, grab our weapons, and go to the buses.
Names are read off and our platoon is chopped into at least two buses by alphabetical order. I'm on Sgt. Saldana's bus, and this doesn't exactly thrill me. If you haven't gathered this yet, he is the most strict of the DIs. He's the designated monster.
We get on the buses, which are the same buses that picked us up from the airport on the first fateful night. I don't recall who I sit next to, but I'm sitting right behind Sgt. Saldana, who's in the front row. No one is allowed to sleep on the bus, in fact we have work to do.
A few days prior, we'd been givin a brief period of instruction on sewing.
Our task to accomplish on he bus ride is to sew on a laminated "name-tape" to the back of our cover.
I'm not sure if I've covered it or not, but I'm constantly making name-tapes laminated every week and using my marking kit to stamp my name on it. It reads "MILAS, JS" in elongated letters. It's stamped into a 1x6 inch strip of paper cut from a note card and then laminated with clear packing tape. This is what I have to sew onto the back of my cover.
Specifically, it needs to be sewn on so that there are six x-shaped string patterns on the outside of the cover. Also, we have to sew a button onto the inside on the top of the cover.
The entire ride, I basically bullshit this so I can look out the windows of the bus. This is the first time I've seen the outside world since August, and it's now October. Let me tell you, southern California is a beautiful area despite the fact that so many people from there are assholes. The scenery and countryside is quite breathtaking.
The ride lasted maybe an hour from MCRD to Camp Pendleton, which I was a little excited to see, and a little nervous about. This would mark my first time on an actual Marine Corps Base. Pendleton marks a change in scenery. The area is a little more desert-like and more natural. There's less development. This of course is totally re-inforced when we finally reach the gate to Edson Range: one of the most desolate and depressing locations I've ever been to.
Do me a favor and search "Edson Range" on google and go to the images. It might not look so bad, but imagine living at this place. Everything is constantly dry and dusty. One of the three days there was rain during my time in Boot Camp took place at Edson, but the water evaporated so fast it was like it never happened. The place has no color. Everything's just kind of a sickly brown, and the buildings are white. I bet if you went a week without showering there you'd have a coat of dirt on your skin jut because there's so much in the air.
Well, moving to a new place obviously means we're going to get screwed with. There's too much stuff for us to do in a short period of time for things to go smooth. The buses all end up in a large parking area, which doubles as the parade deck here. We get off with our rifles and start unloading seabags, then we go to our barracks. These buildings only have two levels and eight squadbays instead of twelve.
When we get inside our second floor squad bay (my platoon never catches a break, we moved out of a third story squadbay to a second story) I realize how life is going to be here: dirty. The floor looks really dusty. Everything just hits me in a way that brings me down.
We throw the seabags onto a pile since not everyone has theirs and we start doing something dreadful:
"Wagonwheel formation!"
"Wagonwheel formation, aye aye, sir!"
We start walking in a circle around the squadbay and when we get to the quarter deck we grab a seabag. Still, not everyone has theirs. We're walking while bear hugging these seabags and Sgt. Virto starts playing games. We have to stop and squat with the seabags, legs parralel to the deck. This means that our knees form a 90 degree angle. This, you know, is fairly impossible to do while bear hugging a sea bag for a long period of time, so naturally:
"Good, Fletscher doesn't want to have his legs parallel to the deck! Wagonwheel formation!"
And so on and so forth. This goes on for a while until Mellies becomes so tormented that he drops his seabag and goes to pound on the hatch to the duty hut, where SSgt. Arzola has been for a few minutes.
"Good afternoon gentlemen! Recruit Mellies requests permission to speak to Senior Drill Instructor Staff Sergeant Arzola!"
I haven't really covered it too much, but I did mention that I called it. Mellies was the Pvt. Pyle of our platoon, much like the one showcased in Full Metal Jacket. At this point, Mellies tries to quit. He actually tries to quit boot camp here. Of course the rest of us are still bear hugging sea bags or making our racks or whatever, but he's trying to quit.
Well, it doesn't work, so we go on tollerating him.
After the flip-flopping of Syer and Samuels as guide, it's become pretty apparent that Syer will be 1067's guide for the rest of Recruit Training.
The squad leaders have become Pavlik, Kinney, Uzzel, and the fourth's name is escaping me. It starts with a W and I can picture his face very well. Wilkerson? I don't know.
Rohl is the scribe, Ramirez J is the firewatch scribe.
I don't recall the Whiskey Locker recruits. I belive Power is still one of them at this point, but he is eventually replaced sometime during 2nd or 3rd Phase.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Boot Camp Part 18
October 13, 2009
Camp Lejeune
15:10
T20 - Swim Qual
T20 is one of those days I wake up and scream "yay" mentally. It's the 20th day of training. It's really no big deal; there are like 60 days of training or something, but it's a milestone for me.
Qualifying 2nd class only involves two things. I have to swim the entire length of the pool with a helmet, flack jacket, and rifle, but no pack. This means I'm heavier and I have no flotation device. I'm not sure if I had to do this with my feet out in front of me like before, but I don't think I did. By the time I get to the end, I'm exhausted and it takes the added assistance of the designated helper recruits to pull me out.
The other thing we have to do is swim about half the length of the pool while pulling another recruit who's wearing a "main pack." After that he has to pull me back the other way. This ends up not being too hard for me because I just use the other guy as a flotation device. The whole time I'm pushing him down to keep myself up (which might be defeating the purpose) and his face is almost underwater, but we make it. I remember who I did it with, but I can't remember his name. He's one of Fletcher's best friends through the experience and I believe he's actually from San Diego.
That ends Swim Qual. It goes by fast and it's easy. I did the best I could, which was THE best possible: 2nd Class. It's not that much of an accomplishment really, but there are people who only get 3rd or 4th class. In my opinion that's actually kind of pathetic. The required tasks to perform are so simple; they're not scary like they may sound.
T21 - Confidence Course 2
The matrix I'm using as a reference shows today as being Pugil Sticks III, but we didn't do that until 3rd phase, and I know we did the second part of the confidence course during 1st phase.
The first time we do the confidence course, it's the low, easy obstacles. The second time we do it, it's the obstacles that make me want to crap my pants. I'm afraid of heights and some of these things are like thirty feet high. That doesn't sound like much, but when you're afraid of heights and you get to the top and look down...
Well, the whole thing starts off on the wrong foot from the beginning. We split up into groups of maybe twenty, and my group gets screamed at by SSgt. Green (1068's SDI) from the very beginning. He seems like he's in a pretty irritable mood.
SSgt. Freeman (1068's J hat) was making us "in place double time" and I guess I half ass it because SSgt. Green calls ME out specifically.
"Destroy him!" he says to SSgt. Freeman.
SSgt. Freeman proceeds to "destroy" me for about 45 seconds. I makes me hold out a rubber rifle (arms parallel to the deck), run in place, and war cry at the top of my lunges. The whole time he's also telling me to bring my knees up to the rifle and touch it, but also to keep my arms parallel to the deck. This is impossible for anyone who doesn't have unlimited energy, so it just goes on until my group moves on. The first obstacle we're at (there are three) is the stairway to heaven. This is all going on while we're waiting behind another group to climb up it. The stairway to heaven is a gigantic ladder made out of wood and as you reach the top, the steps get farther apart. Thankfully I end up not having to do it because PMSing SSgt. Green kicks our group off of it and none of us do it. If you can't visualize this obstacle, think of Full Metal Jackey. Pyle barely climbs over the top as Joker sits at the top and motivates him.
The next obstacle is the A-Frame. The A-Frame almost made me piss myself.
It involves climbing a rope (which I can barely do), grabbing onto a log and pulling yourself on top of the obstacle. Then you run (or walk as I did) across these logs for ten feet or so. Between the logs is about eight inches of space, so the whole time I'm looking down maybe twenty five feet at these rubber wood-chip things. Not to mention I thought I was going to die when I tried to get off the rope and initially pull myself up. It actually took an adrenaline rush because I was sure I was going to fall off.
When you walk across the logs, you encounter SSgt. Morales (1066's SDI) who tells you to "move!" "hurry up!" "what're you doing!" and you walk over to the actual A-shaped ladder. You climb this ladder which takes you even higher. It's leaning out over dead space at maybe a 70 degree angle and it's got a rope hanging off of it.
If you're me, you're hyperventelating at this point, and Clark, one of your platoon-mates, is trying to calm you down from the other side of the obstacle. There are two lanes on it for two people to do it at once.
Now you have to reach out over a possibly 30 foot drop and grab a rope. Once you work up the courage to actually only hold onto the wooden obstacle with one hand and hold the rope with the other hand, you have to grab the rope with your other hand while maintaining your footing. Step 2? Push yourself off and swing back and forth 30 feet from the ground.
When you finish soiling yourself you start lowering yourself down, hand over hand. If you slide, you skin your hands, and you go to MRP for a month probably.
I hit the ground and take a deep breath. I don't think I breathed the entire time I moved down the last rope.
The next obstacle? "The Slide for Life"
Hm, slide for your life...does that mean I'm going to die if I don't slide?
This obstacle marks my second encounter with Staff Sergeant Green.
This obstacle involves climbing down a rubber rope head first, and not hanging from it. It's at maybe a 30 degree angle, and it's kind of scary. What I mean by not hanging is that you are on top of the rope, using your feet and legs to kind of balance yourself. There's a net under you in case you fall, which is a little more reassuring than the stairway to heaven, which just has a mat underneath.
About a third of the way down I'm told to change position on the rope. I swing my legs down and back up so I'm hanging on the rope, but my feet are going first now. After maybe six feet I'm told to go to a hanging position. When I drop my feet, they hit the edge of the net.
SSgt Green watching me from the side of the swimming pool below: "Oh, good, you wanna touch the net? POA now."
Me: Utter disbelief. I'd been doing so well. I'm mastering this obstacle. No way. I'm not dropping off the rope into the water. Look, SSgt. Arzola is right next to him. Maybe he'll negate what SSgt. Green says and tell me to finish the obstacle. I wait on the rope, hanging by my hands staring at them like a fool.
SSgt. Green: "POSITION...OF...ATTENTION...NOW!"
Me: Oh well. He pretty much made everyone else from 1067 drop off the rope anyway.
I go to position of attention in mid-air. Legs straight, feet at a 45 degree angle pointing outward. Arms locked at my sides, elbows tight to my waist. Hands in a fist against my trouser seam.
I sail through the air like this maybe eight feet into the water.
My boots are wet for the rest of the day, even after being aired out in the squadbay while I take a shower with everyone else SSgt. Green stopped from finishing the obstacle.
Here is a Google Maps picture of each of the obstacles. Kind of hard to see them, but you can see the shadows.
Stairway to Heaven
A-Frame
Slide for Life
Camp Lejeune
15:10
T20 - Swim Qual
T20 is one of those days I wake up and scream "yay" mentally. It's the 20th day of training. It's really no big deal; there are like 60 days of training or something, but it's a milestone for me.
Qualifying 2nd class only involves two things. I have to swim the entire length of the pool with a helmet, flack jacket, and rifle, but no pack. This means I'm heavier and I have no flotation device. I'm not sure if I had to do this with my feet out in front of me like before, but I don't think I did. By the time I get to the end, I'm exhausted and it takes the added assistance of the designated helper recruits to pull me out.
The other thing we have to do is swim about half the length of the pool while pulling another recruit who's wearing a "main pack." After that he has to pull me back the other way. This ends up not being too hard for me because I just use the other guy as a flotation device. The whole time I'm pushing him down to keep myself up (which might be defeating the purpose) and his face is almost underwater, but we make it. I remember who I did it with, but I can't remember his name. He's one of Fletcher's best friends through the experience and I believe he's actually from San Diego.
That ends Swim Qual. It goes by fast and it's easy. I did the best I could, which was THE best possible: 2nd Class. It's not that much of an accomplishment really, but there are people who only get 3rd or 4th class. In my opinion that's actually kind of pathetic. The required tasks to perform are so simple; they're not scary like they may sound.
T21 - Confidence Course 2
The matrix I'm using as a reference shows today as being Pugil Sticks III, but we didn't do that until 3rd phase, and I know we did the second part of the confidence course during 1st phase.
The first time we do the confidence course, it's the low, easy obstacles. The second time we do it, it's the obstacles that make me want to crap my pants. I'm afraid of heights and some of these things are like thirty feet high. That doesn't sound like much, but when you're afraid of heights and you get to the top and look down...
Well, the whole thing starts off on the wrong foot from the beginning. We split up into groups of maybe twenty, and my group gets screamed at by SSgt. Green (1068's SDI) from the very beginning. He seems like he's in a pretty irritable mood.
SSgt. Freeman (1068's J hat) was making us "in place double time" and I guess I half ass it because SSgt. Green calls ME out specifically.
"Destroy him!" he says to SSgt. Freeman.
SSgt. Freeman proceeds to "destroy" me for about 45 seconds. I makes me hold out a rubber rifle (arms parallel to the deck), run in place, and war cry at the top of my lunges. The whole time he's also telling me to bring my knees up to the rifle and touch it, but also to keep my arms parallel to the deck. This is impossible for anyone who doesn't have unlimited energy, so it just goes on until my group moves on. The first obstacle we're at (there are three) is the stairway to heaven. This is all going on while we're waiting behind another group to climb up it. The stairway to heaven is a gigantic ladder made out of wood and as you reach the top, the steps get farther apart. Thankfully I end up not having to do it because PMSing SSgt. Green kicks our group off of it and none of us do it. If you can't visualize this obstacle, think of Full Metal Jackey. Pyle barely climbs over the top as Joker sits at the top and motivates him.
The next obstacle is the A-Frame. The A-Frame almost made me piss myself.
It involves climbing a rope (which I can barely do), grabbing onto a log and pulling yourself on top of the obstacle. Then you run (or walk as I did) across these logs for ten feet or so. Between the logs is about eight inches of space, so the whole time I'm looking down maybe twenty five feet at these rubber wood-chip things. Not to mention I thought I was going to die when I tried to get off the rope and initially pull myself up. It actually took an adrenaline rush because I was sure I was going to fall off.
When you walk across the logs, you encounter SSgt. Morales (1066's SDI) who tells you to "move!" "hurry up!" "what're you doing!" and you walk over to the actual A-shaped ladder. You climb this ladder which takes you even higher. It's leaning out over dead space at maybe a 70 degree angle and it's got a rope hanging off of it.
If you're me, you're hyperventelating at this point, and Clark, one of your platoon-mates, is trying to calm you down from the other side of the obstacle. There are two lanes on it for two people to do it at once.
Now you have to reach out over a possibly 30 foot drop and grab a rope. Once you work up the courage to actually only hold onto the wooden obstacle with one hand and hold the rope with the other hand, you have to grab the rope with your other hand while maintaining your footing. Step 2? Push yourself off and swing back and forth 30 feet from the ground.
When you finish soiling yourself you start lowering yourself down, hand over hand. If you slide, you skin your hands, and you go to MRP for a month probably.
I hit the ground and take a deep breath. I don't think I breathed the entire time I moved down the last rope.
The next obstacle? "The Slide for Life"
Hm, slide for your life...does that mean I'm going to die if I don't slide?
This obstacle marks my second encounter with Staff Sergeant Green.
This obstacle involves climbing down a rubber rope head first, and not hanging from it. It's at maybe a 30 degree angle, and it's kind of scary. What I mean by not hanging is that you are on top of the rope, using your feet and legs to kind of balance yourself. There's a net under you in case you fall, which is a little more reassuring than the stairway to heaven, which just has a mat underneath.
About a third of the way down I'm told to change position on the rope. I swing my legs down and back up so I'm hanging on the rope, but my feet are going first now. After maybe six feet I'm told to go to a hanging position. When I drop my feet, they hit the edge of the net.
SSgt Green watching me from the side of the swimming pool below: "Oh, good, you wanna touch the net? POA now."
Me: Utter disbelief. I'd been doing so well. I'm mastering this obstacle. No way. I'm not dropping off the rope into the water. Look, SSgt. Arzola is right next to him. Maybe he'll negate what SSgt. Green says and tell me to finish the obstacle. I wait on the rope, hanging by my hands staring at them like a fool.
SSgt. Green: "POSITION...OF...ATTENTION...NOW!"
Me: Oh well. He pretty much made everyone else from 1067 drop off the rope anyway.
I go to position of attention in mid-air. Legs straight, feet at a 45 degree angle pointing outward. Arms locked at my sides, elbows tight to my waist. Hands in a fist against my trouser seam.
I sail through the air like this maybe eight feet into the water.
My boots are wet for the rest of the day, even after being aired out in the squadbay while I take a shower with everyone else SSgt. Green stopped from finishing the obstacle.
Here is a Google Maps picture of each of the obstacles. Kind of hard to see them, but you can see the shadows.
