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.

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.

Boot Camp Part 5

March 24, 2009
Camp Johnson
19:56 - Six days since MOS school graduation.

(I had to re-write about 2/3 of this entry, so it's probably not going to be as detailed this time as it's hard enough to write it once than to keep reliving the experience over and over again.)

At some point I go back to sleep, having finished my hour on fire watch. The next morning is the same story as the last. I woke up a couple minutes before the lights came on, so I was prepared for the screaming DI alarm clock waking everyone up and dressing us "by the numbers." We go to morning chow and practice some drill.

At some point we stop and "sit, kneel, bend." That means that we turn to the side, the front squad sits, the second kneels, the third bends, and the fourth just stands. It's so we can all see who's trying to talk to us. Sgt. Garza is taking some sort of roll call with some paper roster he has for out Senior Drill Instructor, who we have not met yet. It's Black Friday and we're all nervous about being picked up with our actual drill instructors.

Sgt. Garza, who at this point I realize is pretty funny, starts taking roll. "Sanchez," he calls out. "HERE, SIR!" Sanchez, who's from Chicago, yells out.

"Are you dirty, Sanches?""No, sir!""I would've said 'hell yeah, sir'," Sgt. Garza replies. We laugh. It's good to laugh during this week. It's been very hectic and stressful.

We return to the squad bay and we have to take another inventory again. Sgt. Garza gets pretty frustrated and gives us a speech about how a 17 year old (named Vasquez) has all of his issued gear and grown men can't keep accountability. He sits us down and gives us a "man to man" talk in which he does not want us to address him as sir. He talks about how he's seen "shit you only see in movies, and then some." Basically, he wants us to get our heads out of our butt holes.

He starts calling up those who have missing gear. "Tran!" he calls out. "Tranny!" That makes me laugh pretty hard, though there's another DI walking around, so I try my best to keep my bearing. We're standing on line facing each other and some other people are trying hard not to laugh either. I think we're all just going insane. People are laughing for no real reason. We're going to experience one of the worst days of our lives and we don't even know it.

One of my later buddies, Tinajero (from California, though I didn't know his name at the time), is missing some gear. He walks up to the front of the squad bay.

"What's that on your face?"

"Acne, sir!"

"Bullshit! Looks like a gypsy put a curse on you!"

I lose my bearing and laugh at that one. The other DI isn't near me, so it doesn't matter. We get this whole mess sorted out. Finally we wait online. Sgt. Garza comes in and says something like, "He's right in the next room." He means our Senior Drill Instructor, like GySgt. Hartmann in Full Metal Jacket. I'm expecting that moment to become a reality very soon. We're all silent.

"Should I go get him?" Sgt. Garza is amusing himself by screwing with us? He's got a big smile on his face like he's going to enjoy watching us suffer. He leaves the squad bay and walkes into an adjacent duty hut (office) and shuts the door. We can hear some muffled talking. Sgt. Garza comes back out and waits silently. A moment later, another Marine follows.

What follows is one of the most painless experiences ever. SSgt. Arzola, our platoon Senior Drill Instructor, walks out of the duty hut and stands before us wearing a red PT t-shirt and green shorts. He doesn't yell, just talks. He doesn't talk in the growly voice that DIs often talk in when they're not yelling either. Basically, he's not acting like a DI at all.


He does another quick inventory to make sure we all have what we need, and then leaves. This maybe takes fifteen minutes because Sgt. Garza quadruple checked everything.

SSgt. Arzola leaves and we stuff everything into our seabags. Everything. We roll up our linens again and put the seabags on our back, bear hugging the war bags and our blankets and pillow. We start marching down the "Recruit Highway" which is a long road that runs through MCRD. We end up having to go to the opposite end of the Recruit Training Regiment (RTR) area to our barracks. On the way, we pass the parade deck to our right. We hear cheering and look over to see the bleachers decorated and filled with happy civilians. Their sons are graduating today. I look farther to see a large formation of graduating Marines marching down the parade deck.

"That's not for you," Sgt. Garza says at the sound of applause.

My friend, Jimmy Bopari, is somewhere in the formation. He's going home today and I've got the whole ordeal ahead of me. Depressing.

We get to the barracks, which is sort of secluded, it's the farthest away from the chow hall and its right next to medical, which is sort of convenient. It's the oldest barracks on the base, so it sucks. I'm serious.

We have to carry all of our crap up to the third deck, and when we get in the squad bay I'm sort of refreshed at how open it is. It's not cramped like the receiving squad bays. Each rack has two footlockers sitting out in front of it and we have to put our seabags down on one. We do this and run back out into a formation outside.

After marching all the way back across MCRD again, we're cleaning in the receiving squad bay. I find myself in the head (bathroom) cleaning when someone tells Pickens to clean something dirty, obviously.

"F*ck that man, I ain't no bitch," he whines in a gangsta way. Pickens is overweight, so thinking of him getting into a fight with someone amuses me. I begin thinking about his comment. You're a bitch, Pickens, I think. If we're not civilians and not Marines, then we're all little bitches stuck in limbo until we graduate. It's a simple fact.

We finish cleaning and then we march to this big auditorium style classroom in "The House of Knowledge." There's a 1st Lieutenent standing at the bottom of the room, 1stLt. Doorsheck (I don't remember how to spell his name). He gives us a quick speech welcoming us to Delta Company and blah blah blah. Officers and their speeches. Platoons 1065, 1066, and 1068 are in the classroom as well. They comprise the second series in the company, "follow series" whereas 1061, 1062, and 1063 comprise lead series. There is no 1064. Platoon 1064 is a lie.

When we finish with this little intro we march ALL THE WAY back across the base again to our barracks and sit in rows on the quarter deck, facing a door. The quarter deck is an open area at the front of the squad bay. We're facing the door to the duty hut. 1stLt. Doerscheck walks in and waits silently behind us.

Sgt. Garza eventually goes into the duty hut and comes back out. "I feel bad for you," he says, chuckles, and we never see him again. Actually I think I saw him a couple more times.

The door opens and three DIs march out in step and snap to attention in front of us. They exemplify ultimate discipline. I recognize SSgt. Arzola in the middle. To his right is Sgt. Virto, and to his left is Sgt. Saldana. Sgt. Saldana looks pretty young and clean cut, so I don't exactly know what to expect. In a way he looks nervous too, probably because of the officer that's about to supervise him.

SSgt. Arzola begins spouting off some pre-recorded message, which I think includes the Drill Instructor's Creed. He also says something like "We won't give up on you, even when you give up on yourselves." The whole thing almost sounds comforting, but none of us have any idea what's going to happen.

Suddenly, he says something like "Drill instructors, carry out the plan of the day."

"Aye aye, senior drill instructor," the other two answer before exploding at us like monsters.

Let me freeze for a second and introduce my DIs.

