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And what a week it has been. So here are some pictures of the destruction that hit the ville during the storm. Now its up and running... this is form like a week and a half ago. I went down to the ville because we went off lock down and my custom leather shoes and suit were there waiting for me. There pretty nice and i'm glad that they didn't get flooded.

Ok so Wednesday and thursday last week i pretty much just hung around waiting for the weekend. Nothing big happened. On thursday some people got promoted so they had to buy us beer for some great reason. So i drank some. And later that night my company had a celebration for the Kattusas (koreans in the us army) and we went to this korean barbecue. It was like mongolian. Those strips to the left that are pinkish were delicious. I think it was pork. I couldn't tell you what the rest of it was but it was very good. Some soju and orange soda made it better.
So because we had a 4 day weekend i had to put a pass in for the weekend.


I had to fill out this form to show my risk level for the pass. They make you add points for any factor that can make your trip more risky. Well i scored high but the commander didn't really look at it because the thing is 1. rigged and 2. kinda stupid in my opinion. I thought it was funny


So after the dinner this cadet from west point and i went down to Seoul. We first bought some soju and mixed it with coke. Good stuff the train ride was fun and the other cadet was chill. We got down there and randomely found some officers we knew and went to this club. (picture is the club on the outside). My friend was spitting some game on some girl and i was just talking with other military people, and english teachers. The club was like a mix of koreans and american servicemembers and english teachers, and people from everywhere.

This dude was from somewhere in europe but i don't remember. He was cool he told me how racist KOreans were to black people. I met some english teacher who went to uw he was super cool. Then the club ended at like 3 and i couldn't find my friend so i just went to train station and waited for the next train. I feel asleep on teh train and what do you know im going the wrong way when i wake up from my nap. And this is 6 30 in the morning so the commuters are all looking at me. But i get back fine, and my friend who i was with got back fine to.

So the next day i regrouped at camp casey and assembled a team of people to party again in Seoul. This time we got a hotel in this area called dongdaemun. It was cool there were plenty little shops selling all sorts of stuff for very cheap. We got a hotel for cheap ( we only had to pay 20,000 won which is like 18 bucks each). It had one bed and plenty floor space. We just sleep head to foot on the bed and one on the ground. (picture of hotel on the bottom)
So anyway we took a train to hungdai or idk how you spell it but its some womens college in korea and theres all these clubs around there for college students. Its not a very GI friendly area though. Some of the lower enlisted told me how they got jumped by the mob there or something. But yea some Korean guys don't like Americans and american guys with their girls. And some Americans are just idiots sometimes and this is a potion for ffrequent fights. Usually the Americans win though cuz i mean there servicemembers so some of the places in hungdai don't serve troops. But yea we went there and told everyone we were UN interns ha.

BUt yea we wondered around and asked the few and far between white people were the best clubs were and they had no idea. I asked some random Korean dude at burger king where the club was at and he said some club cocoon. So we found the club and we go in line right. But we went to the wrong line. We had to go to the line that waited for that line. Let me tell you that line was huge. It was like 12 30 so it was just getting started. We ran into two European dudes that knew english and we talked to him. They were cool and described how great it is to chill and we told them how hard we have to work. One guy told us a story about how he left his job after stealing something and then came back a few months later and it was ok. Must be nice. But Yea that was cool and we got in the club and it was packed. Packed and huge and crazy. We immeadiately went on stage because we had too and we were just dancing and stuff all night. It was pretty cool.
Yea so the club was nuts and we found some other cadets who went there and i talked to some other cadets today and they said they were there that night so club cocoon was the place to be. We left at like 3 30 am. I swear some guys were mean mugging us all night and i don't think they liked soldiers or americans so we left because the other guys were tired and we didn't wanna have no trouble. We took a taxi back and he got dropped off at a freakin palace. But it was near where we lived so that was cool.
All the shops and stuff were still open at 4am.

The next day we woke up and went around and shopped and stuff. There was like a secondhand market type place so that was pretty nice and they were selling everything. Polaroid cameras, pet turtles, and lots of fake shoes.
Here is a little river that was in the downtown area in dongdaemun. It was pretty nice.
So on saturday we went to the North Seoul tower. Its on a giant hill that overlooks the city it was nice.



It was cool to see the whole city. Its weird to think that Seoul is really a super young city because after the Korean war in 1953 it was flattened and there economy took some time to start going. So there aren't like a crazy amount of places to go in seoul like NYC but you know its a lot.
Then we went down to the army garrisson and hung low that night. Just went to this Korean friend Chicken place. I personally wanted to go out on the town again because that was fun but the other people didn't want to and i know its stupid to go on your own so i couldnt go out.
Then the next day we went down to Itwawon and shopped and went back on base. I again wanted to go out but I couldn't go out alone and im sure ill have another opportunity to go to Korea sometime down in the future. So then the last two days i packed up and now im at the airport.