Stairway to Heaven
A-Frame
Slide for Life
Monday, October 12, 2009
Boot Camp Part 17
October 12, 2009
Camp Lejeune
14:52
Sunday
Church goes the same as it always does. I get really sad and get pissed off at people who go who probably aren't Lutherans. Actually, nevermind. The behavior displayed by those who didn't really give a rat's ass about being in church is pretty close to actual Lutherans, so I'll take that back.
Every Sunday I fight to do laundry. Cammies and other clothes must be washed and dried, but there's hardly any opportunity to wash clothes because the washers and driers are swamped by people trying to do laundry. If I didn't go to church and just did laundry as early as possible than it wouldn't be an issue, but I don't want to sacrifice that time of the week. It helps to keep me somewhat sane.
I end up getting a washer, but I dont' have enough time to dry my clothes. I take my wet cammies back up to the whiskey locker and put them on a shelf to dry later during free time, because I have a certain time to be back in the squadbay by.
I NEVER saw those cammies again. Someone took my wet cammies. Guess what? The next time I wore clean cammies wasn't or another four weeks at least. I was left with one set of deserts for Swim Week and all of second phase. But that's just how Boot Camp works. It distinguishes the scum bags from the good people. The people who only care about themselves and have no real reason to be in the Marine Corps.
There were times on firewatch where I'd take my moon beam (flashlight) and check everyone's cammies hanging up on their rack to find the ones with my name marked in them. I never ended up finding them that way. By the end of 3rd phase I ended up having to buy a whole set of deserts, along with another woodland blouse and possibly even ANOTHER desert one.
Needless to say, that Sunday put me in a pretty bad mood, but the flip side was that I felt great. I didn't even take my bed rest because I didn't need it. I'd pretty much beaten pneumonia in a week, but I think I may have had it for a week before I realized I'd had it.
T18 - Swim Qual(ification) Begins
Swim week is probably the easiest and most laid back week in all of Boot Camp. It's when you first start getting treated a little better. Sgt. Virto told us we were only 1st Phase recruits in name only and he felt that we were 2nd Phase as soon as we finished Initial Drill.
The day works like this:
We make our swim rolls (which is a bunch of crap rolled up in a towel) and march to the swim tank. That's the pool if you can't figure it out.
We strip down in a big room with a bunch of cubby holes in the wall until all we're wearing is our green PT shorts. Then we all file through this hallway which is spraying freezing water on us to clean us off before we go in the pool.
Once through the halls we end up in a room with a bunch of boots and cammies. They are the worst boots and cammies the Marine Corps has to offer. They're worn every day by different people, missung buttons, boots missing laces, torn, you name it. My boots were different sizes, my heel was sticking out the back of one of them. Then we sit on these bleachers and wait our turn to jump off a diving board. After that we line up and put on a helmet and flack jacket and walk through the water.
I don't remember how the rest of 4th Class worked. It was pathetically easy. This information is probably available in the internet, but I'm not too concerned with finding it.
After we're done with 4th Class (which takes about 300x longer to accomplish than the time it took you to read my description) we go back into the cubby hole room to get our war bags with our uniforms in them. For some reason every DI is doing the same thing. They act like we're not sounding off enough and when we try and get our stuff out of our bags they say:
"Let me help you with that!" and they throw everything out of the bag all over the place. They didn't get me too bad, but I realized it was some kind of routine that must have been scheduled for today because they all did it and they were all saying the same thing.
T19 - Swim Qual Part 2
Now that I had finished Fourth Class, it was onto Third.
Did I mention swim qual is a joke? Basically, once Initial Drill is done, all the stress is over until rifle qualification. It's almost like a break from REAL training and is just kind of something to fill the schedule. Marines are amphibious, so I guess they really need to learn how to swim, but proving it is one of the easiest things I had to do at MCRD.
There were actually people who couldn't swim and had to spend the first two days of the week learning how so that they could qualify as fourth class on Wednesday. Sucks for them, I qualified as 2nd class and don't have to re-qualify until 2011.
Anyway, 3rd class. We do the same thing again: march over to the swim tank, take our clothes off, and put on the terrible boots and cammies. 3rd class involves jumping off the five foot diving board in full gear and then using the emergency releases to remove the large pack you're wearing, all the while not losing your M16. That's an automatic UNQ.
After that, we swim a certain length using the pack as a flotation device and then get out of the water. I don't think there was much after that. Of course for everyone in the series to do this takes about 500,000 hours.
The DIs send us back to the squadbay in groups of ten and then literally just sit around and do nothing until everyone else returns.
That concludes T19. On swim qual days I don't even think we had classes. On most T days, there's some kind of class that takes place in the morning before whatever the matrix has for that day is completed.
Camp Lejeune
14:52
Sunday
Church goes the same as it always does. I get really sad and get pissed off at people who go who probably aren't Lutherans. Actually, nevermind. The behavior displayed by those who didn't really give a rat's ass about being in church is pretty close to actual Lutherans, so I'll take that back.
Every Sunday I fight to do laundry. Cammies and other clothes must be washed and dried, but there's hardly any opportunity to wash clothes because the washers and driers are swamped by people trying to do laundry. If I didn't go to church and just did laundry as early as possible than it wouldn't be an issue, but I don't want to sacrifice that time of the week. It helps to keep me somewhat sane.
I end up getting a washer, but I dont' have enough time to dry my clothes. I take my wet cammies back up to the whiskey locker and put them on a shelf to dry later during free time, because I have a certain time to be back in the squadbay by.
I NEVER saw those cammies again. Someone took my wet cammies. Guess what? The next time I wore clean cammies wasn't or another four weeks at least. I was left with one set of deserts for Swim Week and all of second phase. But that's just how Boot Camp works. It distinguishes the scum bags from the good people. The people who only care about themselves and have no real reason to be in the Marine Corps.
There were times on firewatch where I'd take my moon beam (flashlight) and check everyone's cammies hanging up on their rack to find the ones with my name marked in them. I never ended up finding them that way. By the end of 3rd phase I ended up having to buy a whole set of deserts, along with another woodland blouse and possibly even ANOTHER desert one.
Needless to say, that Sunday put me in a pretty bad mood, but the flip side was that I felt great. I didn't even take my bed rest because I didn't need it. I'd pretty much beaten pneumonia in a week, but I think I may have had it for a week before I realized I'd had it.
T18 - Swim Qual(ification) Begins
Swim week is probably the easiest and most laid back week in all of Boot Camp. It's when you first start getting treated a little better. Sgt. Virto told us we were only 1st Phase recruits in name only and he felt that we were 2nd Phase as soon as we finished Initial Drill.
The day works like this:
We make our swim rolls (which is a bunch of crap rolled up in a towel) and march to the swim tank. That's the pool if you can't figure it out.
We strip down in a big room with a bunch of cubby holes in the wall until all we're wearing is our green PT shorts. Then we all file through this hallway which is spraying freezing water on us to clean us off before we go in the pool.
Once through the halls we end up in a room with a bunch of boots and cammies. They are the worst boots and cammies the Marine Corps has to offer. They're worn every day by different people, missung buttons, boots missing laces, torn, you name it. My boots were different sizes, my heel was sticking out the back of one of them. Then we sit on these bleachers and wait our turn to jump off a diving board. After that we line up and put on a helmet and flack jacket and walk through the water.
I don't remember how the rest of 4th Class worked. It was pathetically easy. This information is probably available in the internet, but I'm not too concerned with finding it.
After we're done with 4th Class (which takes about 300x longer to accomplish than the time it took you to read my description) we go back into the cubby hole room to get our war bags with our uniforms in them. For some reason every DI is doing the same thing. They act like we're not sounding off enough and when we try and get our stuff out of our bags they say:
"Let me help you with that!" and they throw everything out of the bag all over the place. They didn't get me too bad, but I realized it was some kind of routine that must have been scheduled for today because they all did it and they were all saying the same thing.
T19 - Swim Qual Part 2
Now that I had finished Fourth Class, it was onto Third.
Did I mention swim qual is a joke? Basically, once Initial Drill is done, all the stress is over until rifle qualification. It's almost like a break from REAL training and is just kind of something to fill the schedule. Marines are amphibious, so I guess they really need to learn how to swim, but proving it is one of the easiest things I had to do at MCRD.
There were actually people who couldn't swim and had to spend the first two days of the week learning how so that they could qualify as fourth class on Wednesday. Sucks for them, I qualified as 2nd class and don't have to re-qualify until 2011.
Anyway, 3rd class. We do the same thing again: march over to the swim tank, take our clothes off, and put on the terrible boots and cammies. 3rd class involves jumping off the five foot diving board in full gear and then using the emergency releases to remove the large pack you're wearing, all the while not losing your M16. That's an automatic UNQ.
After that, we swim a certain length using the pack as a flotation device and then get out of the water. I don't think there was much after that. Of course for everyone in the series to do this takes about 500,000 hours.
The DIs send us back to the squadbay in groups of ten and then literally just sit around and do nothing until everyone else returns.
That concludes T19. On swim qual days I don't even think we had classes. On most T days, there's some kind of class that takes place in the morning before whatever the matrix has for that day is completed.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Boot Camp Part 16
October 6, 2009
Camp Lejeune
11:42
T - 15
I wake up on the Thursday morning to Drill Instructors that are STILL very angry about the whole graffiti thing. The previous day, I'd missed my opportunity to acquire my military ID, so there was now something that would be hanging over my head until 3rd Phase: my next chance to get it.
Today is the Tug of War day. Personally, I feel that this day is pointless anyway, but not only because I didn't get to engage in the activity. I'm now on Light Duty, which means I can't participate in any drilling and can't march in the formations anywhere we go. I also get to wear my shoes instead of the boots.
Secretly, I'm enjoying this day. The only thing that really sucks about it is that I'm CONSTANTLY cleaning the squad bay with the others on light duty. I will end up being in the squadbay for the next two days straight, which led to an amusing story involving Rodriguez, but this day is rather boring. Instead of getting to sleep, I have to sweep almost non-stop since there's nothing else for me to do while everyone else PTs.
Also, there's a gear-guard duty that takes place during the day. It's much like firewatch actually. One of the recruits stands behind the podium made of three stacked footlockers and stands guard. I did this several times and it's painfully mundane and mind numbing.
Not much happens on T-15 for me. Tomorrow is the Senior Drill Instructor inspection and then Saturday is initial drill. Near the end of the day, we are taken out to practice drill for Initial Drill. I put my boots on and join in, even though I'm clearly sick. Everytime I breath in, I feel a popping sensation
T - 16 Senior Drill Instructor Inspection
I miss the SDI inspection by SSgt. Arzola because of my follow up appointment at medical the following day. Same routine, different day. As usual.
I head over to the medical facility adjacent to my current barracks and fill out the CHIT, saying that I have a follow up for pneumonia. I sit for hours. The DIs walking around the area discover us all sitting outside waiting, some people following asleep, so they "play games."
"Ok, stand up right now!"
And we scream a response and stand up. Then we sit down. Then we stand up. This happens a few times. Then of course there's the short, fat, black woman scampering about screaming at recruits like she's a DI as well. On top of that the female corpsman are making me nervous, and as it so ends up I'm waiting outside the office of one of them.
I'm sitting in the hall, Indian style (left knee over right knee as it's referred to). Inside the office I'm outside of I can here this chic straight bitching at the recruits that go in before me.
"I didn't ask you that!" I hear her yell at one of them, who's just mumbling answers at her that I can't hear.
My blood pressure probably starts to rise as I'm nervous to go in and be yelled at. I mean, come on, lady. It's not my fault I got sick and I'd rather be training than be seeing a doctor, or a doctor wannabe who's going to give me Motrin.
Finally, it's my turn. She's actually pretty nice to me because I don't answer any more or any less of the questions she asks me from her computer. She becomes a little more compassionate toward my cause when I explain the odd popping sensation in my chest when I breath. She names it a really long complicated name that starts with a "C" and leave to bring in some other guy to check it out. They feel my ribs when I breath deeply and come to some conclusion that my sickness has become more complicated.
Did I mention I feel like crap?
This all goes on for a little bit. He leaves. She starts checking me out again. Eyes, noes, ears, etc.
Well, then she starts getting pretty worked up. My ears are dirty, and this is aggravating for her because she has to clean them for me. I don't really say much...what can I say? Sorry? No, you don't have to clean them, I'll get it myself.
Well, she cleans them with this horrifying stick thing and it really hurts. It makes me cough.
She says, "This always makes people cough, but I don't know why," and I'm wondering Well if you don't know why the body works, than why should I trust you?
They give me more medicine. She ends up writing me a new SIQ CHIT saying that I have THREE DAYS OF BEDREST. This kind of worries me. Sure, I'm thinking 'THIS IS GOING TO BE AWESOME,' but I'm also thinking that I don't want to miss too much training and get held back...
I really don't want to be stuck here longer than I have to. I mean, if you've been following this then you realize how much life sucks. I'm not going into every little detail about Boot Camp, but you've seen Full Metal Jacket right? It's just like that except they don't choke us.
I take the CHIT and return to the empty squad bay, where Rodriguez is standing post. He makes some comment and jockingly makes fun of me. This is how our friendship sort of began; talking crap to each other.
It's easy to make friends in Boot Camp because there's a common enemy, and that's what unites Americans.
I put my medicine away after taking more if it and change out of my cammies into "Green on Green" (PT shorts and green skivvy shirt) and lay down on my rack.
At some point I fade back into concsiousness. Rodriguez salutes two DIs (who I don't recognize) entering the squad bay and reports in.
"Good afternoon gentleman! Recruit Rodriguez reports Building 525, Squadbay C3, all secure at this time. There are three recruits on deck. 96 M16A2 service rifles and 96 United States Marine Corps foot lockers are all locked and secure at this time. There is nothing unusual to report at this time, sir!"
That's not verbatim, but it's pretty close. That's what you say to a DI coming into the squadbay if you're standing on post at night during firewatch, or during the day on gear guard duty. Of course one of two things happen here.
Scenario 1: You screw up and stutter, or don't remember what to say. The Drill Instructor you report in to approaches you and demands that you say it again, louder, faster. He wants more confidence and self assuredness. If you're a little bitch about it, then he won't leave you alone.
Scenario 2: You do it perfectly and loud, and the DI ignores you.
Sometimes the DI doesn't give a crap anyway and just ignores you altogether. That's what these two DIs did to Rodriguez. They walked right past him and into the duty hut, which left him reporting into no one.
I'm lying there watching, the DIs didn't find any of 1067's DIs in the squad bay, so the leave. When a DI exits the squad bay you give another verbal greating.
These two didn't really have anything else to do, since they couldn't talke with our DIs for whatever reason they needed to.
They left the squadbay. Then the jumped back in through the door. Rodriguez had to report in again because they crossed the threshold.
Sometimes our Company Commander 1st Lieutenent Doersheck did this. He'd stand on the other side of the threshold and leave us waiting or the exact moment to call attention on deck. He'd raise a foot and juke us out a few times.
These two DIs started alternating which one went through the door. One would jump in and one would jump out. Then the one who was out would jump in and the one who was in would jump out. They did this for about twenty seconds with Rodriguz screaming "GOOD AFTERNOON SIR! GOOD AFTERNOON SIR! GOOD AFTERNOON SIR!" several times.
I covered my face with the blanket so they wouldn't see me laughing, which they were trying hard not to do themselves. Eventually they left. Rodriguez was out of breath. Then everything went back to the way it was. He was forced to stand there for probably another two hours straight without any kind of relief, and I went to sleep.
T - 17 Initial Drill
"Lights lights lights lights lights! Get outta the rack! Get up! Let's go! Get up! Well you have 100 99 98 97 96 95 94..."
We jump up and get online and count off to make sure everyone's there. Go through the entire routine and start getting dressed.
This is Day 2 out of 3 for me and SIQ. Sgt. Virto notices that I'm not getting dressed and he comes over.
"Why aren't you getting dressed, Milas?" he asks.
"This recruit's on bed rest, sir!"
"They put you on two days of bed rest?"
"Three days, sir!"
Somehow, he detects a smart ass tone in my voice, which I wasn't intending. He flips out and tells me he's not in the mood for my attitude.
I yell "Aye aye, sir!" because I can't really disagree with him. He says for integrity's sake he wants me to get dressed and go to morning chow. He wants to personally check with medical about my chit, because I'm betting he's never had a recruit get three days of bed rest in a row before.
It would've been cleared up, but my CHIT was missing from the scribe's desk, and I have no idea what Rohl had done with it.
So to make a long story short, I don't get to go back to sleep until maybe nine o'clock. Sgt. Virto finally confirms it and sends me back to the rack. I think Sgt. Virto ended up trusting me after this event because he found out I wasn't lyign or trying to stretch the truth or bend the truth.