SSgt. Arzola is the oldest, and we may be his fifth or sixth cycle, I'm not positive. He's married with a son. He is the senior drill instructor and the most calm and personable one, much the opposite of how GySgt. Hartmann acts in Full Metal Jacket, which isn't totally accurate in that regard. SSgt. Arzola is the one you want your parents to meet when you graduate.

Quotes that I remember:

[while holding his NCO sword] "Good, Milas! You think that's funny?" [points the sword at me] "It'd be pretty funny if I stabbed you in the heart!"

[wiping snot off his nose on a cold morning] "It's like I got Ron Jeremy's nut coming out my nose!"

"Yeah, keep looking at me like I got a dick on my forehead!"


Sgt. Virto is the J-Hat, or Jr. Drill Instructor, or J, or Drill Hat as they call them at Parris Island. His primary job is "to train you" as he said, but mainly it's to teach us drill and marching. Sgt. Virto becomes my favorite of the drill instructors. He instills the most discipline while still actually having a personality. His punishments are pretty scary, but I'm not usually subject to them.

I don't remember too many quotes from him other than him saying "Milas, you're kind of a tree aren't you?" late in the cycle.

Sgt. Saldana is the "Kill Hat" or 3rd hat. He's the "scary one." We're his second cycle. Sgt. Saldana screams almost everything he says throughout the first phase of training. His job is pretty much to yell. I'm serious, that's basically his job and he's good at it.

[I screw up while drilling] "What was that Milas!?" [pronounced mee-las]

"No, excuse, sir!"

"Yeah, there is an excuse!" [gets in my face] "You should've been aborted!"


Back to reality. Sgt. Virto and Sgt. Saldana begin screaming at us to GET UP GET UP GO NOW GET ON YOUR GEAR GET ON YOUR GEAR NOW and start counting down from around "two hundred" I think. We stand by our seabags.

"DUMP 'EM NOW!" they yell.

I open my seabag and hold it upside down. Unfortunately, Miranda, my new rackmate has a broken bottle of laundry detergent that spills all over the place when it falls from his seabag. Some of it gets on my stuff which is piled up in front of me. We don't know what to do and we don't say anything. The DIs either don't notice or pretend not to as we stuff all our gear into our footlockers. We lock them and then Sgt. Virto leads us around our barracks showing us various rooms such as the "Pisser Room" "Shitter Room" and less offensively names "Rain Room."

After our short tour, we go back into the squad bay and stand on line and wait in silence. Sgt. Saldana comes into the squad bay and screams at us to get our mattress covers out of our war bags. They're cheap plastic mattress covers and we get counted down to put them on the racks. They rip and tear on the springs, but we get it done.

We're called up to the guide's rack, which is a lone rack in the front of the squad bay. It's not a bunk bed, it's just got one bed. We gather around it in a school circle, to listen to Sgt. Saldana. He gives us a short period of instruction on making our racks, the whole time screaming "OK, DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME!?" He's sweat so much that his uniform is a shade darker.

This whole time a photographer has been running around taking pictures. I haven't seen the pictures yet, but I probably look like I'm about to cry. It was a scary day, I'm not describing it well enough with words here. I'll post the pictures when I get ahold of them.

Anyway, when we're done running around screaming and being screamed at we go outside. Sgt. Virto gets us in a platoon formation and sizes us. This means that the taller people go to the front of the formation. I'm officially declared to be something like the the 6th or 7th tallest person in the platoon. I'm in 2nd squad, third from the front behind my buddy Rodriguez (from Chicago). Rodriguez becomes my best friend in Boot Camp. Aside from the very last week, I'm either his rackmate or standing on line next to him throughout the cycle.

For the rest of the day, we practice drill with Sgt. Virto. Columns, mark time, obliques, to the rear, etc. We go to evening chow and more rules are strictly enforced. We have to hold our trays with our elbows tight to our sides. When we finish getting our food we have to say:

"GOOD EVENING SIR, RECRUIT MILAS!" and the DI tells us to sit down. I think this is so they can learn our names.

We finish that and go back to the squad bay. We're inspected by some officer who wants to see all of our tattoos and to see if we have any skin diseases or anything. He sees that my rib cage is screwed up (since we're down to our "skivvies" i think) and asks me if I have a waiver.

"NO, SIR!"

"Ready to start training?"

"YES, SIR!" (no shit, serlock. i wanna get this crap overwith)

That finishes and it's time to hygiene. This is a terrible part of the day for any first phase recruit. It involves everyone being counted down to undress while standing online. We wrap a green towel around our "naughty bits" and then one side of the squadbay runs into the sink room and the other half goes to the rain room. I go to the sink room first, and we have our razors. (Everyone is issued a Gillette Fusion)

We get counted down to put shaving cream on our face and shave. People are cutting themselves all over the place. This is the very last time I ever used shaving cream. Not even kidding. You don't need shaving cream for gillette fusions, it's a smooth shave as long as your skin's moist.

Anyway, when that's over we change places with the half of the platoon that's in the rain room. We throw off our towels as Sgt. Virto's standing off to the side and he has us get in and turn the showers on. Some of us have soap. He starts naming body parts and counting down for us to scrub them.

"Wash your face!"
"Wash your kneck!"
"Wash your nuts!"

There's a good scene of this in Ears Open, Eyeballs Click although, you have to experience it to really feel demeaned.

When that's over we do a hygiene inspection practice, but it wasn't really detailes. I'll explain it in the next entry. We hit the racks, lights go off, and recruits start getting fire watch again. It's more detailed this time, and the instructors stay awake to show us what to do. I don't have it tonight, but I don't think the DIs slept for more than two hours a night for a week. That's my educated guess and a big reason I'd never be a DI. If I'm as miserable as my recruits, than something's wrong.

Boot Camp Part 4 - The Piss Test Nightmare

March 21, 2009
Camp Johnson
13:56

At some point on Thursday August 28th I believe, I wake up. It's dark in the squad bay and I'm on the bottom rack, eying the front hatch. I don't know what time it is, but the people on fire watch (which is nothing more than an excuse to deprive us of sleep) walk over to the hatch and stand there. My view is obstructed by other racks in between me and the door, so I can't see what's going on.

Everything is quiet.

Suddenly the lights come on and I'm blinded. The DI runs in.

"LIGHTS! LIGHTS! LIGHTS! GET UP! GET OUTTA THE RACK! LET'S GO!" and he starts counting down in that garbled way that DIs count down.

I jump out of my rack, wearing my green shirt and short green PT shorts and stand "on line" in front of my rack wearing my black flip flops, which we call shower shoes. We all count off and then get counted down to put on our desert cammie trousers. We get counted down to put on our running shoes.