Heres some pictures of my room. It was pretty big and nice and also had my own bathroom with shower. It also had like two desks and multiple chairs and the on base bus went by often. So now im at the airport super bored because i got here at 7 am and my flights not till 5 pm. grrrrrrrrrrrrr

TBA

I will post a post Monday night or tuesday morning ish about my past week here. It will be hugeeeeeee i promise im just getting done packing and stuff so im a little bit busy. But i leave tuesday at 5 20 pm and arrive detroit at 5 35 pm. ha And madison at 8 15pm

long day

Today was a long day just got off work.

But this morning we had first formation at 9 30 instead of the usual 6 30 so I got to sleep in. It was great because I could do my laundry at 7 in the morning when nobody was using it and i got caught. Not wet clothes are pretty great to get into. So I got another great breakfast today at the dfac and got to formation... and im like we are totally gonna work plenty today... they said we are having a re fitting day (bascially just a chill day). So I just ran around with my sponsor and when we went to the Kattusa snack bar (plenty good korean food) and went to the library. I had to go to a powerpoint meeting and I was the one who got to click for the next slide. Im very important.

Anyway at like 1 my sponsors like ok go home and i was like yess. So I was just chillen all day on the computer readfing and stuff then i get a call at 5 and my sponsors like we got formation get over here fast.

So I walk up to formation and the first Sargeant( like 20ish plus years in the military. Is the NCO of a company size element. COmpany size is like 120-160ish troops) and hes reading off every name in the company for accountability. Everyone was getting called to this formation. And this was an unplanned formation and stuff and im like what the heck is going on.

So i talk to a lieutenant and hes like some idiot tried to buy drug off base (we were not allowed off base this weekend) from an undercover military policeman. The company commander (company commander is the officer in charge and he is a Captain in rank) plans to search all the rooms in the barracks for contraband and pee test everyone. So i don't need to get pee tested and my stuff searched but the company commander told me to follow him as he searches room.

First couple rooms theres nothing around. We found some embarassing things but nothing big. Some rooms are super messy and some are super clean and all of the people have to be in the room as we search it but ya nothing came up.

So then the Commander leaves to do something and im in the room with my sponsor and a sargeant who is searching a room. So this guy's room we are searching is about to leave in a week and he was telling us how crappy his old job in a mill was, and that in the summer it was 150 degrees and the winter it was 20. So the Sgt is going through his socks and bam there is a marijuana pipe in hidden in a glove. And he remarks "this is the worst part of the job." Then we find some muscle relaxants hidden on top of the bathroom ceiling. We tell the Commander and he gets extremely angry and the MPs (miltiary police) are called to search the room further. The two of the three contraband items were on one side of the room (two people live in the room) and one was in the bathroom. So its pretty obvious whose stuff it is but the guy cries innocence that he never saw the glove with the pipe that smells like its just been used in the middle of his socks before. If he doesn't fess up though he could really screw his buddy. So ya that was fun... not really but after that they told me to go home because we checked all the rooms and i wasn't gonna pee test so i came to the food court and ate.

So i have mixed feelings because it was cool to see how a commander reacts to a problem not talked about in rotc which is drugs and contraband but at the same time I probably saw some guys army career come to an end.

In pretty good news though the sargeant first class was like hmm its your last week we need to get you to go down to seoul withs ome of the guys. So im pretty excited for that. Its looking like we are gonna have friday off so ill be able to go out thursday and friday night! then im getting moved away from my sponsor and camp casey down to yongsan garrison in downtown seoul. So hopefully i can go out saturday sunday and monday night because i wont be flying out till tuesdayyyy. So this could be a great great weekend.

Cleaning up the mud

So because of all the rain and resulting mudslides we have had to clean up the base and surrounding areas for the past for days. Really put a buzz on my weekend plans of going to Seoul.

So on Friday they put the base on lockdown which means we can't go out. Sucked. I need to go check on the places where I got my custom shoes and coat to make sure that it didn't get deluged by the rain. They are right outside the place in the area called the Ville, so as soon as we are not on lockdown I can go and check on my things. Don't worry I only put down like 30% on both items so they won't just pack up and leave hopefully. I mean the guys have been there a while(like 32 years) so im like 95% sure he wont pack up.