I slept through initial drill. Everyone came back. We ended up getting 2nd place in the company after 1066 got first. The DIs were in a fairly good mood. Now we can blouse our boots and unbutton the top buttons on our blouses to look a little more like "real Marines."
Everyone earns a 10 minute phone call home, but since I'm on bed rest, I don't end up making a phone call until November.
Camp Lejeune
11:42
T - 15
I wake up on the Thursday morning to Drill Instructors that are STILL very angry about the whole graffiti thing. The previous day, I'd missed my opportunity to acquire my military ID, so there was now something that would be hanging over my head until 3rd Phase: my next chance to get it.
Today is the Tug of War day. Personally, I feel that this day is pointless anyway, but not only because I didn't get to engage in the activity. I'm now on Light Duty, which means I can't participate in any drilling and can't march in the formations anywhere we go. I also get to wear my shoes instead of the boots.
Secretly, I'm enjoying this day. The only thing that really sucks about it is that I'm CONSTANTLY cleaning the squad bay with the others on light duty. I will end up being in the squadbay for the next two days straight, which led to an amusing story involving Rodriguez, but this day is rather boring. Instead of getting to sleep, I have to sweep almost non-stop since there's nothing else for me to do while everyone else PTs.
Also, there's a gear-guard duty that takes place during the day. It's much like firewatch actually. One of the recruits stands behind the podium made of three stacked footlockers and stands guard. I did this several times and it's painfully mundane and mind numbing.
Not much happens on T-15 for me. Tomorrow is the Senior Drill Instructor inspection and then Saturday is initial drill. Near the end of the day, we are taken out to practice drill for Initial Drill. I put my boots on and join in, even though I'm clearly sick. Everytime I breath in, I feel a popping sensation
T - 16 Senior Drill Instructor Inspection
I miss the SDI inspection by SSgt. Arzola because of my follow up appointment at medical the following day. Same routine, different day. As usual.
I head over to the medical facility adjacent to my current barracks and fill out the CHIT, saying that I have a follow up for pneumonia. I sit for hours. The DIs walking around the area discover us all sitting outside waiting, some people following asleep, so they "play games."
"Ok, stand up right now!"
And we scream a response and stand up. Then we sit down. Then we stand up. This happens a few times. Then of course there's the short, fat, black woman scampering about screaming at recruits like she's a DI as well. On top of that the female corpsman are making me nervous, and as it so ends up I'm waiting outside the office of one of them.
I'm sitting in the hall, Indian style (left knee over right knee as it's referred to). Inside the office I'm outside of I can here this chic straight bitching at the recruits that go in before me.
"I didn't ask you that!" I hear her yell at one of them, who's just mumbling answers at her that I can't hear.
My blood pressure probably starts to rise as I'm nervous to go in and be yelled at. I mean, come on, lady. It's not my fault I got sick and I'd rather be training than be seeing a doctor, or a doctor wannabe who's going to give me Motrin.
Finally, it's my turn. She's actually pretty nice to me because I don't answer any more or any less of the questions she asks me from her computer. She becomes a little more compassionate toward my cause when I explain the odd popping sensation in my chest when I breath. She names it a really long complicated name that starts with a "C" and leave to bring in some other guy to check it out. They feel my ribs when I breath deeply and come to some conclusion that my sickness has become more complicated.
Did I mention I feel like crap?
This all goes on for a little bit. He leaves. She starts checking me out again. Eyes, noes, ears, etc.
Well, then she starts getting pretty worked up. My ears are dirty, and this is aggravating for her because she has to clean them for me. I don't really say much...what can I say? Sorry? No, you don't have to clean them, I'll get it myself.
Well, she cleans them with this horrifying stick thing and it really hurts. It makes me cough.
She says, "This always makes people cough, but I don't know why," and I'm wondering Well if you don't know why the body works, than why should I trust you?
They give me more medicine. She ends up writing me a new SIQ CHIT saying that I have THREE DAYS OF BEDREST. This kind of worries me. Sure, I'm thinking 'THIS IS GOING TO BE AWESOME,' but I'm also thinking that I don't want to miss too much training and get held back...
I really don't want to be stuck here longer than I have to. I mean, if you've been following this then you realize how much life sucks. I'm not going into every little detail about Boot Camp, but you've seen Full Metal Jacket right? It's just like that except they don't choke us.
I take the CHIT and return to the empty squad bay, where Rodriguez is standing post. He makes some comment and jockingly makes fun of me. This is how our friendship sort of began; talking crap to each other.
It's easy to make friends in Boot Camp because there's a common enemy, and that's what unites Americans.
I put my medicine away after taking more if it and change out of my cammies into "Green on Green" (PT shorts and green skivvy shirt) and lay down on my rack.
At some point I fade back into concsiousness. Rodriguez salutes two DIs (who I don't recognize) entering the squad bay and reports in.
"Good afternoon gentleman! Recruit Rodriguez reports Building 525, Squadbay C3, all secure at this time. There are three recruits on deck. 96 M16A2 service rifles and 96 United States Marine Corps foot lockers are all locked and secure at this time. There is nothing unusual to report at this time, sir!"
That's not verbatim, but it's pretty close. That's what you say to a DI coming into the squadbay if you're standing on post at night during firewatch, or during the day on gear guard duty. Of course one of two things happen here.
Scenario 1: You screw up and stutter, or don't remember what to say. The Drill Instructor you report in to approaches you and demands that you say it again, louder, faster. He wants more confidence and self assuredness. If you're a little bitch about it, then he won't leave you alone.
Scenario 2: You do it perfectly and loud, and the DI ignores you.
Sometimes the DI doesn't give a crap anyway and just ignores you altogether. That's what these two DIs did to Rodriguez. They walked right past him and into the duty hut, which left him reporting into no one.
I'm lying there watching, the DIs didn't find any of 1067's DIs in the squad bay, so the leave. When a DI exits the squad bay you give another verbal greating.
These two didn't really have anything else to do, since they couldn't talke with our DIs for whatever reason they needed to.
They left the squadbay. Then the jumped back in through the door. Rodriguez had to report in again because they crossed the threshold.
Sometimes our Company Commander 1st Lieutenent Doersheck did this. He'd stand on the other side of the threshold and leave us waiting or the exact moment to call attention on deck. He'd raise a foot and juke us out a few times.
These two DIs started alternating which one went through the door. One would jump in and one would jump out. Then the one who was out would jump in and the one who was in would jump out. They did this for about twenty seconds with Rodriguz screaming "GOOD AFTERNOON SIR! GOOD AFTERNOON SIR! GOOD AFTERNOON SIR!" several times.
I covered my face with the blanket so they wouldn't see me laughing, which they were trying hard not to do themselves. Eventually they left. Rodriguez was out of breath. Then everything went back to the way it was. He was forced to stand there for probably another two hours straight without any kind of relief, and I went to sleep.
T - 17 Initial Drill
"Lights lights lights lights lights! Get outta the rack! Get up! Let's go! Get up! Well you have 100 99 98 97 96 95 94..."
We jump up and get online and count off to make sure everyone's there. Go through the entire routine and start getting dressed.
This is Day 2 out of 3 for me and SIQ. Sgt. Virto notices that I'm not getting dressed and he comes over.
"Why aren't you getting dressed, Milas?" he asks.
"This recruit's on bed rest, sir!"
"They put you on two days of bed rest?"
"Three days, sir!"
Somehow, he detects a smart ass tone in my voice, which I wasn't intending. He flips out and tells me he's not in the mood for my attitude.
I yell "Aye aye, sir!" because I can't really disagree with him. He says for integrity's sake he wants me to get dressed and go to morning chow. He wants to personally check with medical about my chit, because I'm betting he's never had a recruit get three days of bed rest in a row before.
It would've been cleared up, but my CHIT was missing from the scribe's desk, and I have no idea what Rohl had done with it.
So to make a long story short, I don't get to go back to sleep until maybe nine o'clock. Sgt. Virto finally confirms it and sends me back to the rack. I think Sgt. Virto ended up trusting me after this event because he found out I wasn't lyign or trying to stretch the truth or bend the truth.
I slept through initial drill. Everyone came back. We ended up getting 2nd place in the company after 1066 got first. The DIs were in a fairly good mood. Now we can blouse our boots and unbutton the top buttons on our blouses to look a little more like "real Marines."
Everyone earns a 10 minute phone call home, but since I'm on bed rest, I don't end up making a phone call until November.
Saturday, September 12, 2009
Boot Camp Part 15
September 12, 2009
Camp Lejeune
12:05
T13 - Boots & Uts Run (Log Drills)
Today I wake up, suffering from major chafing that I suffered the previous day while double timing in place constantly. It actually does hurt every time I take a step. I'm talking about my testicles. The skin is actually almost broken because I really had chafed that bad the previous day.
Today are the log drills, which thankfully only take place once during the whole of Boot Camp. We run (painfully for me) to the PT field with our boots and trousers, but wearing our green sweatshirts.
We are briefed on what kinds of drills we'll be doing, and then we're broken down into squads. The shortest go to the back of a log and the tallest go to the front. I was significantly taller than the person behind me, so I was carrying more weight than I would have if the person was just slightly shorter than I was. We go around a track with the log on our right shoulder. At first it's not that bad. We do curls with the log, we do squats, etc. Then when we don't sound off loud enough we have to hold the logs above our head with our arms locked out. This gets very hard very fast.
Eventually, the ordeal is over and we go back to shower and change back into desert cammies.
Throughout the day my cough persists. I drink water, but it gets worse like it had been getting over the weekend.
At some point in the afternoon, one of our DIs informs our platoon that someone has written graffiti in the armory head across the street from the classrooms. It says "1067 T7" or something along those lines on one of the stalls. Sgt. Virto and Sgt. Saldana are furious, but we're about to go to a class, so there's not much they can do.
While sitting in the class, it hits me: a fever. It hits me like a brick wall. Suddenly my head feels detached from the rest of my body, like it's floating away. A dull throbbing headache follows that and I can barely concentrate on what we're learning.
After the class is over we're marched over to a sandy/dusty area next to the chow hall where Sgt. Virto & Saldana proceed to interrogate the platoon on who could have written the graffiti. No one confesses. They ask people to say something if they know anything.
I raise my hand in formation and suggest that it could have been Miller or one of the other recruits who had failed the piss test and been sent off. Sgt. Virto responds saying that they left before T7.
Since the Senior Drill Instructor is the only DI who can IT the entire platoon at once, Sgt. Virto & Saldana begin taking groups of ten people and ITing them in front of the formation. Eventually I'm called out, and I can't stop coughing. I can barely sound off "Aye aye, sir!" "Yes, sir!" etc. Sgt. Saldana notices this and tells me to go away before I can be ITed.
Later that night, the platoon plays games constantly. Dump out footlockers, two sheets & a blanket, etc.
This is after a previous day when Sgt. Saldana and Sgt. Virto destroyed our squad bay by having us take our shoe displays, sheets, blankets, pillows, war bags, and mattresses to the shower room after dumping out footlockers. That day, SSgt. Arzola sent them home.
This time, SSgt. Arzola is backing the DIs the whole time. No one confesses to the graffiti though.
Later, SSgt. Arzola is telling is that we should make sure we're good for tomorrow since we're getting our military IDs and if we don't get them (i.e. if we go to medical) we won't be able to get them until third phase.
I have to fill out a chit to go to medical tomorrow; I feel like absolute shit. There's no other way to put it. I haven't felt this sick in a long time, and certain suspicions are beginning to arise in my mind.
Other recruits such as O'Brien and Reoyo constantly are going to medical for illnesses and whatnot.
I stand up on the quarterdeck with the others going to medical for the hygiene inspection. I wrote "upper respiratory infection" on my chit.
T14 - Pugil Sticks II
We wake up and everything goes as normal, except those going to medical leave the platoon to go to early chow. We march off to the chow hall in a group of about four to six and eat, then march over to medical and sit outside (the same place we got our shots) in the dark, filling out sick call chits and waiting for medical to open.
Every once in a while a DI or a short angry civilian comes around and yells at us for something. Most of the corpsmen are pretty laid back, except the females for some reason.
Eventually I get called in and I have to wait in the hall behind a few other people. When its my turn I go into the office of a mild looking guy, who I believe was an E5 or HM 2. He is pretty laid back, doesn't get impatient with me or raise his voice. He asks me a bunch of questions and checks things off on a computer.
"Any decrease or loss of appetite?"
"Yes," I say, and then I realize he probably already knows what's wrong with me. I couldn't eat yesterday for dinner or this morning for breakfast. I just couldn't. I had absolutely no desire to eat at all.
"You have pneumonia," he says. Horror washes over me. This is what people get held back for in Boot Camp. I could miss Initial Drill this Friday, and that's a graduation requirement.
He writes some things down, a few prescriptions, and puts me on bed rest (Sick In Quarters) which means I get to sleep all day today. Secretly, I'm relieved, but I hold my bearing to look regretful and disappointed that I can't train.
When I finally get my medicine, it's already lunch time, so I go eat. When I get back to the squad bay, not many people are around. I'm wearing a blue face mask when I walk in so when I cough I don't spew germs everywhere. Someone's guarding the door, one of my fellow recruits. They see I'm sick and sort of nod.
I put my light duty/bed rest chit on the scribe's desk (who is Rohl, a strange guy who I haven't really described yet). Then, I take whatever pills I'm supposed to, put the medicine where it goes, and go to sleep.
Camp Lejeune
12:05
T13 - Boots & Uts Run (Log Drills)
Today I wake up, suffering from major chafing that I suffered the previous day while double timing in place constantly. It actually does hurt every time I take a step. I'm talking about my testicles. The skin is actually almost broken because I really had chafed that bad the previous day.
Today are the log drills, which thankfully only take place once during the whole of Boot Camp. We run (painfully for me) to the PT field with our boots and trousers, but wearing our green sweatshirts.
We are briefed on what kinds of drills we'll be doing, and then we're broken down into squads. The shortest go to the back of a log and the tallest go to the front. I was significantly taller than the person behind me, so I was carrying more weight than I would have if the person was just slightly shorter than I was. We go around a track with the log on our right shoulder. At first it's not that bad. We do curls with the log, we do squats, etc. Then when we don't sound off loud enough we have to hold the logs above our head with our arms locked out. This gets very hard very fast.
Eventually, the ordeal is over and we go back to shower and change back into desert cammies.
Throughout the day my cough persists. I drink water, but it gets worse like it had been getting over the weekend.
At some point in the afternoon, one of our DIs informs our platoon that someone has written graffiti in the armory head across the street from the classrooms. It says "1067 T7" or something along those lines on one of the stalls. Sgt. Virto and Sgt. Saldana are furious, but we're about to go to a class, so there's not much they can do.
While sitting in the class, it hits me: a fever. It hits me like a brick wall. Suddenly my head feels detached from the rest of my body, like it's floating away. A dull throbbing headache follows that and I can barely concentrate on what we're learning.
After the class is over we're marched over to a sandy/dusty area next to the chow hall where Sgt. Virto & Saldana proceed to interrogate the platoon on who could have written the graffiti. No one confesses. They ask people to say something if they know anything.
I raise my hand in formation and suggest that it could have been Miller or one of the other recruits who had failed the piss test and been sent off. Sgt. Virto responds saying that they left before T7.
Since the Senior Drill Instructor is the only DI who can IT the entire platoon at once, Sgt. Virto & Saldana begin taking groups of ten people and ITing them in front of the formation. Eventually I'm called out, and I can't stop coughing. I can barely sound off "Aye aye, sir!" "Yes, sir!" etc. Sgt. Saldana notices this and tells me to go away before I can be ITed.
Later that night, the platoon plays games constantly. Dump out footlockers, two sheets & a blanket, etc.
This is after a previous day when Sgt. Saldana and Sgt. Virto destroyed our squad bay by having us take our shoe displays, sheets, blankets, pillows, war bags, and mattresses to the shower room after dumping out footlockers. That day, SSgt. Arzola sent them home.
This time, SSgt. Arzola is backing the DIs the whole time. No one confesses to the graffiti though.
Later, SSgt. Arzola is telling is that we should make sure we're good for tomorrow since we're getting our military IDs and if we don't get them (i.e. if we go to medical) we won't be able to get them until third phase.
I have to fill out a chit to go to medical tomorrow; I feel like absolute shit. There's no other way to put it. I haven't felt this sick in a long time, and certain suspicions are beginning to arise in my mind.
Other recruits such as O'Brien and Reoyo constantly are going to medical for illnesses and whatnot.
I stand up on the quarterdeck with the others going to medical for the hygiene inspection. I wrote "upper respiratory infection" on my chit.
T14 - Pugil Sticks II
We wake up and everything goes as normal, except those going to medical leave the platoon to go to early chow. We march off to the chow hall in a group of about four to six and eat, then march over to medical and sit outside (the same place we got our shots) in the dark, filling out sick call chits and waiting for medical to open.