Then we stand there ready to go outside. The DI walks up and down the isles checking shaves and making people dry shave if they have any stubble. I'm lucky to have blonde facial hair. Finally, he tells us to get outside and form it up. When I run out of the squadbay and along the catwalk on the 2nd deck, I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror and am instantly startled. It's the first time I've seen myself in well over 24 hours. I can't say I'm comfortable with what I see.

We march to the chow hall and eat breakfast all in a span of about 20 minutes. It's amazing how fast you eat when you're as nervous as you are. We're told to get up and leave as we finish instead of being dismissed altogether like we were yesterday. People start finishing their food and leaving and the guy at my table hastily gets up.

"Don't go yet, you have time," I say without looking up. He regains his composure and sits to eat about half of his apple before he leaves. I finish my apple and get up and leave.

When we get outside we're in a formation again. We make sure we're all there and whichever DI is with us starts drilling us and teaching us how to march and do column lefts and rights and halts and mark times. We did this a lot the previous day as well but it's hard for people to remember all the commands so we get yelled at when we screw up.

Eventually we go back to the large room with the four screens on the ceiling again. We're there to take pictures for our IDs and to take a piss test. We take our pictures. I think about how this is a terrible time to photograph us, and sure enough, check any Marine's military ID to see what I mean. At some point while we're sitting at the tables in the large room, a recruit named Mellies (who I begin to notice is totally incapable of rational thought) offers to take some canteens to fill them up in the "head." I give him mine, one of the dumbest things I could've done, but I was too afraid to go myself.

He returns without my canteen and I'm visibly annoyed. "Where's my frickin' canteen?" I ask him.

"Igaveittosomeoneelseandtheysaidthey'dbringitback," he spits out. He's from Oklahoma and I later find out he's some kind of bull rider. I think he broke his head being thrown off one time, really, that's what he told us. I heard he needed someone to tie his boots for him during this receiving week because he had previously only worn cowboy boots.

Now I'm without a source of hydration, a fact I conceal from the DIs for the rest of the day. It's not good to be dehydrated in Boot Camp. Despite this, I'm currently hydrated and it's time to take the piss tests.

The Piss Test Nightmare

We're in the room where we emptied our pockets a couple nights ago, with the red tables and their cubicles. I hate this room with a passion. There's a DI standing in the front of the room at some podium for some reason and he waits for us all to get in. There are more people than just my platoon. It's urinalysis time, baby!

This is one of the worst experiences in all of boot camp if you ask me. The DIs are getting really ticked off as we're each given a small clear bottle with a lid on it. We have to remember the order we took them out of a cardboard box so they all go back in. I'm pretty sure it was alphabetical. They take groups of about 15 recruits at a time who have to line up and hold their bottles above their heads straight up. And you can't bend your elbows or lower the bottle at all or you get yelled at.

Finally, my 15 gets called out to be in the pit. We wait for the next group to get back and we're rushed to the bathroom. We run down a hall, screamed at the whole time, and enter the Men's room. Already, there are at least two DIs in here and probably like seven or eight recruits with their pants and underwear down to their feet and they're holding their shirts up to their faces.

"God bless 'em!" I remember a DI laughing and saying to another DI.

We're standing in front of urinals.

"Drop your trousers and your shorts!" we're told "tactfully."

So now we're standing in the bathroom awkwardly in silence all with our dicks hanging out just trying to not lose our bearing. Some people don't know whether to laugh or cry. I think one recruit yelled a response in a way that the DI thought he wanted to fight, so he laughed and confronted him before we were told to fill the bottles. I don't have too much trouble. I just think about MEPS.

The bottle is full, I finish off in the urinal and flush, but I don't pull my pants up because I haven't been told to yet. We have to wait for everyone to finish and some people can't go. They get screamed at. DIs are losing their voices over this.

The ones that pissed are allowed to leave. We go back to the room and go through this ridiculously overcomplicated process of putting a red piece of tape over the lid of the bottle and writing our name in it before replacing it into the cardboard box.

Finally we get the hell out of there as people are still screaming and yelling and we're outside. We go back to the squad bay and DI Sgt. Hernandez (the shorter one) takes about thirty of us. We march in the blazing San Diego sun across the base to a supply warehouse. This is the first time I take in the surrounding San Diego area. There are rich houses and apartments on hills overlooking the whole base. It's one of the most depressing realizations of my life. Later I find that I can see the downtown skyline from my training platoon squad bay.

We stop at the warehouse and some male and female Sergeants are already yelling at us. I'm pissed because I'm getting sweaty and thirsty and Mellies lost my canteen. I'm afraid I'll faint out of dehydration.

When you faint a corpsman puts a rectal thermometer up your anus. It's referred to infamously as "The Silver Bullet" everywhere I've been.

We have to fill seabags with all the crap that was in them the other night when we got to MCRD. We line up in rows of four and get all the gear, put it in a seabag, close it, and put them all in a pile. We do this for probably about two hours in the sun before loading them onto a truck. I take a couple drinks from another guy's canteen.

Afterwards we sit around a while and the DI discovers Santos, a 30 year old Philipino college graduate who has a family. Santos remains in my platoon for the remainder of boot camp. The DI asks him why he's there. I wonder too.

We return to the squadbay. Sgt. Gonzales (the taller one) has us sit down and eat lunch, the sandwiches and juice boxes and apples and animal crackers we had yesterday. I'm in platoon 1063, and there are six other platoons in Delta Company. The amount of recruits in the platoons is unbalanced so some of us have to leave. Sgt. Gonzales reads off a list of names which includes mine who are going to 1067. I'm honestly depressed because I just fear certain changes in general. I met a few people in this platoon and I don't want to have to get to know all new people. Our DIs here are pretty cool and laid back for the most part.

While we're sitting around waiting Sgt. Gonzales starts talking. "You need to motivate yourself. Think about something that gets you through the day. Me, I'm thinkin' about the stripper I'm gonna get with tonight."

We laugh. He's not really wearing a uniform right now so he's pretty informal. The ones moving have to pack up our gear and go outside. I roll up my blankets and pack the seabag and war bag and wait outside.

At some point, I think Oh yeah, I'm John Milas. I have a family and friends and I'm from Illinois. That's not a joke. I'd literally reminded myself of my identity because I'd had no time for it anymore.

We're taken into the next door squadbay, which is platoon 1067. There are only 18 recruits in this platoon before about 50 of us from 63 move to it.

Earlier in the day, we'd gone to "clothing" and had been fitted for our cammie blouses and boots. We're given three sets of woodland cammies and two sets of deserts. They measure my feet a size too small and I take the boots anyway because they feel ok.

When we're at 1067, a guy named Fletcher is the first guy I meet. He shows me how to lace the boots properly (we have two pairs) and he shows me how to roll the sleeves on my desert blouse which we don't have much time to do. I'm instantly depressed by the heavy handed nature of this platoon's DIs. The 18 recruits referred to as the "super squad" seem depressed and look like they're been beaten into submission.

