Day Thirty Five

Day One of the Field Exercise:

We reported to the school building for a 1400 briefing. We were being sent out of Kadena AFB in Okinawa, Japan to a Forward Operating Base (FOB) in Brunei (fictional). We are part of a coalition force going to help the Bruneiese against an offensive by Kalimanten and China. They are expecting random attacks tomorrow with the main thrust to begin on Tuesday.

After the briefing, we were assigned our transportation chalks (a mobility term, meaning the group with which you are traveling), and the transports began.

Our destination was a mock-up of a FOB - it was pretty amazing!

Welcome to the FOB!

These gates were locked every night - there was no way out!!

Airman Stanley opening the gates for our transport

Ready for war! From left to right: Kent Smaciarz, Brian Honett, me, Matt Nansel

Looking back at the gate from the inside

Getting a tour of the FOB

Walking through the tents - the tents at the end of this aisle were the showers

The showers... Not quite as bad as in M*A*S*H, but not the Hyatt, either!!

The female latrines

Male latrines (note the big "M"!)

Every major area is surrounded with HESCOs - wire frames holding up burlap that is filled with sand - they serve as sand bags.

Dining facility - were we get to stand in the heat and eat

Our only drinkable water supply

Our washing station!!

We got to the base and proceeded to the main building, which we also designated as out chapel. It was divided into two sides - the chapel side and the classroom side. First thing we were told was that all the work we did on Friday, dividing up our religious programing and planning, was all scrapped. Everyone had ten minutes to come up with a new schedule.

During the briefing, we were told that we always had to have our Airman's Manual with us, and we would be judged by our ability to access important information under fire. At one point, the instructor said something, and I said, "Amen!" (prounounced: Ay-men) Some smartass turned around and said, "Rabbi, are you even allowed to say that?" "I turned to him and said, "Excuse me - we INVENTED IT!" Later, the instructor reiterated, "Folks, this Manual is your Bible!" The chaplains all looked at each other a little uncomfortably with that blasphemous statement. I just said, "I guess it's my New Testament!" Awesome...

We got the tour of the grounds, and then brought our things to the tents. The tents were sweltering, even with a field AC unit attached. The fact that it was in the high 90's didn't help.

Setting up our tent - guy in the right is Ray Pajas (more on him later)

NO back support with those bed frames - almost like sleeping in a hammock

  We then proceeded to the dining area for our first meal. Dinner was MREs (Meals, Ready to Eat). The kosher ones are awesome - but they are meant for "minimum output" if you know what I mean.

My MRE - the bag on the right contains the heating element, and all the other goodies, like raisins, peanuts, granola bars, coffee, cereal, candy, sunflower seeds, etc...

My "Old World Stew"! MMMmmmm!!

Everyone enjoying their tasty dinner!

After dinner, we went to the chapel for an icebreaker. Remember, this was the second time we were spending time with the Chaplain's Assistants, and certainly the longest time we would be together. Furthermore, the Chaplaincy has a concept called Religious Support Teams (RSTs), which consists of a Chaplain and Chaplain's Assistant (talked about this a while ago in the blog), so the purpose of this entire exercise was to see how to build an RST and then function in real-world scenarios.

After the icebreaker, I offered a class called "Judaism 101: Everything you wanted to know about Judaism but where afraid to ask!" Of the 36 participants in the school, 23 attended. They kept me there for an 1 hour 45 minutes. We called it a night, and went to the showers, and then bed. Tomorrow would be a LONG, HOT day!

Getting ready for bed - shower towels drying!