Every once in a while a DI or a short angry civilian comes around and yells at us for something. Most of the corpsmen are pretty laid back, except the females for some reason.
Eventually I get called in and I have to wait in the hall behind a few other people. When its my turn I go into the office of a mild looking guy, who I believe was an E5 or HM 2. He is pretty laid back, doesn't get impatient with me or raise his voice. He asks me a bunch of questions and checks things off on a computer.
"Any decrease or loss of appetite?"
"Yes," I say, and then I realize he probably already knows what's wrong with me. I couldn't eat yesterday for dinner or this morning for breakfast. I just couldn't. I had absolutely no desire to eat at all.
"You have pneumonia," he says. Horror washes over me. This is what people get held back for in Boot Camp. I could miss Initial Drill this Friday, and that's a graduation requirement.
He writes some things down, a few prescriptions, and puts me on bed rest (Sick In Quarters) which means I get to sleep all day today. Secretly, I'm relieved, but I hold my bearing to look regretful and disappointed that I can't train.
When I finally get my medicine, it's already lunch time, so I go eat. When I get back to the squad bay, not many people are around. I'm wearing a blue face mask when I walk in so when I cough I don't spew germs everywhere. Someone's guarding the door, one of my fellow recruits. They see I'm sick and sort of nod.
I put my light duty/bed rest chit on the scribe's desk (who is Rohl, a strange guy who I haven't really described yet). Then, I take whatever pills I'm supposed to, put the medicine where it goes, and go to sleep.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
Boot Camp Part 14
September 10, 2009
Camp Lejeune
21:05
T11 - Circuit Course
I don't remember doing the circuit course a second time but I guess we do it. It's possible we do different exercises or do one of the circuit runs where we stop and do stuff.
Today (Sat) is also a week from Initial Drill. We practice drill rigorously, usually on Sundays.
This is probably the fifth night we've actually gotten an hour of free time. I recall not getting any until the first Sunday, and then not until the next Wenesday (although it is possible we got it on the previous Monday).
Sometime around this area I start to develop a cough. It comes and goes, but to attempt to avoid being sick I eat two whole oranges per meal (six a day) and drink orange juice to try and boost my immune system. It doesn't help.
We're told earlier in the week that starting today, we'll be allowed to go anywhere on MCRD unaccompanied by a Drill Instructor. For instance, we'll be able to go to church by our self, or go to medical or dental without a DI. It doesn't really mean much; it's just another step closer really. As you progress through Boot Camp, small barriers are lifted.
An example would be the uniform. First you start with your collar buttoned shut and boots unbloused. You eventually blouse the boots and unbutton the collar (looking more like a real Marine).
The privilege of being able to go anywhere on the Depot would be a step closer to acting responsible like a real Marine.
Sunday
This is the first time I go to church alone. I don't recall who I go with; it could have been a number of people, or I simply could have gone alone as there were several Sundays where I did so. A lot of people went to the protestant service, which I never had any intention of going to. I am a Lutheran and always will be and would rather not go to church than go to a service that means nothing to me.
Of course other people go to the Buddhist thing where apparently you're allowed to sleep, or they go to the Muslim group or any number of things just to get away. I can guarantee that no one went to church in MCT where liberty time is a precious commodity, but in Boot Camp, there's no question of whether or not you'll go to church just to leave.
Again, there's not really much different about this Sunday. Perhaps I was getting my voice back and was actually able to sing in church again. Other than that, it was basically just a big tear fest for me. A lot of people at my stage or ahead manage to control themselves, but then a lot of new people are there as well crying and whatnot.
I don't remember what Sunday it actually was, but during the sermon I remember there are a couple recruits totally ignoring it. They've somehow managed to smuggle newspaper clippings in and are reading the sports sections.
This is typical of Lutherans: to be a part of the denomination in name only. It still made me furious though.
T12 - Confidence Course 1
The Confidence Course entails a number of things. There are a ton of different obstacles to overcome. There are the regular "low obstacles" and then the intimidating "high obstacles." Most of these appear somewhere in Full Metal Jacket whether it's actually demonstrated or just shown in the background.
Today, we do the easy "fun" obstacles. After splitting up into small groups (I went with SSgt. Arzola thankfully) we sprint to each excercise, beginning with the Dirty Name. In FMJ, this is the one that Pvt. Pyle tries to do but can't and GySgt. Hartman says "God would have put you up there if you were supposed to go up there" or something. It involves jumping across three ascending logs. It's pretty tough for me since I really hate hights, and jumping from a circular surface to the next is a challenge.
After this we probably do a swinging rope thing wich I manage. We climb over a wall. We climb up a ladder that's slanted back and then over the top and back down. We climb over a net, over the top, and back down. All of these have some strange witty, traditional name to make it sound scarier than it is. There are monkey bars which people tear their hands apart on, there's the Weaver which I never did.
I end up not having to do the skyscraper either (until the Crucible at least) which is almost a high obtacle. (It is in my opinion)
We halt training because someone falls off of it.
Camp Lejeune
21:05
T11 - Circuit Course
I don't remember doing the circuit course a second time but I guess we do it. It's possible we do different exercises or do one of the circuit runs where we stop and do stuff.
Today (Sat) is also a week from Initial Drill. We practice drill rigorously, usually on Sundays.
This is probably the fifth night we've actually gotten an hour of free time. I recall not getting any until the first Sunday, and then not until the next Wenesday (although it is possible we got it on the previous Monday).
Sometime around this area I start to develop a cough. It comes and goes, but to attempt to avoid being sick I eat two whole oranges per meal (six a day) and drink orange juice to try and boost my immune system. It doesn't help.
We're told earlier in the week that starting today, we'll be allowed to go anywhere on MCRD unaccompanied by a Drill Instructor. For instance, we'll be able to go to church by our self, or go to medical or dental without a DI. It doesn't really mean much; it's just another step closer really. As you progress through Boot Camp, small barriers are lifted.
An example would be the uniform. First you start with your collar buttoned shut and boots unbloused. You eventually blouse the boots and unbutton the collar (looking more like a real Marine).
The privilege of being able to go anywhere on the Depot would be a step closer to acting responsible like a real Marine.
Sunday
This is the first time I go to church alone. I don't recall who I go with; it could have been a number of people, or I simply could have gone alone as there were several Sundays where I did so. A lot of people went to the protestant service, which I never had any intention of going to. I am a Lutheran and always will be and would rather not go to church than go to a service that means nothing to me.
Of course other people go to the Buddhist thing where apparently you're allowed to sleep, or they go to the Muslim group or any number of things just to get away. I can guarantee that no one went to church in MCT where liberty time is a precious commodity, but in Boot Camp, there's no question of whether or not you'll go to church just to leave.
Again, there's not really much different about this Sunday. Perhaps I was getting my voice back and was actually able to sing in church again. Other than that, it was basically just a big tear fest for me. A lot of people at my stage or ahead manage to control themselves, but then a lot of new people are there as well crying and whatnot.
I don't remember what Sunday it actually was, but during the sermon I remember there are a couple recruits totally ignoring it. They've somehow managed to smuggle newspaper clippings in and are reading the sports sections.
This is typical of Lutherans: to be a part of the denomination in name only. It still made me furious though.
T12 - Confidence Course 1
The Confidence Course entails a number of things. There are a ton of different obstacles to overcome. There are the regular "low obstacles" and then the intimidating "high obstacles." Most of these appear somewhere in Full Metal Jacket whether it's actually demonstrated or just shown in the background.
Today, we do the easy "fun" obstacles. After splitting up into small groups (I went with SSgt. Arzola thankfully) we sprint to each excercise, beginning with the Dirty Name. In FMJ, this is the one that Pvt. Pyle tries to do but can't and GySgt. Hartman says "God would have put you up there if you were supposed to go up there" or something. It involves jumping across three ascending logs. It's pretty tough for me since I really hate hights, and jumping from a circular surface to the next is a challenge.
After this we probably do a swinging rope thing wich I manage. We climb over a wall. We climb up a ladder that's slanted back and then over the top and back down. We climb over a net, over the top, and back down. All of these have some strange witty, traditional name to make it sound scarier than it is. There are monkey bars which people tear their hands apart on, there's the Weaver which I never did.
I end up not having to do the skyscraper either (until the Crucible at least) which is almost a high obtacle. (It is in my opinion)
We halt training because someone falls off of it.
Sunday, September 6, 2009
Boot Camp Part 13
September 6, 2009
Camp Lejeune
17:21
T8 - Circuit Course
I remember this day pretty well. It was the day that Kinney joined the platoon. He's a recruit who's been held back for a few weeks (maybe even a month) because he got sick. In boot camp if you get sick bad enough and miss enough training days you'll be sent to MRP or PCP to recover and then you'll have to wait to get picked up with another training platoon. In Kinney's case, he picked up back on T8 where he left off last time. I can't even imagine how it must feel to be there longer than you have to.
Kinney immediatley volunteers to become a squad leader and remains one for the rest of recruit training. He was the first Lutheran to become a squad leader. At this point, people were getting fired left and right and I think Samuels had failed to get a count of recruits after chow, so Syer was made the guide.
Syer and Samuels alternated in their positions as guide several times before Syer ultimately became the guide of 1067.
Like I mentioned previously, Truitt had been there for about a month before I entered boot camp.
Anyway, the circuit course is pretty pointless, even looking back on it. It involves a lot of physical activity in between exercises. Wait, let me correct myself. All we do in between exercises is scream and "in place double time" which means run in place. It's obnoxious to have to war cry from station to station...but it's only the 8th training day and it's only just begun for us.
The circuit course involves doing push-ups with your feet up on a step behind you while blood rushes to your head. There's some dumbbells to do curls and military presses while standing as well. We walk up and down steps while holding an ammo can in each hand. If we don't sound off we have to hold the ammo cans out in front of us with our arms locked out and parallel to the deck.
This goes on for maybe an hour. There are certain regulations for recruits being outside in the sun for a certain amount of time. I don't think I was able to complete every exercise, but like I said, it was all pretty pointless anyway and I didn't care.
Later, we're practicing drill. The previous night, Sgt. Virto called someone out when we secured the head. He'd seen someone laughing and the person didn't confess. He knew who they were, but they didn't come out with it. Sgt. Virto didn't say anything; he just let them carry it on their own concious. While we're drilling, someone laughs again when we're in a school circle. Sgt. Virto marches out in front of us demonstrating a movement. He power walks through the platoon and comes face to face with Weinmann, who I end up loathing.
Weinmann is the perfect example of a spoiled brat who probably never worked a real job in his life. Why he enlisted in the Marine Corps instead of getting his parents to pay for college, I'll never know and I hope I never encounter him again. Sgt. Virto says something along the lines of, "You're the liar from last night" or whatever. Weinmann is a total asshole, and when he makes some comment about me screwing up when we're drilling I simply respond with some comment about him being a scumbag.
I believe this moment is when I first start breaking down. Many people refer to First Phase as the "Breaking You Down Phase" while in 2nd and 3rd phase you're built back up.
T9 - Obstacle Course
The Obstacle Course is never referred to as such. It's called the O-Course (as the Endurance Course on Lejeune is called the E-Course. The Marine Corps loves destroying the English language). The O-Course involves mainly jumping over logs, pulling yourself over pull-up bars, sliding down bars, climbing over walls, and then finally climbing up and down a rope at the end.
We're formed up alongside the O-Course in a mass formation as a DI instructs us on how to do it and a few Drill Instructors demonstrate it in their PT gear.
It begins with a bar that's maybe two feet higher than my head. One of the ways to do it is roll backwards, bringing your feet over your head. This is called the "college boy roll," and I don't even bother trying it. I just hold onto the bar and walk my legs up one of the side poles holding it up to flip over it. The rest is pretty simple, jumping over logs, jumping over walls, slinding down some bars.
When I get to the rope I kind of freak out. I got my same 17 pull-ups that I alway got as a poolie in the initial IST, but I've been getting weaker here due to the lack of actual weight training.
I begin climbing the rope with SSgt. Arzola watching me. I get maybe 3/4 of the way before getting extremely tired.
Some Corpsman on the ground looks up at me and says, "Look at how skinny you are. You should be done already."
I don't make it to the top and for the rest of the day my wrists are killing me.
T-10 Counters to Strikes
Since I hate MCMAP and I hate talking about it, I'm not really going to say anything. As I haven't been to Boot Camp in a year, my memory if each individual day has faded and I don't know what else to say about this day.
If I had my Green Monster knowledge I could elaborate on some of the classes we were receiving,
No doubt by this time we were at First Aid III (out of 5) and probably History II or III.
Incidentally, here's a picture of Sgt. Saldana, my kill hat. You can't see his face.
Camp Lejeune
17:21
T8 - Circuit Course
I remember this day pretty well. It was the day that Kinney joined the platoon. He's a recruit who's been held back for a few weeks (maybe even a month) because he got sick. In boot camp if you get sick bad enough and miss enough training days you'll be sent to MRP or PCP to recover and then you'll have to wait to get picked up with another training platoon. In Kinney's case, he picked up back on T8 where he left off last time. I can't even imagine how it must feel to be there longer than you have to.
Kinney immediatley volunteers to become a squad leader and remains one for the rest of recruit training. He was the first Lutheran to become a squad leader. At this point, people were getting fired left and right and I think Samuels had failed to get a count of recruits after chow, so Syer was made the guide.
Syer and Samuels alternated in their positions as guide several times before Syer ultimately became the guide of 1067.
Like I mentioned previously, Truitt had been there for about a month before I entered boot camp.
Anyway, the circuit course is pretty pointless, even looking back on it. It involves a lot of physical activity in between exercises. Wait, let me correct myself. All we do in between exercises is scream and "in place double time" which means run in place. It's obnoxious to have to war cry from station to station...but it's only the 8th training day and it's only just begun for us.
The circuit course involves doing push-ups with your feet up on a step behind you while blood rushes to your head. There's some dumbbells to do curls and military presses while standing as well. We walk up and down steps while holding an ammo can in each hand. If we don't sound off we have to hold the ammo cans out in front of us with our arms locked out and parallel to the deck.
This goes on for maybe an hour. There are certain regulations for recruits being outside in the sun for a certain amount of time. I don't think I was able to complete every exercise, but like I said, it was all pretty pointless anyway and I didn't care.
Later, we're practicing drill. The previous night, Sgt. Virto called someone out when we secured the head. He'd seen someone laughing and the person didn't confess. He knew who they were, but they didn't come out with it. Sgt. Virto didn't say anything; he just let them carry it on their own concious. While we're drilling, someone laughs again when we're in a school circle. Sgt. Virto marches out in front of us demonstrating a movement. He power walks through the platoon and comes face to face with Weinmann, who I end up loathing.
Weinmann is the perfect example of a spoiled brat who probably never worked a real job in his life. Why he enlisted in the Marine Corps instead of getting his parents to pay for college, I'll never know and I hope I never encounter him again. Sgt. Virto says something along the lines of, "You're the liar from last night" or whatever. Weinmann is a total asshole, and when he makes some comment about me screwing up when we're drilling I simply respond with some comment about him being a scumbag.
I believe this moment is when I first start breaking down. Many people refer to First Phase as the "Breaking You Down Phase" while in 2nd and 3rd phase you're built back up.
T9 - Obstacle Course
The Obstacle Course is never referred to as such. It's called the O-Course (as the Endurance Course on Lejeune is called the E-Course. The Marine Corps loves destroying the English language). The O-Course involves mainly jumping over logs, pulling yourself over pull-up bars, sliding down bars, climbing over walls, and then finally climbing up and down a rope at the end.
We're formed up alongside the O-Course in a mass formation as a DI instructs us on how to do it and a few Drill Instructors demonstrate it in their PT gear.
It begins with a bar that's maybe two feet higher than my head. One of the ways to do it is roll backwards, bringing your feet over your head. This is called the "college boy roll," and I don't even bother trying it. I just hold onto the bar and walk my legs up one of the side poles holding it up to flip over it. The rest is pretty simple, jumping over logs, jumping over walls, slinding down some bars.
When I get to the rope I kind of freak out. I got my same 17 pull-ups that I alway got as a poolie in the initial IST, but I've been getting weaker here due to the lack of actual weight training.
I begin climbing the rope with SSgt. Arzola watching me. I get maybe 3/4 of the way before getting extremely tired.
Some Corpsman on the ground looks up at me and says, "Look at how skinny you are. You should be done already."
I don't make it to the top and for the rest of the day my wrists are killing me.
T-10 Counters to Strikes
Since I hate MCMAP and I hate talking about it, I'm not really going to say anything. As I haven't been to Boot Camp in a year, my memory if each individual day has faded and I don't know what else to say about this day.