I remember meeting Fletcher and Weaver. Another guy comes in and seems like he's about to have a heart attack. Wick is his name. I try to calm him down and show him what we need to prepare. We need to make skivvie rolls, which means we need to roll up a shirt, underwear, and socks. I suck at it at first but I manage.

There's a recruit named Boyle who's referred to only as "Number 1" by DI Sgt. Garza, who cracks me up for the rest of the time I'm in receiving. Boyle is a big tall goofy guy from the Chicago area. Another recruit named Crump is referred to as "Einstein" by him. Crump's from...Arkansas, yeah that's it. He has a country accent and is given a hard time for this. Mellies somehow becomes Boyle's number two, but he's not called "Number 2" he's called "Number 1's Assistant" by Sgt. Garza.

Basically, he just helped with some roster stuff. A monkey could've done it.

We get more of our crap ready for tomorrow as more recruits from other platoons are switched to 67. Not many more because we only have 89 total at that point I believe, maybe a few more. A recruit named Patterson has lost his voice and sounds like a DI when he talks, so he talks just to hear himself talk and it's pretty annoying. He's one of the most immature people that I end up training with for the rest of the time.

The entire time, Sgt. Garza gives a hard time to a recruit named Tran, who I don't even see until the next morning. The reason being is probably that he's tiny. I could hear Sgt. Garza yelling at Tran for the rest of the day, but could never pinpoint the location of this recruit.

We go to evening chow. Same deal as always. About 30 seconds to eat an entire meal and leave. We go back to the squad bay and we take an inventory of the crap we have and the crap we're SUPPOSED to have, but that people have lost. Tomorrow is Black Friday, and we need all of our gear to pick up with our training platoons.

Sgt. Garza yells at Tran for missing things.

Night comes and I have to be on fire watch at one point. I remember meeting Reher, who's name was often mispronounced as "ree-her" or "rear" but is pronounced "rare." He seemed like a good guy. He ended up being pretty cool. He's a Mormon who went to recon, so basically he's one of the baddest SOB's who walks the earth now.

Fire watch consisted of us being awake for an hour in the middle of the night in uniform with our covers on and wearing our geek straps (glow belts) and walking around the squad bay cleaning and whatnot. It was never really defined during the receiving week. I mopped a little bit and swept before I went to sleep.

Tomorrow is Black Friday or pick-up day. That is the day when we meet our actual Drill Instructors for the rest of the cycle. Think beginning of Full Metal Jacket when GySgt. Hartmann introduces himself to his platoon at the beginning of the movie and proceeds to ridicule and mock every one of them while chocking them out and physically beating them. The physical beating thing isn't allowed anymore, but I think that's what we all had in our minds as what would happen the next day.

Boot Camp Part 3

March 18, 2009
Camp Johnson
18:00

We all look the same and we all now have everything shoved into our war bags. Again, war bags are nothing more than small digitally camouflaged duffel bags. They refer to them differently at Parris Island.

We are all told to stand up (again, with the odd sounds playing over our heads) and start filing through a door. We end up in an enormous room. This room is big, very big. In the middle, hanging from the ceiling, is one of those things that they have in the middle of in door stadium type places that usually is a scoreboard. I know people who've been to the U of I assembly hall know what I'm talking about. This one has four large screens on it, one for each side of the room, which is a large square with red walls and a large brass Eagle, Globe, and Anchor hanging from one of the walls. There are approximately three long rows of tables and chairs against each wall. Under the large screens is a computer enclosed in a sort of cubicle and some tables near it on the carpeted floor.

We are herded into this room and all stand behind a chair. I'm pretty sure a few people sit down and are subsequently told "WHO TOLD YOU TO SIT DOWN?" "OH, SOMEONE MUST'VE TOLD YOU TO SIT DOWN, RIGHT?" and they stand up, looking scared.

We are finally told to sit down and are given pens, or "ink sticks." This is "The Moment of Truth" which I did a mock version of at mini boot camp, though that had real no resemblance to this one. The moment of truth in boot camp consists of about two hours worth of paperwork I'd say. And keep in mind, I've been up since around 3 AM and it's probably going on 11:30 PM at this point when we START. We initial a lot of things and a lot of people mess up 0n their paperwork and get screamed at because they need another copy of a form to fill out again and this is a problem, or at least it's presented to us as a problem. Some more screaming and yelling (though this part of my day is relatively quiet) and we're told that we're going to be in deep crap if we don't come out with the fact that we've done drugs, or if we lie about something we don't disclose. I say nothing, I think a couple people may have, but we eventually leave the room.

I can't exactly remember how, but we each grab a Sea Bag (large, long, green bag with one side that opens with four flaps) and run outside. I think we grabbed them from a pile inside.

We take them outside and run into another formation and kneel down in grass. It's early enough now that the sprinklers are going off and we get damp. People closer to them get more wet. The Sergeant who's yelling at us during this time makes no mention of the sprinklers and I think he himself even gets a little wet.

He tells us to open the sea bags. They open by releasing a clip and sliding three loops off of a pin that sticks out. There are four flaps and it opens kind of like the petals on a flower. One by one, we remove a poncho, two canteens, a war belt (a thick green belt that SUCKS), two canteen pouches (to be attached to the war belt), and a canteen cup. I think that's what was all in the sea bag. Oh, and another sea bag. These items were with me until the week before November 21st. The two sea bags are still with me to this day and probably always will be.

When it is verified that everyone has all of this stuff, we put it back in the sea bag. The Sergeant uses an analogy to show us the order of which flaps to put over the pin in what order. "You've got your dick," he says holding up the pin, "And you've got your bitches." He holds up the other side with the other three flaps that have rings in them. "You f*ck the one in the front," he slides the opposite flap over, "The one on the left," he closes the left flap, "And the one on the right," he closes the right flap and clips the bag shut. We do the same.

This whole time, recruits have been pretty pissed off. Someone's always screwing up at something and we're getting bitched at constantly. It's the whole point, but still I can hear people muttering behind me "f*cking retard" "dumb ass bitch" "stupid people" and other frustrations. At this point in time, everyone wants to fight. I almost turn around and slap someone in the face while we're checking the items in our sea bags, I'm not even joking. Not one bit.

The first week of boot camp destroys you. It fights you for your own soul and you have to fight back hard to keep it. People at the end of the cycle (cycle is a way to represent each graduating company) talk about how Receiving Week wasn't that hard and they'd do it again. I consider it to be the worst week of my life. And technically, it was only about three days.

When we have our sea bags, we're told to carry them (probably bear hug again) and get into a formation. We file off on a sidewalk amidst a bunch of buildings (it's still dark) and I'm pretty disoriented. I don't know my sense of direction and I've got no idea where I am. Again, this is the whole point. Nothing is supposed to be comfortable or comforting.