So on Camp Casey (the camp i am at if you forgot) there are a million run off canals to take the rain from the hills and mountains to the river in the base. After the rain and mudslides the canals overflew with rain and mud so now they don't work because of all the mud in the canals. So we Friday night we dug the mud out. Our shift was from 10 pm to 4 am. It wasn't to bad, I got all wet and stuff but so did everyone else. I actually liked doing the work because most of the time officers sit back and supervise things but it was good to finally show the guys that a cadet could do the dirty work too. I mean we needed all the hands we could anyway. The only bad thing is it caused my sleeping cycle to become all flukey so i woke up after the Dfac (dining facility) was closed and after i ate fast food (only other thing on base unfortunately) then i took a nap and well then i woke up after the Dfac was closed again so more fast food. Its weird you would think that soldiers, who are demanded to be in somewhat good physically shpae, should have adequate access to a healthy meal ya know.

Anyway saturday i just sat around waiting for my next shift which was at 4 am today (sunday). Today we dug out more mud and rocks out of the run off canals. Again i got my clothes wet, so im down to my last clean shoes and i have no more clean boots. But we only worked for 6 hours and our sargaent first class(senior Non commissioned officer in our platoon, usually like 15 years or so of experience, Usually they are paired with fresh officers and kind of mentor them ) had us not doing too much. Right now we've done a lot of work around the camp, and tts starting to look like we have done as much as we can without heavy equipment(like a bull dozer).

Our base is starting to look better but when I saw the Ville on friday, it got hit much worse. I have pictures but again i left my camera in my rooom, im upload them as soon as I can. But it basically look like a hurricane came through. One of the mini marts cleared their inventory because it was all wet. A lot of the stores are electronic stores and rain and electronics ya know doesn't create bubbles and candy. Whole families were helping in the clean up, and we have a lot of troops out there right now helping too. I'm glad we are helping out too because we should, a lot of the shop owners are older people, and we have thousands of young people in their prime to help out.

Also a little off of my previous topic but that whole debt thing is talked about a lot. Many people are saying if they don't get paid they are not going to work. A lot of the people here have kids and bills so i don't blame em. Its messed up when people aren't paid what they owe, but to send someone overseas, deploy him multiple time, stop loss hir (yes that is a gender neutral pronoun and in place of him or her). You can tell a lot of people here are very cynical about politics for some good reasons.

Anyway ill try and upload pictures as soon as i can. My bad. I was busy getting dry. Also I have plans for the best weekend in Seoul if we get done cleaning. Its payday tomorrow so it should be crazy (not that i need a payday to go out mom, ive been budgeting extremely well, its just others haven't been and they keep saying i gotta wait till i get paid, and i can't go out without a battle buddy. So now that others get paid, they can go to the club, and because they can go to the club/hostel, then i can have a battle buddy therefore this should be a great weekend). And this week we are learning how to use our tanks at work. Should be fun. I leave next Tuesday. crazy

http://www.stripes.com/news/pacific/korea/u-s-military-bases-in-korea-begin-cleanup-after-massive-rainstorm-1.150493

News on the rain

Lots of rain

We got absolutely pounded by rain. I have never seen rain like this. It has been raining extremely hard for the past couple days. Its nuts.
So on wednesday (yesterday) we woke up and had PT. We did PT in the rain and it was pretty hard because the company (company: around 120 soldiers) commander (rank of captain like 4-8 years in the army) was leading our pt and he worked us hard and made do pushups and stuff on the rainy ground. fun. It rained all day. After PT i had to change. Then after a un exciting work day i had to change because i was covered in rain. So at that point im down to my last set up clean clothes really. So i put on civilian clothes because the work day is done then i take a cab to the PX to get internet.
It was rainy super super super super hard. It was crazy. the rivers like 10 feet higher than usually. I mean when it rain it rains hard but on top of that there are so many hills and mountains the runoff floods the base. So i get to the PX and it rains adn rains and then they stopped running buses and taxis because the conditiosn were so terrible. So me and some cadets were like dang we gotta leave the PX before it gets even worse. So five of us go out and we strap up our backpacks high in case we have to wade water and stuff and i have on a poncho.