If I had my Green Monster knowledge I could elaborate on some of the classes we were receiving,
No doubt by this time we were at First Aid III (out of 5) and probably History II or III.
Incidentally, here's a picture of Sgt. Saldana, my kill hat. You can't see his face.
To All Followers
September 6, 2009
Camp Lejeune
17:15
I was just copying and pasting all of my entries into Word to see what kind of a word count it would come up with. I noticed that there were a lot more comments made then I initially noticed. My apologies for being so slow with this blog between March and August. I was just in a poor state of mind and really didn't feel like working on anything, but recently I've been getting myself back into a writing routine, so things should come more regularly.
Unfortunately, it seems like some of you are already in Boot Camp now...
I don't really know what to say other than good luck. You'll see this message when you come back. Hopefully you'll follow through with reading this. I have a lot more material to offer about the Marine Corps than just boot camp, as I'm almost a whole year behind myself as far as where I want to be with this blog.
My goal is just to catch up with where I'm currently at and this means posting entries covering September 08 through September 09!
I'll get on that...starting now.
By the way, up through Part 12, this blog contains at least 32,000 words and covered 61 pages in microsoft word.
Camp Lejeune
17:15
I was just copying and pasting all of my entries into Word to see what kind of a word count it would come up with. I noticed that there were a lot more comments made then I initially noticed. My apologies for being so slow with this blog between March and August. I was just in a poor state of mind and really didn't feel like working on anything, but recently I've been getting myself back into a writing routine, so things should come more regularly.
Unfortunately, it seems like some of you are already in Boot Camp now...
I don't really know what to say other than good luck. You'll see this message when you come back. Hopefully you'll follow through with reading this. I have a lot more material to offer about the Marine Corps than just boot camp, as I'm almost a whole year behind myself as far as where I want to be with this blog.
My goal is just to catch up with where I'm currently at and this means posting entries covering September 08 through September 09!
I'll get on that...starting now.
By the way, up through Part 12, this blog contains at least 32,000 words and covered 61 pages in microsoft word.
Saturday, August 29, 2009
Boot Camp Part 12
August 29, 2009
Camp Lejeune
1745
Four days past my year mark.
The Chow Hall
I have not yet elaborated on the procedures of going to eat and what it all entailed, so I thought I'd take this time to do so.
The "Chow Hall" (mess hall) is basically a hub for the Recruit Depot. The Recruit Chow Hall that is. Only recruits eat here, and of course the Drill Instructors. When looking at a map or google image of the area, it's located in the center of the multiple barracks for convenient access.
Upon marching to the chow hall every morning, afternoon, and evening, we are most likely going to have to wait in line. The period of waiting in line starts when our platoon reaches the building. The area is loud as platoons are yelling in response to their DI's commands or reciting knowledge.
Within the first week we receive a piece of white paper which has been laminated by taping both sides with clear tape. It shows the general orders, rank structure, chain of command, etc. We are always supposed to have this knowledge sheet on us which we simply refer to as "a knowledge" if I'm not mistaken.
Our platoon halts in formation, we stand at attention, and Sgt. Saldana power-walks out front and begins yelling.
"Get our your knowledge!"
"Aye aye, sir!"
We unfold the papers which are stuffed in either our chest or cargo pockets and look down at it while we wait for the platoons ahead of us to go through the door.
Sgt. Saldana screams, "General orders!" and we respond "General orders, aye aye, sir! This recruit's first general order is: To take charge of this post and all government property in view! This recruit's second general order is: To walk my post in a military manner-"
And if we're not loud enough we'll simply be cut off by Sgt. Saldana yelling "General orders!" once again. He was in charge of our learning of the "Prac" which stands for Practical Knowledge (I think) and is later tested on T-50. There are several things we "recited" in front of the chow hall.
"Four life saving steps!"
"Four life saving steps, aye aye, sir! One, restore the breathing! Two, stop the bleeding! Three, protect the wound! Four, treat for shock! Four life saving steps, aye aye, sir!"
This would go on for perhaps fifteen minutes, which seems like hours. Sgt. Saldana is constantly shouting "Eyeballs! Ears!" and if we're not loud enough "Okay, EARS!" until we respond with "OPEN SIR!" so loud that we lose our voices. I lost my voice during the first couple weeks but then didn't really scream as loud as I could've for the rest of my time there. I yelled, but I didn't go nuts like I was supposed to.
The platoon ahead of us is finally far enough in the chow hall that we are about to get in a single file line behind them.
Our guide at the time is Samuels, a short, black muscular guy with little common sense and even less competence. He was a character. Samuels is carrying the guidon (out platoon's red flag) and marches out in front of the platoon.
"Ears, 67!" he shouts.
"Open, guide!" we respond.
"Ears, 67!" he answers louder.
"Open, guide!" we increase volume.
"The platoon will be sitting at Deck 3, far bulkhead! Does the platoon understand?"
"Yes, guide!"
"Does the platoon understand?"
"Yes, guide!"
"Aaaaatack!"
"Where's 66?"
"Aaaaatack!"
"Where's 68?"
"Aaaaaaaaaatack!"
"WANT SOME COME GET SOME!"
And then if we're not loud enough one of the Drill Instructors makes us do the whole thing again. I we are loud enough he'll come out in front of the formation. Finally, we're all thinking.
"Ooooooone two three four attack the chow hall!" he calls out. Sometimes (if it's SSgt. Arzola) he'll call the numbers out in a different order. The order of the four numbers dictate the order in which the squads will file off from the formation to get in line.
"One two three four attack the chow hall, aye aye, sir!" we answer. Sometimes they repeat this over and over again, changing the order of the numbers if we're not loud enough.
"Move!" he yells. "Kill!" we respond.
We run out of the formation in line, me almost stepping on Rodriguez's heels everytime. After the first week I became a "Double Rat" which is the designation for a recruit who gets double rations. I was given a seperate tag to wear on my blouse to show the chow hall employees. The double rats run up to the front of the line because they need more time to eat the double portions of food. Being a double rat recruit was one of the best parts of boot camp. When I first started eating more I became sick a couple times, but I eventually got used to it.
When our platoon starts moving to the door in line, Samuels stands with the guidon.
"Four recruits!" he yells after gauging how much room there is for us to line up inside. As each recruit walks through the door and takes their cover off they yell "Four, aye aye, guide" "Three, aye aye, guide!" and two, one, etc. so the people behind know when to stop. If there's a DI inside the door they must also yell out "Good morning, sir!" or whatever time of day it is.
The verbal greetings seem pretty absurd to anyone just coming into the area. People walking by a Drill Instructor will be literally screaming at the top of their lungs "GOOD AFTERNOON, SIR!" or gentleman if there's more than one.
"Oh, so it's afternoon then is it?" a DI will ask if it's morning. Recruits always call out wrong verbal greetings.
"Good morning, sir!" they'll yell out again.
Anyway, we go through the line. First is the salad, then the main courses, of which I'm allowed two. Desert is after that. I always set my tray down and get back up to get bread to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I do that for every meal. I have to put that back at the table and go to get something to drink as we're not allowed to carry more than one thing at a time. When we're eating, our eyes do not wander away from our food, and I don't finish what I'm chewing before I start eating the next thing. What I mean is I might still be eating fish, macaroni, spaghetti, or something else when I start eating my cake or brownies.
Sgt. Saldana early on watched us like a hawk. He would get up in your face while you were eating if he saw you look around and would make you get out, or just yell at you and IT you later.
One afternoon I'm sitting and eating on Deck 4, which is at the side of the building. We were eating at the far bulkhead which is next to a window when I glanced up to see Sgt. Saldana standing in the bushes right outside the window looking in at us staring at someone and yelling something muffled through the window. I cracked up and then made eye contact with him, which is a mistake to say the least. He calls me out and asks my name but he forgets later because I managed to blend in so well.
When we're done eating we get up, hold the tray with our elbows hard against our body, and power walk to the door, setting the tray down on a conveyor belt in the process. When outside we must do ten pull ups before getting into formation.
Every...single...meal.
I just found this video which illustrates some of the ares at MCRD pretty well. I've been to every place shown, so when you're reading this, you can picture what you see here.
Camp Lejeune
1745
Four days past my year mark.
The Chow Hall
I have not yet elaborated on the procedures of going to eat and what it all entailed, so I thought I'd take this time to do so.
The "Chow Hall" (mess hall) is basically a hub for the Recruit Depot. The Recruit Chow Hall that is. Only recruits eat here, and of course the Drill Instructors. When looking at a map or google image of the area, it's located in the center of the multiple barracks for convenient access.
Upon marching to the chow hall every morning, afternoon, and evening, we are most likely going to have to wait in line. The period of waiting in line starts when our platoon reaches the building. The area is loud as platoons are yelling in response to their DI's commands or reciting knowledge.
Within the first week we receive a piece of white paper which has been laminated by taping both sides with clear tape. It shows the general orders, rank structure, chain of command, etc. We are always supposed to have this knowledge sheet on us which we simply refer to as "a knowledge" if I'm not mistaken.
Our platoon halts in formation, we stand at attention, and Sgt. Saldana power-walks out front and begins yelling.
"Get our your knowledge!"
"Aye aye, sir!"
We unfold the papers which are stuffed in either our chest or cargo pockets and look down at it while we wait for the platoons ahead of us to go through the door.
Sgt. Saldana screams, "General orders!" and we respond "General orders, aye aye, sir! This recruit's first general order is: To take charge of this post and all government property in view! This recruit's second general order is: To walk my post in a military manner-"
And if we're not loud enough we'll simply be cut off by Sgt. Saldana yelling "General orders!" once again. He was in charge of our learning of the "Prac" which stands for Practical Knowledge (I think) and is later tested on T-50. There are several things we "recited" in front of the chow hall.
"Four life saving steps!"
"Four life saving steps, aye aye, sir! One, restore the breathing! Two, stop the bleeding! Three, protect the wound! Four, treat for shock! Four life saving steps, aye aye, sir!"
This would go on for perhaps fifteen minutes, which seems like hours. Sgt. Saldana is constantly shouting "Eyeballs! Ears!" and if we're not loud enough "Okay, EARS!" until we respond with "OPEN SIR!" so loud that we lose our voices. I lost my voice during the first couple weeks but then didn't really scream as loud as I could've for the rest of my time there. I yelled, but I didn't go nuts like I was supposed to.
The platoon ahead of us is finally far enough in the chow hall that we are about to get in a single file line behind them.
Our guide at the time is Samuels, a short, black muscular guy with little common sense and even less competence. He was a character. Samuels is carrying the guidon (out platoon's red flag) and marches out in front of the platoon.
"Ears, 67!" he shouts.
"Open, guide!" we respond.
"Ears, 67!" he answers louder.
"Open, guide!" we increase volume.
"The platoon will be sitting at Deck 3, far bulkhead! Does the platoon understand?"
"Yes, guide!"
"Does the platoon understand?"
"Yes, guide!"
"Aaaaatack!"
"Where's 66?"
"Aaaaatack!"
"Where's 68?"
"Aaaaaaaaaatack!"
"WANT SOME COME GET SOME!"
And then if we're not loud enough one of the Drill Instructors makes us do the whole thing again. I we are loud enough he'll come out in front of the formation. Finally, we're all thinking.
"Ooooooone two three four attack the chow hall!" he calls out. Sometimes (if it's SSgt. Arzola) he'll call the numbers out in a different order. The order of the four numbers dictate the order in which the squads will file off from the formation to get in line.
"One two three four attack the chow hall, aye aye, sir!" we answer. Sometimes they repeat this over and over again, changing the order of the numbers if we're not loud enough.
"Move!" he yells. "Kill!" we respond.
We run out of the formation in line, me almost stepping on Rodriguez's heels everytime. After the first week I became a "Double Rat" which is the designation for a recruit who gets double rations. I was given a seperate tag to wear on my blouse to show the chow hall employees. The double rats run up to the front of the line because they need more time to eat the double portions of food. Being a double rat recruit was one of the best parts of boot camp. When I first started eating more I became sick a couple times, but I eventually got used to it.
When our platoon starts moving to the door in line, Samuels stands with the guidon.
"Four recruits!" he yells after gauging how much room there is for us to line up inside. As each recruit walks through the door and takes their cover off they yell "Four, aye aye, guide" "Three, aye aye, guide!" and two, one, etc. so the people behind know when to stop. If there's a DI inside the door they must also yell out "Good morning, sir!" or whatever time of day it is.
The verbal greetings seem pretty absurd to anyone just coming into the area. People walking by a Drill Instructor will be literally screaming at the top of their lungs "GOOD AFTERNOON, SIR!" or gentleman if there's more than one.
"Oh, so it's afternoon then is it?" a DI will ask if it's morning. Recruits always call out wrong verbal greetings.
"Good morning, sir!" they'll yell out again.
Anyway, we go through the line. First is the salad, then the main courses, of which I'm allowed two. Desert is after that. I always set my tray down and get back up to get bread to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I do that for every meal. I have to put that back at the table and go to get something to drink as we're not allowed to carry more than one thing at a time. When we're eating, our eyes do not wander away from our food, and I don't finish what I'm chewing before I start eating the next thing. What I mean is I might still be eating fish, macaroni, spaghetti, or something else when I start eating my cake or brownies.
Sgt. Saldana early on watched us like a hawk. He would get up in your face while you were eating if he saw you look around and would make you get out, or just yell at you and IT you later.
One afternoon I'm sitting and eating on Deck 4, which is at the side of the building. We were eating at the far bulkhead which is next to a window when I glanced up to see Sgt. Saldana standing in the bushes right outside the window looking in at us staring at someone and yelling something muffled through the window. I cracked up and then made eye contact with him, which is a mistake to say the least. He calls me out and asks my name but he forgets later because I managed to blend in so well.
When we're done eating we get up, hold the tray with our elbows hard against our body, and power walk to the door, setting the tray down on a conveyor belt in the process. When outside we must do ten pull ups before getting into formation.
Every...single...meal.
I just found this video which illustrates some of the ares at MCRD pretty well. I've been to every place shown, so when you're reading this, you can picture what you see here.
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Boot Camp Part 11
August 18, 2009
Camp Lejeune
20:20
T6 - Upper Strikes
The beginning of my second week of actually training begins like any other. We wake up to "LIGHTS LIGHTS LIGHTS LIGHTS! GET OUTTA THE RACK! GET UP! LET'S GO! WELL, YOU HAVE 300299298297296295..." as Sgt. Virto runs up and down the Drill Instructor Highway (middle of the squadbay). Sgt. Saldana is behind him screaming as well. We are tired, annoyed, pissed, we have to piss, we're nervous because we don't know what's in store for us today.
"LEFT BOOT SOCK, GET IT ON YOUR BODY NOW! WELL, YOU HAVE [counts down]" yells Sgt. Virto and I scramble to pull a brown sock onto my left foot. "Ten nine eight seven six five four three two one, you are..."
"DONE, SIR!" we answer in unison. We stand at attention but of course someone doesn't have their sock on all the way. You'd be surprised how hard it is to get a sock on when someone's screaming at you. And of course we all have to take our socks off in a time limit and start over. Eventually we're totally dressed.
"PORT SIDE GET IN THE HEAD, STARBOARD SIDE MAKE YOUR RACKS. READY..." we take a breath. "MOVE!"
We yell "KILL!" in response. The port side of the squad bay scrambles to get into the head to piss and brush their teeth. We, on the starboard side, scramble to make our racks as one of the DIs counts us down. Miranda, my half brain dead rackmate, will hardly respond to me when I make a suggestion. It's either "huh?" or "what?" which is more frustrating than it sounds.
Either way we survive without wetting our pants.
After eating breakfast and whatnot we change over into green cammies for MCMAP training, which I come to hate eventually. We march over to a "pit" filled with rubber chunks and get covered and aligned in a mass formation with the rest of follow series. There's an instructor with a green shirt in front of us (the DIs wear a shirt of the color of their battalion, in our case red).
We begin by doing warm up excersises. We start with "BENDSANDTHRUSTS!" as the instructormakes it sound. This is dropping down, shooting your legs out, doing a pushup, and jumping back up. These are sometimes called burpees.
After this we learn about setting up the dojo. The Mexican instructor we have (who's talking on a bullhorn periodically so we can all hear) says it like this: "set up the doJO!" People who went through Boot Camp in San Diego within the past year or two know exactly who I'm talking about. It's a well quoted phrase to say the least. I can't recall his name, but it was one of those long, Hispanic compound names.
We begin with "body hardening" which I'm not exactly comfortable with at first. This involves essentially hitting your partner while he hits you to deaden your nerves a little bit. We hit the insides of our elbows together, the insides of our wrists, we punch eachother in the stomach, we kick the outside of eachother's thighs, and we kick the inside of eachother's thighs. The first couple times I did this was with a guy named Moulard. Physically, he's a beast. As we do it he keeps muttering "harder to me" as we beat each other in tandem. I'm wincing pretty much every hit, and the worst is getting kicked inside the groin. Ouch.