We end up going up some stairs with our war bag and sea bag and enter a squad bay. This is a receiving squad bay and there are four rows of bunk bed racks instead of just two in a normal training platoon squad bay. The lights are on and everything seems sterile and fake. A drill instructor (either DI Sgt. Gonzales or Sgt. Hernandez, yeah I even remember their names) enters and starts yelling at us to get in alphabetical order by a rack and we count off. We scream the number that comes after what the person screams to our left, or right. I don't remember which direction the count off started. I think I'm 68. I remember I was in the 60's in terms of my alphabetical order.

We put our sea bags and war bags on the racks by hanging them from posts and then run back out of the squad bay outside. It's pretty early. I feel like I'm skipping something because It must have been around...at least 4 in the morning. The night I arrived there is especially a blur because of how fast everything happened, but things did take a long time.

We get into a formation and the DI calls cadence and marches us to the chow hall (local eatery). A lot of other recruits are marching around and at first I think they're Marines. I don't really know what's going on right now. I'm in a pretty bad mental state. They are all recruits though. You can definitely tell the difference between first phase and 3rd phase recruits (2nd phase recruits are exclusive to Camp Pendleton, we'll get there). The discipline level and outward appearance is conspicuous.

The chow hall is blaring loud with commotion. DI's are screaming left and right and recruits are screaming back in the hundreds all over the place, marching and halting, waiting for the platoon in front to get inside, eat, and get out so they too can eat breakfast (or morning chow). The chow hall has four seperate entrances and "decks" to eat at and we line up in front of one door. It's dark outside but the inside of the building is brightly lit and I can see inside through the large windows. Finally, we start going in one by one.

When you go into the recruit chow hall you first grab a metal tray. You get silverware. Then comes the salad bar. Usually there's salad, except for the mornings. There're apples and oranges. I get neither at this point, at least I don't think. There are small packets of peanut butter. I didn't get any yet. I forget what else is there during the day. Cottage cheese. I think they had that for breakfast. I get some. There's some other loose fruit that I spoon onto my tray. The main line is next which is actually served by humans, or..sub humans. Every chow hall employee was an ex-con according to my Kill Hat, Sgt. Saldana.

You hold your tray underneath the glass and they put "scrambled eggs" and bacon or sausage and maybe a hashbrown and pancakes, waffles, or small pieces of french toast. The french toast is the best. You can grab packets of syrup. There's a small desert section that in the mornings either has cinnamon rolls or apple turnovers. We all put our trays on a table (with four seats) and stand and wait to be seated. When the whole platoon of 110+ recruits is at a table, we are told to seat and eat.

In receiving, you don't get yelled at while eating as much, but you still don't talk or look around or chew with your mouth open or have more than one hand over the table at all times or carry more than one thing at a time. I eat fast, but I don't have that much food, especially compared to what I would normally get later. We're told we're done and we get up and put our trays on a conveyor belt and get outside into a formation. The time, even looking back, is lost on me at this point. I know it's before 6 because it's dark. We all have to march to medical, which I didn't know at the time was medical.

We sit outside a building in metal benches under an overhang. At this point, I start second guessing my decision. I didn't have time before now. When you've been awake for over 24 hours and you sit down, your eyelids tend to get heavy. DI's occasionally enter the area and make everyone stand up and sit down and stand up and sit down to wake us up. And they scream and yell and we all sit up straight and put our right hand on our right knee and our left hand on our left knee and get away from the back of the bench and sit on the edge. But the area is mostly populated by Navy personnel. Navy Corpsmen to be precise.

Navy Corpsmen are pretty laid back. They don't scream and yell at us, though they do get impatient and give us a hard time, especially the females. Male corpsmen are pretty easy going, but the females are monsters not to be trifled with. We sit and wait and fill out some paperwork which is hard because we have nothing to write on but each others' backs. The teamwork starts now!

I hate signing papers on someone else's back, especially when he hasn't showered for a while. We all smell terrible and are itchy with our own hair all over us from the haircuts. No, they didn't put blankets over our shoulders when they shaved our heads.

Eventually, we found out we were getting shots. This entails getting a shot in each shoulder, a shot in the left fore arm, and a shot in the ass. We wait a very long time for this. A very very long time. People fall asleep and we get yelled at. We start lining up for shots.

We enter the building finally (at least I do, there are still people waiting behind me). There are a lot of Navy doctors and corpsmen inside. We are told to roll our sleevs up to reveal our shoulders and to undo our belts. It's an assembly line. We first give blood actually, just a little bit. After that I get a shot in my left forearm. Next I step between two people who just stabbed a guy in each shoulder. They pick up new needles and I take a breath. They jam the needles into my shoulders and push the fluid in. It feels like an instant bruise has just materialized on my right shoulder. Ouch. I see blood come out when they remove the needles. I move to a curtain. When it's my turn I accidentally say "yes, ma'am. i mean uh yes, sir" to a corsman who asks me "did you just call me ma'am?" right before I put my arms against a wall and get a shot in the ass. This one hurts too, like a bruise is being injected into me. It instantly feels like someone punches me in the butt. I bleed from there. I buckle my belt and limp out.

One of the recruits is white in the face and almost faints after the shots. I'm just sore. It gets to the point where I can't even move my right arm, the shoulder locks up almost totally. I have maybe 55% mobility and can barely raise it. This sucks; I'm right handed. I didn't realize it was the shot at first and kind of freak out, but I deal with it.

When we finish our shots, we march all the way across MCRD (i'll have to draw a map of the base; it's pretty small but i didn't know that yet) to dental. There's a civilian dentist who keeps saying "ears" and "eyeballs" to get our attention, which annoys me and probably the DI who's with us. We have to sign and date a card.

The dental building is a portable office. Ghetto. Also typical of the Marine Corps. We have no money.

We line up in an ENORMOUS line that snakes around like waiting for a ride at Six Flags. On this ride, you get one side of your mouth x-rayed, and another side x-rayed. You get an exam by some dental technician, or maybe an actual dentist to make sure everything's in place. The whole time there's a young woman bitching at me when I'm confused at the directions she gives me. "Yeah, I must not know what I'm doing because I don't do this every freaking day!" she yells at me. I doubt she's ever gone through this, but I have a feeling these civilians are told to be short with us. Very few people are nice at boot camp.

While we're at dental we sit down and eat "bag nasties." That means that we are given a sandwich, animal crackers, peanut butter crackers (the orange looking kind), an apple or orange, a milk carton with grape drink in it, and maybe a bag of chips. The ground outside of dental is so dry that it's basically dust that just blows around. We put sun lotion on earlier and I sweat and some gets in my eye. A stinging pain like I've never felt hit me in the eye and I can't keep it open. I think it was a combination of dust and sun lotion. It happened about three times during receiving and maybe six or seven times throughout boot camp. It ended by me just tearing up pretty bad and rinsing out my eyes from whatever it was. When we finish eating I can't remember what we do. I think they take our vitals here, our blood pressure. I don't remember why, but I remember it happening. Dental is the first place I noticed the verbal greeting as well.

