Afghan News 2, from near the Front, 15 May ‘10
Hello from Patrol Base Shahzad, Nad e Ali, again.
Having been inundated with a reply to my last “update”, I thought I’d keep things ticking along with more Afghan rumblings and I don’t mean a case of D&V! For those who don’t know, that’s diarrhoea and vomiting (Bastion Burst, Shahzad Shuffle). Which every one catches at some point, no casual farting around here!
Since my last report, it’s been a parcel bonkers time, no wonder the helicopters are worn out, carting tons of mail bags around the country, perhaps they should paint them Red, mind you the Royal Mail only take them to RAF Northolt back home and then it’s down to the military to send it out. Thanks again to all those of you that do send stuff out here, even though I may never go near rice, curry and noodles ever again, well maybe in 2011. Here’s a thought, why is it that curry and lager look the same, both before and after consumption?
My thoughts go out to my buddy Lamby here (there’s a picture of him in my album on facebook), he was running around in the camp area (I don’t mean camp as in bent wrist camp), sorry, he was running around in the base, until he found a washing line with his throat, which flipped him over, landing on his head (missed his brain by 6 foot 2 inches or 2 meters if you are metric). It was a typical army washing line, that is, there wasn’t any washing on it, probably been nicked (see last report, re scousers). I found him a day later, with a very sore neck (which he couldn’t move)trying to nail a poncho sheet 7 foot up in his room/office, whilst under the sheet and using a very large hammer, which meant he couldn’t see what he was doing. In his own words, “I can’t see what I’m doing”, to which I replied “you can’t see where you run either”, I then thought it was best to leave, as he still had the large hammer.
It’s good to know that despite the rigors of being in a war zone, which you can tell, because it sounds like a weekend in Essex, but on a daily basis, (helicopters buzzing around, dogs barking and occasional background gunfire), the army still like to pull out the stops for visiting “brass”. Today we were up at 05:30, pronounced - oh five thirty, - what’s the “oh” for, it’s as in “oh my god, it’s early”, then at 06:00 we had a cleaning party! Yes the balloons were out and paper hats issued, not! There we were, wandering around picking up litter and generally making things tidy! This army gets through more black plastic rubbish bags than bullets! And of course shirts were to be worn, as usually we go around bear chest, no not really, just T shirts don’t look so good, especially if it’s Ann’s “make tea, not war” T shirt. Which reminds me, Ann asked me to get a picture of me wearing it whilst standing next to something large and military, this I mentioned in the ops room, to which a reply came back “stand next to the Sgt Major”. Hmm, must get around to that one.
More silly military stuff, we had an attack warning this morning, which didn’t interrupt the cleaning party (shame), but it did seem prudent to shut our plywood blast door, well the “star trek” shields were down at the time. I wonder if army issue bin bags are bullet proof. If in doubt hide behind something large & solid, where’s the Sgt Major?
I forgot! There are two of us here! No, I don’t mean the army is seriously undermanned; there are two Turton’s at Shahzad! Yes it’s true, from the Royal Signals we have Sgt Marc Turton, he was very confused at first, because he saw my name and thought he’d been demoted! I will put our picture on facebook.
Anyway I took my life in my own hands on Sunday, I was cheering on Chelsea in a room full of northerners as the title went back to London, I suppose wearing my army T shirt with LONDONS on it didn’t help, well, you got to push the envelope sometimes. They do have one or two “slow ones” here, we have one microwave cooker here and there was a bit of a queue for it, one of the lads put a bowl of rice in it and then turned to his mate, took his bowl and squeezed it in alongside, I said “if you cook two things, it takes twice the time” to which I got the answer “we are in a hurry”, “but it won’t cook any quicker”, I pointed out, now wishing I hadn’t bothered, just as well the kettle has a light on it, to show when its boiling.
I saw we have a new government now, there are 10,500 of us waiting with baited breath, are they going to double the Operational Allowance we get at the end of the tour, not one soldier here was concerned about anything else on the election and we still don’t know if we are getting it or what’s happening.
Well it’s not all fun and combat clothing here, for the first few weeks, I had a trapped nerve in the small of my back which meant I couldn’t sleep properly, so I became run down and started not feeling well, that then turned in to a cold, but the back stopped hurting, then as the cold got better, my back started hurting again! A good cocktail of tablets has seemed to sort things out; god knows what I’ll be like when I get old!
Stop the press! The mirrors have returned! Please see last instalment, yes we have mirrors back in the wash tent, with 6 bolts holding each one down, that will hopefully slow down the scousers!
Well that’s about it for this time and I’m counting down the days to the end of the month as my R&R starts on the 29th, 2 whole weeks off and then back here for a least another 3 months, any way I’ll have the world cup to distract me, Bastion NAAFI will a riot for the USA game as a lot of US Marines use it! Special relationship, my arse!
Laters,
Tomsk