Either way we finish it and learn basic "Upper Strikes" such as punching and uppercuts. It's all worthless talk and just a time waster if you ask me. MCMAP is through in my opinion, especially the initial training one must suffer.
Everytime we execute a strike we have to do it twice and say "KILL! KILL!" which sort of makes me grin now. If I were watching recruits do this I'd probably break out laughing.
After this nonsense the training finishes...we eat...we hygiene...we hydrate...we sleep.
T7 - Pugil Sticks I
It seems like when I tell people about Boot Camp they always ask me about this part. "Did you get to do that thing with the sticks and the football helmets?"
"Yes...I did that. They're called Pugil Sticks. It's overrated."
After beginning the day like we normally do, we go to a large PT area. We've all picked up a rubber M16. Some people have really shitty ones that are bent or rusted. Parts of them are rubber, but most of them are metal. You could still do some serious damage with them. We take a rubber bayonet and click it onto the end of the barrel.
We all "set of the doJO" once again with our rifles and learn various butt strokes and bayonet stabbing moves. This all translates over to the pugil sticks, which have a red end (the front) and a black end (the back) to simulate an M16. There are some people I definitely would have rather used a rubber rifle on.
We organize by weight class (I was 150 at the time if I'm not mistaken) and line up in order of heaviest to lightest. Once at the end there are recruits that dress us with a flack jacket, large gloves, a groin protector, and a hockey/football helmet. The whole time we're watching other people in the large circle next to us fight (there are about three or four fights going on at a time if I'm not mistaken). The photographer that was taking pictures of us during pick up is walking around snapping shots of peoples faces. I didn't get photographed during this time, unless I missed it when I examined the CD back in April.
Finally, it's my turn. Many of the fights have been called by an instructor based not on how many times a person hits the other guy, but how accurately they execute one of the moves we were just taught.
I get into the ring with someone from another platoon, who stares me down through the mask on his helmet. The whistle is blown and we rush at eachother. He throws his stick around a couple times and I block him, and I execute one butt stroke, hitting him in the head with the black end of the stick. The whistle blows again. The green shirt comes over and hits me in the head. "Winner," he says. "Horizontal butt stroke," he says, which is the move I won with. Well, that was my ego booster for the week. I run out and take my stuff off and go back to where all of our canteens are staged. I stand in formation with other recruits from my platoon and drink water, waiting for everyone to finish.
Camp Lejeune
20:20
T6 - Upper Strikes
The beginning of my second week of actually training begins like any other. We wake up to "LIGHTS LIGHTS LIGHTS LIGHTS! GET OUTTA THE RACK! GET UP! LET'S GO! WELL, YOU HAVE 300299298297296295..." as Sgt. Virto runs up and down the Drill Instructor Highway (middle of the squadbay). Sgt. Saldana is behind him screaming as well. We are tired, annoyed, pissed, we have to piss, we're nervous because we don't know what's in store for us today.
"LEFT BOOT SOCK, GET IT ON YOUR BODY NOW! WELL, YOU HAVE [counts down]" yells Sgt. Virto and I scramble to pull a brown sock onto my left foot. "Ten nine eight seven six five four three two one, you are..."
"DONE, SIR!" we answer in unison. We stand at attention but of course someone doesn't have their sock on all the way. You'd be surprised how hard it is to get a sock on when someone's screaming at you. And of course we all have to take our socks off in a time limit and start over. Eventually we're totally dressed.
"PORT SIDE GET IN THE HEAD, STARBOARD SIDE MAKE YOUR RACKS. READY..." we take a breath. "MOVE!"
We yell "KILL!" in response. The port side of the squad bay scrambles to get into the head to piss and brush their teeth. We, on the starboard side, scramble to make our racks as one of the DIs counts us down. Miranda, my half brain dead rackmate, will hardly respond to me when I make a suggestion. It's either "huh?" or "what?" which is more frustrating than it sounds.
Either way we survive without wetting our pants.
After eating breakfast and whatnot we change over into green cammies for MCMAP training, which I come to hate eventually. We march over to a "pit" filled with rubber chunks and get covered and aligned in a mass formation with the rest of follow series. There's an instructor with a green shirt in front of us (the DIs wear a shirt of the color of their battalion, in our case red).
We begin by doing warm up excersises. We start with "BENDSANDTHRUSTS!" as the instructormakes it sound. This is dropping down, shooting your legs out, doing a pushup, and jumping back up. These are sometimes called burpees.
After this we learn about setting up the dojo. The Mexican instructor we have (who's talking on a bullhorn periodically so we can all hear) says it like this: "set up the doJO!" People who went through Boot Camp in San Diego within the past year or two know exactly who I'm talking about. It's a well quoted phrase to say the least. I can't recall his name, but it was one of those long, Hispanic compound names.
We begin with "body hardening" which I'm not exactly comfortable with at first. This involves essentially hitting your partner while he hits you to deaden your nerves a little bit. We hit the insides of our elbows together, the insides of our wrists, we punch eachother in the stomach, we kick the outside of eachother's thighs, and we kick the inside of eachother's thighs. The first couple times I did this was with a guy named Moulard. Physically, he's a beast. As we do it he keeps muttering "harder to me" as we beat each other in tandem. I'm wincing pretty much every hit, and the worst is getting kicked inside the groin. Ouch.
Either way we finish it and learn basic "Upper Strikes" such as punching and uppercuts. It's all worthless talk and just a time waster if you ask me. MCMAP is through in my opinion, especially the initial training one must suffer.
Everytime we execute a strike we have to do it twice and say "KILL! KILL!" which sort of makes me grin now. If I were watching recruits do this I'd probably break out laughing.
After this nonsense the training finishes...we eat...we hygiene...we hydrate...we sleep.
T7 - Pugil Sticks I
It seems like when I tell people about Boot Camp they always ask me about this part. "Did you get to do that thing with the sticks and the football helmets?"
"Yes...I did that. They're called Pugil Sticks. It's overrated."
After beginning the day like we normally do, we go to a large PT area. We've all picked up a rubber M16. Some people have really shitty ones that are bent or rusted. Parts of them are rubber, but most of them are metal. You could still do some serious damage with them. We take a rubber bayonet and click it onto the end of the barrel.
We all "set of the doJO" once again with our rifles and learn various butt strokes and bayonet stabbing moves. This all translates over to the pugil sticks, which have a red end (the front) and a black end (the back) to simulate an M16. There are some people I definitely would have rather used a rubber rifle on.
We organize by weight class (I was 150 at the time if I'm not mistaken) and line up in order of heaviest to lightest. Once at the end there are recruits that dress us with a flack jacket, large gloves, a groin protector, and a hockey/football helmet. The whole time we're watching other people in the large circle next to us fight (there are about three or four fights going on at a time if I'm not mistaken). The photographer that was taking pictures of us during pick up is walking around snapping shots of peoples faces. I didn't get photographed during this time, unless I missed it when I examined the CD back in April.
Finally, it's my turn. Many of the fights have been called by an instructor based not on how many times a person hits the other guy, but how accurately they execute one of the moves we were just taught.
I get into the ring with someone from another platoon, who stares me down through the mask on his helmet. The whistle is blown and we rush at eachother. He throws his stick around a couple times and I block him, and I execute one butt stroke, hitting him in the head with the black end of the stick. The whistle blows again. The green shirt comes over and hits me in the head. "Winner," he says. "Horizontal butt stroke," he says, which is the move I won with. Well, that was my ego booster for the week. I run out and take my stuff off and go back to where all of our canteens are staged. I stand in formation with other recruits from my platoon and drink water, waiting for everyone to finish.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Boot Camp Part 10
August 16, 2009
Camp Lejeune
21:03
I've been doing a good amount of writing today, the most I've done since back in March and April, so here's a second entry for you.
T3 - Intro to MCMAP (Marine Corps Martial Arts Program aka A Joke)
I remember this day fairly well. It was too hot for training when we were actually supposed to be outside doing MCMAP (pronounced McMap). At the time we were wearing deserts, so for MCMAP we were switching over to greens, which I thought looked pretty badass. They're much more severe looking and with the sleeves rolled down, they just look cooler. At this point I believe we were also wearing our boots. Earlier in the week we were wearing desert cammies with tennis shoes...which obviously looks retarded. There's probably pictures you can find (or I can post) of recruits looking stupid like this.
Either way we were changed over and I was excited and then we had to change back to deserts! It was a "black flag" or something which means the USMC packs up and goes inside for the day. We sat around in one of the other platoon's squad bays as a MCMAP instructor demonstrated some of the Tan Belt moves we would be learning. He briefly mentioned body hardening, which I will get into later.
I became pretty disturbed at the time when we were shown the Eye Gouge move. You read that right, yes. We were shown how to gouge someone's eye out. Well, make that shown how to theoretically gouge an eye out. I doubt if anyone's every tried it with this form of martial arts in Iraq of Afghanitan. Normally we, you know, blow up the enemies with bombs or guns before we get that close. But you never know do you?
After the MCMAP we could have done any number of things. The first week at recruit training is very blurry to me, I can't lie about that. It was a shocking experience (not the first week, but just the whole transition).
Of course, we practiced more drill. See, Initial Drill was coming up in two or three weeks, and we had to look sharp for it, so practice for that is pretty continuous.
T4 - Marine Corps History
T4 was another classroom day.
I wake up, stand on line, get dressed in "300 seconds," go piss, brush my teeth, and get back online. Then I run downstairs in front of the barracks to my spot in the formation and we march to chow. Then we form it up outside and march to the classroom. Today is "History I." We are taught a brief period of history from the genesis of the Marine Corps through the Civil War if I'm not mistaken. Then we leave and do other things. More drill. Weapons maintenance. At some point in the week we learn how to totally disassemble our M16s and clean them, so basically the M16s are now a burden. It's a burden not lifted from our shoulders until November.
T5 - Sprints
This day is simply called "Sprints" on the matrix because that's what we did for PT (physical training). Sprints is a pointless Saturday activity. It's the same old sports exercise where you do high knees down to one end, jog back. Butt kicks and jog back. Sprint down and jog back. Kareoke and jog back. It probably takes three hours for follow series to complete this pointless exercise. This is when I realized that PT in Boot Camp was going to be easy, and I wasn't wrong at all.
Sunday
Another Sunday means another day with free time means another day I spend about an hour at church crying. It feels so strange everytime I go to church, because it's a total escape. I know that between this church service and the next service I'll be going through something awful during the weekdays. Living Boot Camp for me was living from meal to meal, church service to church service. The Drill Instructors will try and convince you that this is the unmotivated to live through the experience, but I guarantee it's the only way anyone makes it. Living meal to meal makes a day go by in the blink of an eye.
When I finish church (which I may have gone to with Pavlik) I power walk back to the squad bay. Every Sunday we have to re-mark everything. This means I have to have a 1 by 6 piece of a note card cut and stamped with my name from my marking kit (a stamp with my name on it which I still have). I need enough of these to mark my foot locker in two places, my rack, my rifle, my rifle rack, and I don't remember what else. This is the first time I've gotten free time all week. We haven't yet begun to get an hour in the evening like we will when our schedule levels out. We've still been showering by the numbers and such. Still playing Two Sheets & a Blanket (tearing the blankets and sheets off our racks and remaking them in a time limit or doing it all over again).
When free time is over we march to lunch. Then we practice drill.
P.S. Sorry for the tense change during the beginning. This isn't the most polished thing in case you haven't noticed. I'm just trying to get my ideas and memories down in a basic skeleton for something to polish later.
Camp Lejeune
21:03
I've been doing a good amount of writing today, the most I've done since back in March and April, so here's a second entry for you.
T3 - Intro to MCMAP (Marine Corps Martial Arts Program aka A Joke)
I remember this day fairly well. It was too hot for training when we were actually supposed to be outside doing MCMAP (pronounced McMap). At the time we were wearing deserts, so for MCMAP we were switching over to greens, which I thought looked pretty badass. They're much more severe looking and with the sleeves rolled down, they just look cooler. At this point I believe we were also wearing our boots. Earlier in the week we were wearing desert cammies with tennis shoes...which obviously looks retarded. There's probably pictures you can find (or I can post) of recruits looking stupid like this.
Either way we were changed over and I was excited and then we had to change back to deserts! It was a "black flag" or something which means the USMC packs up and goes inside for the day. We sat around in one of the other platoon's squad bays as a MCMAP instructor demonstrated some of the Tan Belt moves we would be learning. He briefly mentioned body hardening, which I will get into later.
I became pretty disturbed at the time when we were shown the Eye Gouge move. You read that right, yes. We were shown how to gouge someone's eye out. Well, make that shown how to theoretically gouge an eye out. I doubt if anyone's every tried it with this form of martial arts in Iraq of Afghanitan. Normally we, you know, blow up the enemies with bombs or guns before we get that close. But you never know do you?
After the MCMAP we could have done any number of things. The first week at recruit training is very blurry to me, I can't lie about that. It was a shocking experience (not the first week, but just the whole transition).
Of course, we practiced more drill. See, Initial Drill was coming up in two or three weeks, and we had to look sharp for it, so practice for that is pretty continuous.
T4 - Marine Corps History
T4 was another classroom day.
I wake up, stand on line, get dressed in "300 seconds," go piss, brush my teeth, and get back online. Then I run downstairs in front of the barracks to my spot in the formation and we march to chow. Then we form it up outside and march to the classroom. Today is "History I." We are taught a brief period of history from the genesis of the Marine Corps through the Civil War if I'm not mistaken. Then we leave and do other things. More drill. Weapons maintenance. At some point in the week we learn how to totally disassemble our M16s and clean them, so basically the M16s are now a burden. It's a burden not lifted from our shoulders until November.
T5 - Sprints
This day is simply called "Sprints" on the matrix because that's what we did for PT (physical training). Sprints is a pointless Saturday activity. It's the same old sports exercise where you do high knees down to one end, jog back. Butt kicks and jog back. Sprint down and jog back. Kareoke and jog back. It probably takes three hours for follow series to complete this pointless exercise. This is when I realized that PT in Boot Camp was going to be easy, and I wasn't wrong at all.
Sunday
Another Sunday means another day with free time means another day I spend about an hour at church crying. It feels so strange everytime I go to church, because it's a total escape. I know that between this church service and the next service I'll be going through something awful during the weekdays. Living Boot Camp for me was living from meal to meal, church service to church service. The Drill Instructors will try and convince you that this is the unmotivated to live through the experience, but I guarantee it's the only way anyone makes it. Living meal to meal makes a day go by in the blink of an eye.
When I finish church (which I may have gone to with Pavlik) I power walk back to the squad bay. Every Sunday we have to re-mark everything. This means I have to have a 1 by 6 piece of a note card cut and stamped with my name from my marking kit (a stamp with my name on it which I still have). I need enough of these to mark my foot locker in two places, my rack, my rifle, my rifle rack, and I don't remember what else. This is the first time I've gotten free time all week. We haven't yet begun to get an hour in the evening like we will when our schedule levels out. We've still been showering by the numbers and such. Still playing Two Sheets & a Blanket (tearing the blankets and sheets off our racks and remaking them in a time limit or doing it all over again).
When free time is over we march to lunch. Then we practice drill.
P.S. Sorry for the tense change during the beginning. This isn't the most polished thing in case you haven't noticed. I'm just trying to get my ideas and memories down in a basic skeleton for something to polish later.
Boot Camp Part 9: Training Begins
August 16, 2009
Camp Lejeune
12:01
1st Phase - T1 - Interior Guard
Training begins on the Tuesday after we receive our rifles. I wish I could elaborate more on what happened today, but all I'm going by is the training matrix. We receive a class on Interior Guard, which involves us "drilling" over to the House of Knowledge and running into the classroom while being screamed at. Nothing new.
It escapes me who taught the class. There were assorted instructors who were former DIs who taught classes and had different reactions to us falling asleep or having to get up, get out, and go to the head across the street. The classes are a nightmare. At our recommended 8 to 12 canteens a day, this is when a normal person has to take a piss: the most awkward time. I have to find someone else to go with me, then we have to walk up one of the side isles in the classroom, then we have to somehow get through the gaggle of Drill Instructors waiting outside the class.
We have to yell "GOOD MORNING, GENTLEMAN!" and it's never loud enough so we have to keep screaming it as we power walk across the street to use the bathroom at the armory. Worst case scenario a DI follows you and counts you down as you both piss in the same urinal, just like in the mornings.
After the class we learn drill. Column lefts & rights, left & right obliques, about face. We learn the simple things first. When we do good Sgt. Virto says "Good job, you understand me?" "YES SIR!"