This is the verbal greeting:

You walk by a Drill Instructor.
You: "Good afternoon, sir!"
DI: "What?"
You: "GOOD AFTERNOON, SIR!"
DI: "SCREAM!"
You: "GOOD AFTERNOON, SIR!"
DI: "SCREAM IT!"
You: "GOOD AFTERNOON, SIR!"
DI: "SO, I GUESS IT'S AFTERNOON NOW, RIGHT?"
You: "GOOD MORNING, SIR!"
DI: "SO WHAT, IT'S MORNING NOW?"
You: "YES SIR!"

I can't imagine what a civilian would think just walking through MCRD San Diego. You'd hear people screaming "GOOD AFTERNOON" "GOOD EVENING" at the top of their lungs and people screaming in agony and pain from inside the barracks. How absurd. Freaking concentration camp.

We eventually leave dental and go back to the large red room with the screens. At some point during the day I spill sun lotion in here when I try to put it in some retard's hand and he retracts his arm before I'm done. It gets all over the table. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

While in the large red room, we do another moment of truth type thing. One guy starts asking us if we have anything we want to tell him. It doesn't matter. We all line up outside of his office and I enquire about the $5,000 bonus I'm supposed to get along with the contract PFC I'm supposed to be given. He says it's good to go.

I wait in line a VERY VERY LONG TIME to talk to him for about 30 seconds in his office. After this I run into the phone room from the night before to get a pair of go-fasters (running shoes). After that I run to my squad bay to find something going on.

At this point, I don't remember what all else we did that day. I remember that when I got back to the squad bay, gear was arranged in a very specific way and I had to catch up with what already happened while I was waiting in line to talk to the joker at the administration building.

We eventually had to "hygiene." We all stripped down naked and tried to cram into a tiny shower room. I'm not sure if I even got wet. I know I didn't have soap. I think I just rinsed off. I dry shaved by my rack without any water as well.

We were finally put to sleep sometime around 8PM or 9PM. There were people that were on fire watch, but I didn't have to do it that night.

End of Day 1. Slash Day 2. Two days in one.

Next:
The Piss Test Nightmare

Boot Camp Part 2

March 17, 2009
Camp Johnson
17:03 - I didn't even realize it was St. Patrick's Day until about fifteen minutes ago, if that.

With my devotional book, bible, and wallet containing my ID and social security card in my pocket, we are told to look down. I guess you can assume that every time I say "we are told" that it means someone screams at us to do something.

Underneath every ones' cubby area are two camouflage duffle bags, called "War Bags." They seem to be filled with stuff. I don't know what's in them and I'm not told, but I get one anyway. Everyone has one war bag full of gear and we are all moved to another room, adjacent to the current large room we're in. (I can try to find pictures and put them in here at some point. Remind me.).

In the next room is a line of phones against a wall seperated by wooden walls. Everything that I encounter either seems to be painted red or yellow. These are the Marine Corps official colors. On another wall is a large window, kind of like a window you'd see in a cafeteria, with a door that slides up. In the room the window is revealing are a lot of boxes and some Marines standing around.

A big Mexican Sergeant impatiently instructs us on what we are doing. We all have to line up behind a phone and call a number. "I don't care who you call or if they answer, but you're calling someone!" The Sergeant yells. I start getting nervous. I'm already pretty jarred and I don't want to sound weak on the phone with anyone in my family. There is a piece of paper on the wall that we have to read. It says something like:

"Hello, this is _____. I have safely arrived at MCRD San Diego and have been picked up from the airport. I will begin training this Friday with my training platoon. My date of graduation will be_______."

There was something else after the last blank but I don't recall what it was. Yeah, it's hard enough for me to remember anything on this night as the emotional state I was in prohibited a lot of rational thought. I finally arrived at the phone and dialed home. I remember my dad answered. "Hello?" I think I said "Hey, dad." my voice already wavering. I wasn't crying, but I was pretty shooken up. I immediately started reading the sheet interrupting anything he had to say. Unfortunately the blank where my graduation date would have been was just that: a blank. I paused, confused and didn't say anything and then I finished what else I had to read and hung up. That is the last time I heard one of the voices of my family members until November.

We then lined up next to the window in the wall and a Marine put a cover (a hat) on our heads to measure our head size. He marked something on our hand and then looked us up and down to get our trouser size. He marked something on my hand and said, "MOVE RECRUIT!" to which I stumbled away to the window where someone gave me a desert cammie 8 point cover (the hat we wear in cammies) and a pair of desert cammie trousers. They are "Medium Long." Everyone gets their cover and their pants and sits in rows on the floor. We're all still wearing civilian clothes, but the transformation has already begun, since our heads are all shaved.

The most bizarre thing about this entire sequence is that the whole time, there's something playing behind us in another room that we can all hear. It's some sort of conversation between females about sex and they're talking about some guy they thing is attractive, and if they had sex with him or not. I believe this is on to distract us. I'm pretty sure we were meant to hear it, but no one has ever acknowledged it at any stage of my training.

When we're sitting in our rows, the Mexican Sergeant who's pretty pissed off (or just into character) approaches and tells us to open the war bags and get out the green t-shirts, skivvies (underwear), green shorts, a web belt, brown boot socks, and a glow strap (also known as a glow belt, geek strap, fag strap, or reflector belt). We scramble to get this crap out as he counts down and screams at the people who haven't found the items in their bags yet. Keep in mind, our bags are full of a lot of other stuff that we don't even have a chance to take note of yet.

Finally, we are told to take off our shirts and put the green shirt on. We take off our pants, our socks, and underwear all in front of each other and about 20 inches away from each other. It's awkward. We put on the white briefs, which I hate since I wear boxers normally. We put the green shorts on over that. We put on the desert cammie pants and the web belt, which is a brown belt with a brass buckle. We're told to put the glow strap on around our waste and tighten it. I'm too nervous and someone behind me helps tighten it. The belt is velcro, and I remember ripping most of one of the velcro straps off so it kind of hangs. I'm afraid it's going to break and I'll get screamed at. I have this fear for maybe the next two weeks since it was the only glow belt I had.

At this point, I looked around the room. Five minutes ago we had all been individuals. Now we all had the same pants and shirts, and our heads were all shaved. We were one. We were all the same. I specifically remember being stunned by this, even at the time. I didn't have much time to think about it, but I'll never forget that moment. Even if I didn't write this, I wouldn't have forgotten the moment I noticed how we all transformed into the same person. At this point, I began to feel like I was about ten years old instead of feeling like I'd just finished a year of college. I felt like a little kid for maybe the first whole month of boot camp. It's an awful feeling to look back on.

