I’m getting down to the wire here at Bagram. Within two weeks I depart for Kuwait. I miss home but I’m also going to miss Afghanistan. Kuwait, from my perspective, is kind of like purgatory. All us Navy types get shuttled through the “Warrior Transition Program” in Kuwait. We turn in our gear. Turn in our weapons. Listen to lectures and take survey’s all geared toward decompressing before heading back to the land of the big PX (the USA). It still seems odd to me that I’m being sent from beautiful Afghanistan where the temperature has been in the mid 90’s down to Kuwait and temps around 120F. Somehow the Navy feels this is preferable to flying us back to some point in the USA to accomplish these tasks. The only good part is that I’ll be able to turn in most of my gear, including my weapon and body armor before I have to lug them all the way to the USA.
Getting ready to transfer has made life even busier than normal. I’ve had to update all our Standard Operating Procedures work up a transition schedule and will be training my relief in all the various reports and analysis we perform. I’m going to try and work in another trip to Kabul as well. There are several projects we’ve just kicked off that are still in a planning stage so my relief should have an interesting start! Just to keep things really interesting I’m also helping to organize a Fire Safety meeting in the community that I live in back in the states, a short vacation and a long list of chores around the house. Somehow getting back to my civilian job is going to seem like a vacation.
I need to climb a mountain or two when I get home. It’s been frustrating being here in view of such beautiful mountains without access to them. Departing is made somewhat easier by all the airborne dust above the Shamali plain in June and July. The mountains that have teased me for the past six months are frequently barely visible now. Looking at them reminds me of LA back in the 60’s and 70’s. Luckily it doesn’t grab at you lungs the way the LA smog did.
Much as I am certain I’ll miss Afghanistan, I’ll be quite happy saying goodbye to the US Army, the 82’nd Airborne and piss poor contracts awarded to companies that survive off war profiteering. From a taxpayer standpoint this place can be infuriating. Of all the ranting and raving that’s carried on in the USA about entitlement programs wasting money, they don’t hold a candle to the amount of waste carried on in a war zone. To clarify, I a
m not speaking of war itself. War is terribly wasteful but some will defend a given war as vigorously as others defame it. I am speaking of all the needless waste caused by lack of leadership, lack of management acumen, lack of accountability. These are the things that should inflame the tax critics and conservatives. I find it curious that I don’t hear anything at all about this in the US media. Apparently the forces of fiscal accountability are asleep at the switch!
Getting ready to transfer has made life even busier than normal. I’ve had to update all our Standard Operating Procedures work up a transition schedule and will be training my relief in all the various reports and analysis we perform. I’m going to try and work in another trip to Kabul as well. There are several projects we’ve just kicked off that are still in a planning stage so my relief should have an interesting start! Just to keep things really interesting I’m also helping to organize a Fire Safety meeting in the community that I live in back in the states, a short vacation and a long list of chores around the house. Somehow getting back to my civilian job is going to seem like a vacation.
I need to climb a mountain or two when I get home. It’s been frustrating being here in view of such beautiful mountains without access to them. Departing is made somewhat easier by all the airborne dust above the Shamali plain in June and July. The mountains that have teased me for the past six months are frequently barely visible now. Looking at them reminds me of LA back in the 60’s and 70’s. Luckily it doesn’t grab at you lungs the way the LA smog did.
Much as I am certain I’ll miss Afghanistan, I’ll be quite happy saying goodbye to the US Army, the 82’nd Airborne and piss poor contracts awarded to companies that survive off war profiteering. From a taxpayer standpoint this place can be infuriating. Of all the ranting and raving that’s carried on in the USA about entitlement programs wasting money, they don’t hold a candle to the amount of waste carried on in a war zone. To clarify, I a
m not speaking of war itself. War is terribly wasteful but some will defend a given war as vigorously as others defame it. I am speaking of all the needless waste caused by lack of leadership, lack of management acumen, lack of accountability. These are the things that should inflame the tax critics and conservatives. I find it curious that I don’t hear anything at all about this in the US media. Apparently the forces of fiscal accountability are asleep at the switch! 
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