Then someone will screw it up. He'll act like he takes it personally and we'll have to "RUN!" in one direction until he says zero.
"Zero!"
"Freeze or die!"
Then we'll have to "RUN!" in the opposite direction. This is how we learn to march. Of course at this point we still march at a painfully slow pace, but we pick up speed. If we mess something up then we march slow again.
T2 - First Aid
Today we begin the torturous process of learning our basic first aid. In the "Green Monster" binder we have I think there's something like 5 first aid classes. It's awful. We learn several basic first aid things. Let's see if I can remember them all:
Sucking Chest Wound
Amputation
Chemical Burn
Head/Eye Wound
Hemorrage
Rescue Breathing
Stomach Wound (intestines hanging out)
Compound Fracture
I feel like I'm missing one. We go to another classroom to learn these. It's sort of like a small gymnasium with bleachers that we're crammed into. If someone falls asleep the Sgt. instructing will call him a faggot. We'll have to stand up and sit down over and over and over again. We're wearing an awkward green belt with canteen pouches on it with our full canteens, which we're drinking constantly. Then of course everyone has a burning desire to take a piss and several people get up and leave which brings the instructor to say:
"You're all going to leave? You want to disrespect me like that?" or something to that extent.
We get in trouble by our own DIs because of things like this.
After classes one day it turns out that there are some people in our platoon who are going crazy. SSgt. Arzola (Senior DI) calls the platoon in a school circle around him in the middle of the squad bay.
"Hey, is this really that bad?" he asks, sort of with a knowing grin.
"No, sir!" we yell accordingly.
"You just gotta think of it as like a gang initiation, but you're joining the most badass gang in the world," he says reassuringly.
There was a recruit who I believe claimed he was thinking about suicide. He wasn't the first to go. Reedy was his name and he eventually left. There was another one named Raymond who claimed to have "bad dreams" who I didn't expect to leave.
Another guy named Truitt kept giving up. We were punished many times for him during 1st phase. He had already been at MCRD or a month before I got there, having been held in either the PCP or MRP platoon after being dropped from his own training platoon.
We received some other people like this, including Kinney (a fellow Lutheran) who ended up becoming a squad leader, although he didn't arrive until T8.
At the end of the day, we have our hygiene inspections, jump into the racks (I have the bottom one at this point), lay still for taps, and go to sleep.
Camp Lejeune
12:01
1st Phase - T1 - Interior Guard
Training begins on the Tuesday after we receive our rifles. I wish I could elaborate more on what happened today, but all I'm going by is the training matrix. We receive a class on Interior Guard, which involves us "drilling" over to the House of Knowledge and running into the classroom while being screamed at. Nothing new.
It escapes me who taught the class. There were assorted instructors who were former DIs who taught classes and had different reactions to us falling asleep or having to get up, get out, and go to the head across the street. The classes are a nightmare. At our recommended 8 to 12 canteens a day, this is when a normal person has to take a piss: the most awkward time. I have to find someone else to go with me, then we have to walk up one of the side isles in the classroom, then we have to somehow get through the gaggle of Drill Instructors waiting outside the class.
We have to yell "GOOD MORNING, GENTLEMAN!" and it's never loud enough so we have to keep screaming it as we power walk across the street to use the bathroom at the armory. Worst case scenario a DI follows you and counts you down as you both piss in the same urinal, just like in the mornings.
After the class we learn drill. Column lefts & rights, left & right obliques, about face. We learn the simple things first. When we do good Sgt. Virto says "Good job, you understand me?" "YES SIR!"
Then someone will screw it up. He'll act like he takes it personally and we'll have to "RUN!" in one direction until he says zero.
"Zero!"
"Freeze or die!"
Then we'll have to "RUN!" in the opposite direction. This is how we learn to march. Of course at this point we still march at a painfully slow pace, but we pick up speed. If we mess something up then we march slow again.
T2 - First Aid
Today we begin the torturous process of learning our basic first aid. In the "Green Monster" binder we have I think there's something like 5 first aid classes. It's awful. We learn several basic first aid things. Let's see if I can remember them all:
Sucking Chest Wound
Amputation
Chemical Burn
Head/Eye Wound
Hemorrage
Rescue Breathing
Stomach Wound (intestines hanging out)
Compound Fracture
I feel like I'm missing one. We go to another classroom to learn these. It's sort of like a small gymnasium with bleachers that we're crammed into. If someone falls asleep the Sgt. instructing will call him a faggot. We'll have to stand up and sit down over and over and over again. We're wearing an awkward green belt with canteen pouches on it with our full canteens, which we're drinking constantly. Then of course everyone has a burning desire to take a piss and several people get up and leave which brings the instructor to say:
"You're all going to leave? You want to disrespect me like that?" or something to that extent.
We get in trouble by our own DIs because of things like this.
After classes one day it turns out that there are some people in our platoon who are going crazy. SSgt. Arzola (Senior DI) calls the platoon in a school circle around him in the middle of the squad bay.
"Hey, is this really that bad?" he asks, sort of with a knowing grin.
"No, sir!" we yell accordingly.
"You just gotta think of it as like a gang initiation, but you're joining the most badass gang in the world," he says reassuringly.
There was a recruit who I believe claimed he was thinking about suicide. He wasn't the first to go. Reedy was his name and he eventually left. There was another one named Raymond who claimed to have "bad dreams" who I didn't expect to leave.
Another guy named Truitt kept giving up. We were punished many times for him during 1st phase. He had already been at MCRD or a month before I got there, having been held in either the PCP or MRP platoon after being dropped from his own training platoon.
We received some other people like this, including Kinney (a fellow Lutheran) who ended up becoming a squad leader, although he didn't arrive until T8.
At the end of the day, we have our hygiene inspections, jump into the racks (I have the bottom one at this point), lay still for taps, and go to sleep.
A Map
To the right of the House of Knowledge is where Dental is. Underneath the PT Field area, you can just make out the edge of the runway. Yes, it's really that close.
Thursday, July 16, 2009
Boot Camp Part 8
July 16, 2009
Camp Lejeune
17:32
My apologies to those who follow this blog. I just haven't been feeling all that great to write over the past couple months, but I'm trying to push myself out of this slump and get back into it.
Sunday Part 2
I left out "Field Day."
What happens every Sunday during Recruit Training? A little thing we like to call field day. For most people this is a day during the last few days of school in elementary school where you get to skip classes and play sports all day. For Marines it means cleaning.
In Boot Camp it entails this:
There are about twenty racks on each side of the squad bay. All of them must be moved over to the opposite side of the squad bay to sweet and mop in their place. This means we have to move all of the footlockers as well and all of the shoe displays underneath the racks. For inexperienced recruits this can lead to mixing up each others' shoes or footlockers. We are given about an hour by our DIs to get everything done. This includes cleaning out the head, rain room, shitters, pissers, ladder wells (stairs), and every nook and cranny we can find. On Monday morning, the squad bays of each platoon are inspected by company level personnel and they decide if you pass or fail. This is reduced to an individual level while in the Fleet Marine Force.
Monday
The fairytale that is Sunday is now over. We've learned how to field day and cleaned everything. Everyone knows Monday as the last day before training begins. Why is this important? This is the day we get our M16's issued to us. Of course I'm pretty exited about it and am prepared to feel like a badass. I know that the weapon will become a burden eventually (not realizing the extent of it) but I'm not going to let that bring me down yet.
We march past the house of knowledge by the large building where the yellow footprints are from the first night of arrival. Past it and on the right is the armory. I know our platoon isn't the only platoon there to receive weapons. Some, if not all of the other platoons from follow series are there as well. We halt and file off from out formation to stand behind long tables with nothing on them. We're under an overhang and still outside, not sweating though because the heat in San Diego is dry heat.
Of course, the entire time giant jumbo jets are landing at the airport directly in front of me and the sound drowns everything out. After a few minutes some Corporal gets up on a tower in front of us that's about three meters high and begins instructing us on what's going to happen. We're going to get M16's.
Eventually we file off. Recruits carrying their old rifle back from the weapon rack with them to their original spot at the tables are trying to hide smiles of pride and exitement. This is particularly apparent with Crump I remember (who was known as Einstein in receiving). Finally, my row filed off. I remember being between Mellies and another guy who I was beginning to single out from the others as being entertaining to talk to. I forget his name. Since we were alphabetical it obviously began with an M, but I don't recall. Wait, I got it: Miller. Miller was in front of me and Mellies, the human box of rocks was behind me.
The first time I held an M16 was actually in mini-boot camp, so I wasn't all that surprised at how light it felt, but I was still kind of tingly I guess you could say. It was an exiting time to be at Boot Camp.
We laid the M16's out and were then issued cleaning gear. This includes some metal rods, a tooth brush thing, some CLP (lubricant), and other brushes and such to clean the weapon with.
Afte being issued I believe we signed a form and then had to memorize our rifle serial number.
10274137
I still remember.
Camp Lejeune
17:32
My apologies to those who follow this blog. I just haven't been feeling all that great to write over the past couple months, but I'm trying to push myself out of this slump and get back into it.
Sunday Part 2
I left out "Field Day."
What happens every Sunday during Recruit Training? A little thing we like to call field day. For most people this is a day during the last few days of school in elementary school where you get to skip classes and play sports all day. For Marines it means cleaning.
In Boot Camp it entails this:
There are about twenty racks on each side of the squad bay. All of them must be moved over to the opposite side of the squad bay to sweet and mop in their place. This means we have to move all of the footlockers as well and all of the shoe displays underneath the racks. For inexperienced recruits this can lead to mixing up each others' shoes or footlockers. We are given about an hour by our DIs to get everything done. This includes cleaning out the head, rain room, shitters, pissers, ladder wells (stairs), and every nook and cranny we can find. On Monday morning, the squad bays of each platoon are inspected by company level personnel and they decide if you pass or fail. This is reduced to an individual level while in the Fleet Marine Force.
Monday
The fairytale that is Sunday is now over. We've learned how to field day and cleaned everything. Everyone knows Monday as the last day before training begins. Why is this important? This is the day we get our M16's issued to us. Of course I'm pretty exited about it and am prepared to feel like a badass. I know that the weapon will become a burden eventually (not realizing the extent of it) but I'm not going to let that bring me down yet.
We march past the house of knowledge by the large building where the yellow footprints are from the first night of arrival. Past it and on the right is the armory. I know our platoon isn't the only platoon there to receive weapons. Some, if not all of the other platoons from follow series are there as well. We halt and file off from out formation to stand behind long tables with nothing on them. We're under an overhang and still outside, not sweating though because the heat in San Diego is dry heat.
Of course, the entire time giant jumbo jets are landing at the airport directly in front of me and the sound drowns everything out. After a few minutes some Corporal gets up on a tower in front of us that's about three meters high and begins instructing us on what's going to happen. We're going to get M16's.
Eventually we file off. Recruits carrying their old rifle back from the weapon rack with them to their original spot at the tables are trying to hide smiles of pride and exitement. This is particularly apparent with Crump I remember (who was known as Einstein in receiving). Finally, my row filed off. I remember being between Mellies and another guy who I was beginning to single out from the others as being entertaining to talk to. I forget his name. Since we were alphabetical it obviously began with an M, but I don't recall. Wait, I got it: Miller. Miller was in front of me and Mellies, the human box of rocks was behind me.
The first time I held an M16 was actually in mini-boot camp, so I wasn't all that surprised at how light it felt, but I was still kind of tingly I guess you could say. It was an exiting time to be at Boot Camp.
We laid the M16's out and were then issued cleaning gear. This includes some metal rods, a tooth brush thing, some CLP (lubricant), and other brushes and such to clean the weapon with.
Afte being issued I believe we signed a form and then had to memorize our rifle serial number.
10274137
I still remember.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Boot Camp Part 7
May 11, 2009
Camp Lejeune
22:08
Sunday
The first Sunday marks exactly a week since I have seen my family at home. We wake possibly an hour later I believe, but it’s the same as it always is. Waking up during Boot Camp and getting online is my least favorite time of the day until the day I graduate. I just hate having to be rushed through so many things at once and get counted down to dress myself. Of course if someone doesn’t get their left sock on in “100 seconds” than we all have to take off our left socks in a certain time and start all over again. There are several times where we put our socks on, then trousers, and then someone is too slow getting their blouse on so we have to take everything off and start again. Don’t worry; we’re not naked when we start over again. We go to sleep in our green “skivvie” shirt and shorts and wake up wearing them
Like yesterday, we follow the same basic routine and form up in a platoon formation outside. It’s a long march to the Chow Hall from our barracks, and Sgt. Virto marches us very slow. In theory, I guess you can’t march at a fast cadence if you can’t do it slow first, but it’s very irritating taking such slow steps.
“Left right…left…right…left…right” he calls out.
We eat breakfast and return to the squad bay. We make a head call and form up back outside and march to a large theater. Our whole company is sitting waiting, along with everyone else who is waiting for the Protestant service to start. I’m hoping I don’t have to sit through a generic non-denominational service. Luckily we start breaking off by religion.
“Lutherans!” I get up and run outside through a door. It’s kind of weird getting screamed at when you’re on your way to church. There are a handful of Lutherans. We march from the auditorium all the way across the entire parade deck and to the opposite side of the parking lot next to it. The Lutheran chapel is in the far corner of the Recruit Training Regiment area. The Drill Instructors tell us to be respectful and to not fall asleep. They’re not allowed inside the actual church though, and they wait outside menacingly, prowling around.
The inside of the chapel is nice. It reminds me of my church at home, simple and homey. It’s sort of small, but its enough room for the Lutherans. There’s an old woman answering some of our questions before church starts. She explains that it’s a generic Lutheran service, and the green hymnals in the pews support her statement.
I’m thinking about how Mellies raised his hand two separate times when Catholics were called to stand up yesterday and when Jews were asked to stand. Apparently he’s a Catholic Jew. We’ll pick that story up near the end of Second Phase.
The Chaplain is in the front walking around. He looks to be about in his forties. I later learn that he’s a Lieutenant Commander, which is the equivalent of a Major in the Marine Corps.
He tells us that he is a Lutheran Church Missouri Synod Chaplain, which sets my mind at ease when I think about taking communion. Now I know that it’s safe for me to do so. I start missing home. I’m sitting there in the pew next to these other brand new recruits and recruits who are way ahead of us in training surround us. They look bigger, tougher, and more confident. We look like kids.
Before the first hymn plays, the Chaplain asks the first row of people to stand up and face us. They’re wearing Service Charlies (a sort of dress uniform) and are brand new Marines. We clap for them and they sit down. When the music starts playing I start thinking of my family back home sitting in my church. My dad’s giving the sermon and my mom and sister are singing in choir. Everyone else I know is there, not a worry in the world compared to what’s going on in my mind.
I can’t sing because my voice is almost totally gone from yelling. An unknown fact about me is that I actually enjoy singing in church, and this new development depresses me even more than I already am. My eyes start to fill with tears. One rolls down my cheek. I try and keep this hidden from others around me but I notice that most of them are crying too. Between no one knowing how to sing, no one’s voice being good enough to sing, and people crying, the hymn doesn’t really work, but the organist covers it up well.
I spend the rest of the service trying not to just burst into tears. When the sermon comes I do my best to stay awake. Others openly sleep. Some people have somehow snuck the sports sections of newspapers in and are reading them. I’m ashamed of the people who go to church to simply escape since I actually have gone to church almost every Sunday my entire life.
After the service is over and I calm down, there’s a five minute break and then we have about an hours worth of a Luther’s Catechism class type thing. After that we leave and it’s back into reality for me.
We get into our column of twos and march back to the theater. We rejoin people in our platoons and wait to go to lunch. We march to the chow hall, eat, and go back to the squad bay.
I don’t remember what we did back there, but I know we had our IT brief that day. We march back down the main road to a grassy area with a red PT table. The series Drill Instructors get in the table and recruits from a third phase platoon are called out. We learn about IT. IT stands for Incentive Training. It’s known more commonly as “getting slayed” or “going to the dirt.” It’s what happens when you get in trouble. It involves doing a few exercises at a fast pace in succession without stopping. It’s awful. The exercises include:
Pushups
Side Straddle Hops (Jumping Jacks)
Crunches
Steam Engines
Mountain Climbers
Other companies may have had different ones, but these are the main five that we had to do. Tomorrow, the first Monday, it was fair game for the DIs to IT anyone who screwed up, no matter how small the mistake they made.
Monday, April 13, 2009
Boot Camp Part 6
April 13, 2009
Camp Lejeune
8:51
Saturday
The next day is considerably more relaxed than the scream-fest that Black Friday was. That’s not to say that we’re laid back, “smokin’ and jokin’.” Sgt. Saldana is almost always on the prowl. Sgt. Virto is around all the time as well. SSgt. Arzola hasn’t really addressed the platoon since his speech yesterday.