We put all our civilian clothes into a white mesh laundry bag and put it into the war bag. Next up, The Moment of Truth. (sounds scary but it isn't)

Departing for and Arriving at Boot Camp

March 16, 2009
Camp Johnson
18:18

The very last week before I left. What happened? Let me think of the people I specifically remember saying goodbye to. I remember my pal Justin had a party the Wednesday before I left. It was a great time because me and my buddy Mike from high school split a fifth of Jagermeister (of which Matt shared a little) and got pretty inventive with our toasts. I specifically remember drinking to The Axis because I found out his grandpa was in WWII in the Italian army, which I felt (and still do feel) is very rare and interesting.

I think this chick Jess was at the party and I said goodbye to her, I don't remember. We ended up going to Firehaus where Sean and some other people were. I said goodbye to all of them. It took forever to get there because me and Mike decided to run there on foot and in our drunkenness got totally lost in Urbana somehow. Yeah, sense of direction kind of goes out the window when a fifth of Jager gets split between two people. We had a fun night though. I was pretty pissed because school was starting, everyone was back, and there was a LONG line at Firehaus. That whole summer I didn't really have to wait in that long of lines because no one was around. I prefer the summer time and breaks as far as the campus bar scene goes. Downtown is always fun in Champaign though.

There was a separate day when I hung out with Matt one last time. His eyes were welling up a little when I dropped him off at Newman Hall (where he lives, yeah, now you know where he lives!) and gave him a hug goodbye. That was the last I saw of him until just before Thanksgiving. I hate it, but it's almost been that same amount of time since I saw him last currently.

I don't remember too much of what I did that weekend. For some reason I wanted to play StarCraft all the way through, and I think that's where a lot of my time went. I may have finished the short story (1st draft) as well. It was a weekend of me being a vegetable. It felt awful. I get depressed when I'm not productive, and I'm usually not productive because I feel depressed. Hmm. Well, I had to be at the recruiting office at 10AM on Sunday morning to take a shuttle to St. Louis. I remember SSgt. Potts came to our house maybe the week before and had a talk with my parents again on what to expect.

Me and my mom went to church at 8 AM on Sunday, August 24th. We left a little early to be home by around...9:40 maybe. We picked up my sister back at the house where I said goodbye to my dog. I had said goodbye to my dad that morning earlier. It was a very bland goodbye. I hugged him briefly and maybe looked him in the eye once and then he was gone. He had to be at the church he was a pastor at. The service there is at 10:30. Too late, so I had to go to the other church.

We picked up my sister Laura (who is two years older than me, 17 at the time) and headed off to the recruiting office. I remember leaving my room a mess and I think I apologized for this, but other than that, no one said anything. It was a very uncomfortable ride.

On my body I had my driver's license, social security card, $20, and that is it. I wore a crappy blue t-shirt, kakie(sp?) shorts, and a pair of shoes I didn't care about. I had a change of underwear in one of the cargo pockets and a toothbrush with toothpaste in the other pocked that I planned on throwing away. I had no cell phone, and this day would be the last day I would communicate with my family until the first letter I received from them.

We reached the recruiting office and parked. My mom and sister began tearing up, saying they'd miss me. Neither of them made a motion to hug me at that point, we'd done that at the house. I simply said "I'll be back," and got out of the car.

I walked into the recuiting office to be greeted solely by SSgt. Potts who said "I have some good news." (What, I don't have to go after all?) "We got you a bonus for shipping today."

Sure enough, I signed a paper that said I'd get $5,000 at some point. Hopefully I get that soon.

He told me good luck and I got into a van by myself drivin by some old retired Air Force fellow I believe. We stopped in Effingham for more Marine shippers. There was a gathering outside of their recruiting office. There were several young people about my age, male and female. A lot of people were crying. I couldn't tell who was going with me to San Diego, and who the family and friends were. I missed my family already.

Finally, one male and one female entered the car. I believe the female was going into the Air Force. The big guy with crooked teeth was going with me. He said "Ooh rah" to me, and if I ever hear a poolee say that in my presence I'll probably slap them. He hadn't earned it yet. It's the same if someone other than a retired Marine says Semper Fi. It's not as bad as them saying "ooh rah" but it's the same principle. It's like sitting in the student section for a game at a school you don't go to. You don't rate it.

We pushed on to Springfield. The driver told us he was Buddhist when we passed a large white cross standing out of the woods. I forget where this is at; somewhere around Effingham. I didn't care that he said he was Buddhist. I was in the zone. My mind was racing.

We got to the Drury Inn Suites in St. Louis and checked in. There were a large number of other young men and women shipping to their respective boot camps. We were given some snacks at the hotel and pretty much ignored them after we signed in. I went to Hooters with a bunch of guys. The food was great. It left me with little money left.

I went to the room after that, showered, and tried to go to sleep. Tomorrow I would end up in San Diego.

The next day I wake up at 3 and barely eat anything at the continental breakfast. I'm not hungry. It's dark out. At this time, I'm not aware that I won't get to lay down again until around 9PM on Tuesday night. One of the worst nightmares of my life awaits me.

Everyone going to MEPS goes outside into the cold and waits by the side of the street. We get on the bus. This is my fourth time at MEPS and I pretty much have the 10th floor memorized. The Marine shippers gather in the liason office and are told something I forget. We may have had another quick physical, but we swore into active duty service. I recognize someone in there from my 2nd time at MEPS. I NEVER forget a face. Ever.

We do pull ups and sit ups in the other Marine office on the floor. I do 17 pull ups, my record best (even at the end of Boot Camp; I can't do nearly that many now). We go to a class room (the same one I had my first brief in at MEPS) and wait a while. Everyone shipping to boot camp are sitting at desks. Finally, a middle aged Asian woman comes in. She is in charge of us getting to our destinations and is very stern about this. I can barely understand a word she says with her thick accent. Not sure what her exact nationality is. She seems pissed off. Someone laughs, she gets more pissed off at that and makes a long speech about it. She goes on and on and I wish I could think of some good quotes she said. Eventually she realizes one of the dudes in the room is rejoining the Air Force after getting out. She seems to be happy about this. Apparently she earned the title "Airman" a while back, so she smiles at him and has a little side discussion with him. Honestly, it was pretty unprofessional and I kind of wish I could force my EGA down her throat now.

This pointless banter ends and she hands all the groups in their services a large packet of every one's contract and records. There are about 10 of us going to San Diego and she elects a group leader to be accountable for everyone during our travels during the day. I remember him by name. Brian High. He told me his nickname in high school was BHigh. I doubt he recognized me throughout boot camp but I saw him all the time and always remembered him. I brought this up to him when we finally earned the title at the end of the Crucible.

We left MEPS and were on our own from there. We had to walk to the air port in St. Louis and get our tickets from the papers the Angry Asian had given us. We waited at the airport for a while. I ate at Chili's by myself. Some of the other guys tried to make friends with each other and go some place to eat, which wasn't Chili's. I really didn't care. Some of them called home on payphones, or on cellphones they'd brought. I didn't even bother. It would just make things harder.