On Saturday we wake up early as usual. Waking up in the training platoon is a little more intense than waking up in the receiving squad bay. When the lights turn on, either Sgt. Saldana or Sgt. Virto run down the drill instructor highway screaming “LIGHTS LIGHTS LIGHTS LIGHTS GET OUTTA THE RACK GET OUTTA THE RACK LET’S GO! WELL, YOU HAVE 100 99 98 97 96 95…”
“10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1, YOU ARE…”
“DONE SIR!”
We do a thing called morning BDR (Basic Daily Routine) which involves making our rack, brushing our teeth, and taking a piss. Most of us are about to wet our pants because we’ve been drinking a lot of water, and were out cold so we didn’t go to the bathroom in the middle of the night.
We do things half the platoon at a time in the morning. Each side of the squad bay is either the Port Side or the Starboard Side. I’m on the port side I believe, and we’re first to go to the head. We literally run in there and start doubling up on urinals. This is a daily occurrence. I could probably count the times on one hand that I pissed in a toilet by myself while I was a recruit. Of course we are counted down to do this. I’m not sure if I’ve stated this yet, but getting counted down to do something is called doing it “By The Numbers.”
When we’re finished with that, our half of the platoon runs out of the squad bay and back on line in front of our racks. The other half of the platoon disappears with one of the DIs and we’re left with one of them who starts counting us own to make our racks with out any wrinkles. This is done utilizing the buddy system, and Miranda (who’s actually in the same room with me as I write this) is somewhat of a useless rack mate. He just moves kind of lethargically. He’s the opposite of Wick, who when he’s nervous tries to do everything really fast. Miranda just kind of locks up and I get really frustrated by it. We finish that garbage and the other half of the platoon comes back out.
Now it’s time to get dressed by the numbers.
“BLOUSES ON THE BODY NOW!”
We put on our blouses in a time limit. We put our pants on. We put our “go-fasters” on. We look retarded, I’ll have to draw what we look like at different stages to illustrate this.
We go to chow and come back. Saturday is sort of a day for us to learn how things are going to be done in the squad bay on a regular basis. On the training matrix it’s called “in-house procedures.” The training matrix is funny because it only lists one thing for each day even though we wake up around 5AM and go to sleep at around 9:30. I’m pretty sure we do more than one thing per day…
We’re sitting around on the quarterdeck (the front of the squad bay) in a classroom formation. That just means that we’re sitting in rows. We sit “left over right” which is how they describe the Indian style way of sitting. We sit that way because it’s a shooting position and they think that sitting in that position without a rifle will somehow make us more used to the position when we actually do it with an M16.
Sgt. Virto is going over all of the info on how we’ll do laundry, when we’ll do it, what we’ll wash, who we’ll wash it with, when we get mail (he’ll make us wipe our ass with it if he sees us reading it outside of free time), and some other things. He starts assigning the platoon billets. I think at this point Syer was appointed the guide. Syer’s a pretty big kid from Missouri who’s Puerto Rican. Sgt. Virto picks the scribes initially as Wilkerson, Rohl, Boyle (Number 1), and one of the Ramirezes. Wilkerson is a big guy wearing BCGs (Birth Control Glasses, the thick brown glasses that get issued at boot camp, I hadn’t gotten mine yet) who’s also married. I’m sure he got picked because of the glasses. The same with Rohl, though he was wearing his civilian “portholes” still. Rohl was a nerd, but he ended up being a pretty fun guy to talk to despite his weirdness. Scribes usually get picked for their level of nerdy appearance. Their job is to write down a lot of stuff and keep track of records. Boyle…I’m not sure why he got picked. Boyle’s the guy who’s the stereotypical tall, slow person. At least that’s what his first impression seems like. Ramirez, J is picked as the fire watch scribe. I never got to know him that well and I talked to him a few times. He seemed like a pretty laid back guy. His job was to make the fire watch roster.
The squad leaders at the time…I have no idea who they were. They were changed pretty often, but I’m positive one of them was Uzzel (pronounced “uh-ZEL” I think, at least that’s how I said it). Uzzel was pretty much a squad leader throughout the entire cycle, fired only a few times.
Sgt. Virto then needed “house mice” whose job it is to clean the duty hut during field day (cleaning). “Who’s my shortest recruit?” Sgt. Virto asks. I turn my head to see who’s going to stand up.
Tran
This is pretty much the first time I realize who Tran actually is, and I try not to laugh but I can’t help it. He’s just so…funny looking. He’s a tiny Vietnamese guy who’s the exact opposite of what you expect when you hear Marines. He’s always got a strange confused look on his face. His English is decent, but he speaks slow and in a voice that is a couple octaves up from what E.T. sounds like.
“Well, you’re definitely my ugliest recruit,” Sgt. Virto responds. He makes him sit back down. Sgt. Virto takes this time to make fun of people’s names. “Shube,” he reads from the roster. “Lube,” he adds after pausing. Of course there are confusing names like Niswonger, Tinejero, Tijerina, and such that Sgt. Virto has a little trouble with. He gets my name right from the start. He probably reads Uzzels name wrong. SSgt. Arzola refers to him as “oozle.” Than of course there’s Santos, the 30-year-old Filipino college graduate with a wife and kids. His voice is ridiculously high pitched and his English is not good. Sgt. Saldana often makes him “sound off” over and over again, so every day at some point I hear an “AYE AYE, SIR!” screeching over and over again.
After sitting around we get a religious brief in the big red room with the TV screens again. The whole company is in there; both series and we wait for the Chaplain, who’s a Lieutenant in the Navy. He finally comes in and starts going over this power point of why it’s important to go to church, how he won’t help us get out of boot camp, and other things. He starts getting groups of religions to stand up. He asks the Lutherans to stand, a few people do. Some guy raises his hand and asks if Christian Science is like Scientology. The Chaplain says it’s related. I almost fall asleep. We go to afternoon chow, we go to evening chow. Whatever else we did that day must not have been that important, because I don’t remember it.
After we hygiene by the numbers, it’s time to learn how to do our hygiene inspection. Every night we have to be standing online in nothing but our underwear wearing our shower shoes. First the guide goes to the duty hut and pounds on the piece of wood on the wall.
“GOOD EVENING GENTLEMAN! THE TIME ON DECK IS 20:30! PLATOON 1067 IS ONLINE AND READY FOR HYGINE INSPECTION, SIR!”
And then the platoon repeats that.
Than we hear a muffled “turn on the radio!” from inside the duty hut. We then repeat “TURN ON THE RADIO AYE AYE, SIR! CLICK CLICK!” and then everyone hums a pitch, it sounds awful. Then the guide starts “FROM THE HALLS…”
“OF MONTEZUMA
TO THE SHORES OF TRIPOLI!
WE WILL FIGHT OUR COUNTRY’S BATTLES
IN THE AIR ON LAND AND SEA!
FIRST TO FIGHT FOR RIGHT AND FREEDOM
AND TO KEEP OUR HONOR CLEAN!
WE ARE PROUD TO CLAIM THE TITLE OF
UNITED STATES MARINES!”
All out of tune and tempo. It sounds pretty bad. Then the DI comes out of the duty hut with a flashlight and we have to do a stupid little report when he shines it at us and says “HIT IT!”
“SNAP! GOOD EVENING SIR! RECRUIT MILAS, CHAMPAIGN ILLINOIS! 0300 REGULAR SIR!”
We scream that with our elbows locked to our sides, our palms straight out and facing down, and our forearms parallel to the floor. Our head is turned all the way to the right.
The DI says “FLIP!”
We face our palms up and our head pops to the other direction.
“POP! THIS RECRUIT HAS NO PERSONAL OR MEDICAL PROBLEMS TO REPORT AT THIS TIME, SIR!”
“SPIN!”
“SPIN AYE AYE SIR!” We do a 180 so our back is facing him. We must turn to the right, not the left.
“POST!”
“POST AYE AYE SIR! GOOD EVENING SIR!” Than we put our shorts and shirt on and wait for everyone else to go. The whole platoon takes about 30 minutes because we do this in groups of four usually. There’s the occasional night when the Senior is on deck and has everyone do it at the same time because he wants to go to sleep.
After the hygiene inspection we get a 5 minute prayer time. We get a short period of time to say something in front of the platoon. We put our “shoe display” on top of our footlocker, and we go to sleep.
Camp Lejeune
8:51
Saturday
The next day is considerably more relaxed than the scream-fest that Black Friday was. That’s not to say that we’re laid back, “smokin’ and jokin’.” Sgt. Saldana is almost always on the prowl. Sgt. Virto is around all the time as well. SSgt. Arzola hasn’t really addressed the platoon since his speech yesterday.
On Saturday we wake up early as usual. Waking up in the training platoon is a little more intense than waking up in the receiving squad bay. When the lights turn on, either Sgt. Saldana or Sgt. Virto run down the drill instructor highway screaming “LIGHTS LIGHTS LIGHTS LIGHTS GET OUTTA THE RACK GET OUTTA THE RACK LET’S GO! WELL, YOU HAVE 100 99 98 97 96 95…”
“10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1, YOU ARE…”
“DONE SIR!”
We do a thing called morning BDR (Basic Daily Routine) which involves making our rack, brushing our teeth, and taking a piss. Most of us are about to wet our pants because we’ve been drinking a lot of water, and were out cold so we didn’t go to the bathroom in the middle of the night.
We do things half the platoon at a time in the morning. Each side of the squad bay is either the Port Side or the Starboard Side. I’m on the port side I believe, and we’re first to go to the head. We literally run in there and start doubling up on urinals. This is a daily occurrence. I could probably count the times on one hand that I pissed in a toilet by myself while I was a recruit. Of course we are counted down to do this. I’m not sure if I’ve stated this yet, but getting counted down to do something is called doing it “By The Numbers.”
When we’re finished with that, our half of the platoon runs out of the squad bay and back on line in front of our racks. The other half of the platoon disappears with one of the DIs and we’re left with one of them who starts counting us own to make our racks with out any wrinkles. This is done utilizing the buddy system, and Miranda (who’s actually in the same room with me as I write this) is somewhat of a useless rack mate. He just moves kind of lethargically. He’s the opposite of Wick, who when he’s nervous tries to do everything really fast. Miranda just kind of locks up and I get really frustrated by it. We finish that garbage and the other half of the platoon comes back out.
Now it’s time to get dressed by the numbers.
“BLOUSES ON THE BODY NOW!”
We put on our blouses in a time limit. We put our pants on. We put our “go-fasters” on. We look retarded, I’ll have to draw what we look like at different stages to illustrate this.
We go to chow and come back. Saturday is sort of a day for us to learn how things are going to be done in the squad bay on a regular basis. On the training matrix it’s called “in-house procedures.” The training matrix is funny because it only lists one thing for each day even though we wake up around 5AM and go to sleep at around 9:30. I’m pretty sure we do more than one thing per day…
We’re sitting around on the quarterdeck (the front of the squad bay) in a classroom formation. That just means that we’re sitting in rows. We sit “left over right” which is how they describe the Indian style way of sitting. We sit that way because it’s a shooting position and they think that sitting in that position without a rifle will somehow make us more used to the position when we actually do it with an M16.
Sgt. Virto is going over all of the info on how we’ll do laundry, when we’ll do it, what we’ll wash, who we’ll wash it with, when we get mail (he’ll make us wipe our ass with it if he sees us reading it outside of free time), and some other things. He starts assigning the platoon billets. I think at this point Syer was appointed the guide. Syer’s a pretty big kid from Missouri who’s Puerto Rican. Sgt. Virto picks the scribes initially as Wilkerson, Rohl, Boyle (Number 1), and one of the Ramirezes. Wilkerson is a big guy wearing BCGs (Birth Control Glasses, the thick brown glasses that get issued at boot camp, I hadn’t gotten mine yet) who’s also married. I’m sure he got picked because of the glasses. The same with Rohl, though he was wearing his civilian “portholes” still. Rohl was a nerd, but he ended up being a pretty fun guy to talk to despite his weirdness. Scribes usually get picked for their level of nerdy appearance. Their job is to write down a lot of stuff and keep track of records. Boyle…I’m not sure why he got picked. Boyle’s the guy who’s the stereotypical tall, slow person. At least that’s what his first impression seems like. Ramirez, J is picked as the fire watch scribe. I never got to know him that well and I talked to him a few times. He seemed like a pretty laid back guy. His job was to make the fire watch roster.
The squad leaders at the time…I have no idea who they were. They were changed pretty often, but I’m positive one of them was Uzzel (pronounced “uh-ZEL” I think, at least that’s how I said it). Uzzel was pretty much a squad leader throughout the entire cycle, fired only a few times.
Sgt. Virto then needed “house mice” whose job it is to clean the duty hut during field day (cleaning). “Who’s my shortest recruit?” Sgt. Virto asks. I turn my head to see who’s going to stand up.
Tran
This is pretty much the first time I realize who Tran actually is, and I try not to laugh but I can’t help it. He’s just so…funny looking. He’s a tiny Vietnamese guy who’s the exact opposite of what you expect when you hear Marines. He’s always got a strange confused look on his face. His English is decent, but he speaks slow and in a voice that is a couple octaves up from what E.T. sounds like.
“Well, you’re definitely my ugliest recruit,” Sgt. Virto responds. He makes him sit back down. Sgt. Virto takes this time to make fun of people’s names. “Shube,” he reads from the roster. “Lube,” he adds after pausing. Of course there are confusing names like Niswonger, Tinejero, Tijerina, and such that Sgt. Virto has a little trouble with. He gets my name right from the start. He probably reads Uzzels name wrong. SSgt. Arzola refers to him as “oozle.” Than of course there’s Santos, the 30-year-old Filipino college graduate with a wife and kids. His voice is ridiculously high pitched and his English is not good. Sgt. Saldana often makes him “sound off” over and over again, so every day at some point I hear an “AYE AYE, SIR!” screeching over and over again.
After sitting around we get a religious brief in the big red room with the TV screens again. The whole company is in there; both series and we wait for the Chaplain, who’s a Lieutenant in the Navy. He finally comes in and starts going over this power point of why it’s important to go to church, how he won’t help us get out of boot camp, and other things. He starts getting groups of religions to stand up. He asks the Lutherans to stand, a few people do. Some guy raises his hand and asks if Christian Science is like Scientology. The Chaplain says it’s related. I almost fall asleep. We go to afternoon chow, we go to evening chow. Whatever else we did that day must not have been that important, because I don’t remember it.
After we hygiene by the numbers, it’s time to learn how to do our hygiene inspection. Every night we have to be standing online in nothing but our underwear wearing our shower shoes. First the guide goes to the duty hut and pounds on the piece of wood on the wall.
“GOOD EVENING GENTLEMAN! THE TIME ON DECK IS 20:30! PLATOON 1067 IS ONLINE AND READY FOR HYGINE INSPECTION, SIR!”
And then the platoon repeats that.
Than we hear a muffled “turn on the radio!” from inside the duty hut. We then repeat “TURN ON THE RADIO AYE AYE, SIR! CLICK CLICK!” and then everyone hums a pitch, it sounds awful. Then the guide starts “FROM THE HALLS…”
“OF MONTEZUMA
TO THE SHORES OF TRIPOLI!
WE WILL FIGHT OUR COUNTRY’S BATTLES
IN THE AIR ON LAND AND SEA!
FIRST TO FIGHT FOR RIGHT AND FREEDOM
AND TO KEEP OUR HONOR CLEAN!
WE ARE PROUD TO CLAIM THE TITLE OF
UNITED STATES MARINES!”
All out of tune and tempo. It sounds pretty bad. Then the DI comes out of the duty hut with a flashlight and we have to do a stupid little report when he shines it at us and says “HIT IT!”
“SNAP! GOOD EVENING SIR! RECRUIT MILAS, CHAMPAIGN ILLINOIS! 0300 REGULAR SIR!”
We scream that with our elbows locked to our sides, our palms straight out and facing down, and our forearms parallel to the floor. Our head is turned all the way to the right.
The DI says “FLIP!”
We face our palms up and our head pops to the other direction.
“POP! THIS RECRUIT HAS NO PERSONAL OR MEDICAL PROBLEMS TO REPORT AT THIS TIME, SIR!”
“SPIN!”
“SPIN AYE AYE SIR!” We do a 180 so our back is facing him. We must turn to the right, not the left.
“POST!”
“POST AYE AYE SIR! GOOD EVENING SIR!” Than we put our shorts and shirt on and wait for everyone else to go. The whole platoon takes about 30 minutes because we do this in groups of four usually. There’s the occasional night when the Senior is on deck and has everyone do it at the same time because he wants to go to sleep.
After the hygiene inspection we get a 5 minute prayer time. We get a short period of time to say something in front of the platoon. We put our “shoe display” on top of our footlocker, and we go to sleep.
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