While we wait for the flight, one in our group falls asleep on a bench. Someone else buys a Playboy magazine and opens it, laying it over his chest. He can't help himself from adjusting it for some reason, and this wakes up the sleeping guy. It ruins the whole thing and I don't think it's funny anymore.

We finally get on the plane. Right before we board, some guy relinquishes his seat to someone in our group saying "anything for someone who's going to serve our country." I grin. I'll be a god when I get back to Champaign. People will kiss my feet. That's a long time from now, though. The flight takes a while and I think I fall asleep. The layover is in Phoenix. I wake up at some point to look out the window and see that Arizona is not as flat as I pictured it. In fact, from the airplane it has one of the most beautiful countrysides I've ever seen.

The plane lands and we walk into the airport. About half our group goes somewhere to smoke. I notice that there are a lot of attractive women in the Phoenix airport and am soon joined in ogling by others in our group. One of them forcibly breaks his phone, since we're not allowed to have them in Boot Camp anyway. The layover is not long. We spend less time here than at the St. Louis airport.

The next flight is pretty scary because we know that when we get off, we our owned for three months. We make peace with the last of our freedom in Phoenix and sleep for less than an hour before we reach San Diego. The pilot depresses me by saying something like "we hope you enjoy your time in beautiful San Diego" and I know that my life is going to be hell.

The plane lands. We have to go to the USO. It's very late, sometime around 10 PM. We get to the USO to be greeted by a Drill Instructor. Luckily, I'd already experienced this. He wasn't wearing a campaign cover, but he was definitly a former DI if not a current one. I knew the voice inflections. We were told to go outside the USO where the busses were waiting. There was a man outside telling us that "You can only wear one shirt, so if you have two on, take one off. No tank tops or wife beaters. No sweatshirts." He was pretty professional. I later found out he was just a recruit, and even later learned his name was Kunkel and that he was 26 years old. He proceeds to yell at a group of about 60 of us and explains the instructions. We have to bear hug our records and shirts and whatnot. We wait in line while one large group of young tired men get on a white school bus that says on the side it's powered by something other than gas. I forget what it was. It's an official Marine Corps bus, so this surprises me. We're not very innovative unless it concerns killing.

I wait in line and finally our group is told to get on the bus. Kunkel joins our group as the DI hurries us on. I recall the driver of the bus walking around with a clipboard having a calm conversation with the DI. He was a civilian and I wondered what was going through his mind. He was probably used to his job by now. What an awful job to have. Drive recruits around who are about to piss their pants in fear as the DIs scream at them right in front of you. I couldn't do it. I'd have to much sympathy.

We get on the bus and the DI gets on too. He says "Put your heads down between your legs right now! If you look up...something bad is gonna happen!" We all put our heads down, the DI gets off the bus, and the lights go out. I remember the arm wrest to my right was plastic and it dug into my ribs the whole ride from the airport to MCRD. It was maybe 11:30 at this point.

As I sat there, my head down between my legs, I just said over and over in my head God, please help me through this. God, please help me through this. God, please help me through this. I said this the entire ride, sort of praying sort of not. I knew the shit was about to hit the fan. The bus ride lasts shorter than it feels. The bus stops and I hear the driver check in with someone at a gate. We're in the base. I picture what it might look like while my eyes are closed. The bus stops. I start breathing heavily. It's like mini boot camp, but 50x longer.

Finally, the driver gets off and turns the lights on. A large, black DI gets on. "SIT UP STRAIGHT HEAD AND EYEBALLS ON ME! YOU ARE NOW ABOARD MARINE CORPS RECRUIT DEPOT SAN DIEGO BUILDING [insert number]. THE LAST WORD OUT OF YOUR MOUTH WILL BE SIR, AND IT WILL BE LOUD! DO YOU UNDERSTAND?" (YES SIR) Except, when he told us this, it sort of sounded like "aegbe;atbwtuawtb;rta" he said it so fast.

NOTE:
I forgot one of the biggest details of Mini Boot Camp. I learned the whole "Ears! "Open, sir!" "Eyeballs!" "Click, sir!" When a DI screams EARS you say open sir and it means you're listening. When he says EYEBALLS you say click sir and it means you are looking at him. He can say one or the other or both of these to make clear which ones apply. I can't believe I forgot to mention this earlier.

NOTE Pt.2:
I'm at the library at Camp Johnson and a Marine just checked out Dianatics by L. Ron Hubbard. If I was an NCO I'd probably say something rude to him.

END OF NOTES

The DI screams at us more and tells us to get off the bus and onto the (famous) yellow footprints outside. We rush out in a frenzy and find ourselves standing in a formation on yellow footprints that are painted on the sidewalk. There is a lot of EARS/EYEBALLS screaming going on. We look at a sign the DI tells us to look at that says lying can result in a large multi thousand dollar fine and years in jail. It says that if we have drugs in us, that's not tolerated.

He says "IF YOU HAVE ANY MOLES ON YOUR HEAD YOU BETTER FIND 'EM NOW!" This is a scary statement. We then file off into the building we are standing outside of and end up in a long single file line that is moving pretty fast. I finally find myself in a room full of screaming DIs and normal looking barbers. We all get the same haircut. I've never had my head shaved before. It's demeaning and I feel terrible, aside from the fact I'm being screamed at the entire time. After the haircut we line up in a large room full of cubicles that we look like we don't belong in. We meet briefly with a very calm guy at a computer who verifies information like our social security number, middle name, etc.

I run away from him when I'm done and I see at the end of a hall a recruit named Pickens. I didn't know his name at the time, but I learned it later. He was forced to stand at a doorway with his arm pointing out yelling "GO THIS WAY RECRUIT! GO THIS WAY RECRUIT! GO THIS WAY RECRUIT!" Try yelling that about three hundred times fast, because he had to. I WENT THAT WAY RECRUIT and ended up in a large yellowish room with more people pointing their arms in the direction for me to go while DIs screamed some more. I found that I was the first person in this room and I stood at a red table that was divided into small cubicles. People lined up next to me and across from me. I was standing across some guys that were crying. One I remember didn't look like he was crying, his eyes weren't even red, but he had tears streaming down his face. The other guy was a black guy who looked like he was pissed for being disrespected.

The room filled and we were told to empty our pockets. There was a small green bag on the table in front of me. A DI went to each person and checked their belongings to see what they had, if any contraband. I had none, except maybe a devotional booklet I had and a small bible. He just told me to put it all in the little green bag and we put these in our pockets. This bag was with my belongings throughout Boot Camp.

I'm going to end this part right here and continue tomorrow. Remember, that where I pick up tomorrow is still the same night. I'm not even close to being finished with the first day.