So we get out the px and its ccrazy so i gotta take off my glasses cuz they just fog up. Then we walk out and see the baseball field and pool and they are just completely flooded. The field looked like it was like chest deep water. So we walk around and have to walk up the road in like ankle deep water that was running fast. Then we start getting to a pedestrian bridge over the water. Man all of the little run off canals they made for run off from the hills are almost overflowing. It was nuts. So luckily the river wasn't over the bridge so we get over it but on the other side there is knee to waist to water. That water was flowing into the river to so it was going pretty fast. We just said f it and waded through it. I got a picture at that point, its not very good but you can make out someone walking in knee deep water. So yea we eventually got to our building safe and wet.
This morning I woke up and got all call from my sponsor and he said To be in ACUs instead of PT gear this morning. So i was like hmm are we doing combatives (wrestling) pt in the mud again. So on my way there barbed wire fences are destroyed by debris and we get to the area were we do our pt and there is oil and mud and water in knee to ankle deep water. Some of the auxillary building adjacent to the barracks were on there side. I mean some of the barracks are on a hill so debris is all over them. There was a landslide that hit one of the fuel tanks next to a barracks that caused the oil to spill. And the landslide jsut caused a new small stream valley type thing up the hill. So we went to the motorpool and there was knee deep water there and some of the connix's(which are like tiny versions of rail cars and there steel) were on there side. So ya basically they told us to go in our rooms and not do anything because it was going to take a while to get things cleaned up.
So we got 22 inches of rain in 36 hours. Now as a comparison in June 2008 wisconsin got 6 to 13 inches of rain and that was over like several days. So it was a lot of rain. In the town nearby there was like 9 deaths and there was chest high water. So here some pics i took today


Debris on the fuel tank.


Debris on a barracks

You can see one of the electrical boxes tilted out of place
This was a nice paved road

Debris on the fence to a motorpool

Random debris




Socks in Seoul. They were so cheap and name brand. 4 packages of socks for 10 bucks

Bucky in Seoul. No copyright haha
Cass beer is the keystone light of Korea.

Rucking curfew and other goodies

So when i last left you off i was supposed to be going to seoul and blah blah blah Sory in advance i didn't bring my camera connector to my computer so i can't upload pictures my bad.

But anyway on thursday the brigade(brigade: 3,ooo-5,000 soldiers) commander had this gigantic powerpoint presentation in a gym and made all the officers come. So he basically showed us a bunch of slides of how many soldiers have been getting into toruble (assaults, underage drinking etc.) and that we need to educate them. He told us not to mess with the juices and how many of the Koreans and third party nationals try to hustle US soldiers and stuff. He also said that now the brigade was going to have a curfew at 1am to 5 pm, and that we needed passes to go to Seoul. So everyone wasn't happy and eventually we found out on friday that he jumped the gun because he didn't clear it with his higher ups so the new rules don't take into affect for a while. But this shouldn't be a problem for my escapades to seoul anyway because the company commander can sign for the passes and hes cool.

Ok anyway i did that and then on friday we had a ruck march. It was pretty easy we only needed like 30 pounds of weight and we didn't even do it very long because it took us a while to draw weapons. When you ruck you need to have your load bearing equipment, your helmet, rucksack, reflective belt, gloves and a weapon. Plenty of people were dropping out but i mean idk i thought it was pretty easy because at LDAC i had a ruck that was like 80 to 90 pounds so this was like a cake walk. The only thing is is i had shin splits and it hurt but they'll veventually go away because i won't be rucking with 80 to 90 pounds like i did at LDAC. So ya.

Then on friday we went to the call for fire trainer. I am in an infantry unit but with the field artillery officer and therefore all the guys that our under my sponsor are forward observers. They call the big artillery guns and coordinate fires against enemy. So there privates and specialists and lower enlisted and tahts basically the biggest part of their job. So i went with them to the call for fire trainer which is like a giant screen and shows terrain that is the same as the one on a map they give you. And then a tank comes on the screen and you try to figure out what the grid coordinates the tanks on. Then you call in fires and see where it is on teh screen and then you adjust the rouds so it gets closer to the tank until its blown up. A generic (i found it on the internet) example of a call for fire trainer looks like.Its hard to explain sorry. Basically you the scenery on your map is on a screen and you use mountains and roads to figure out what grid coordinates an enemy is on. Anyway i never did it before and it was pretty easy for me. It was fun but some of the joes had difficulty with it and because i did better then them (Sgts exact words were "how did you let a cadet do your job better than you") and they all had to do push ups. So that was cool.

Also on friday we finally got the housing issues squared away. Apparently there was no mix up but the housing guy did not read the second page of an e mail that authorized me to be in housing and stuff. Hahah bureaucracy. So i got to move out of the barracks and into my own room. My rooms pretty ncie i got a microwave and fridge a full size bed, and my own bathroom. Pretty nice. I mean the past month and a half, ive lived in the barracks with like 40 dudes, on the ground, on the gorund with a poncho tent, tents and more tents, an in processing center that was like a barracks and accomodated like 60 people per room, a room for two and my place now is the nicest of all those places. So its nice to get situated. Also its near all the other cadets so its easy to coordinate going places and crap.

Ok so friday night i went out with all of the officers who were mostly lieutenants. Man they kept feeding me and feeding me alcohol it was crazy. But you know i held my liquor to their surprise. We drank cass beer (which is a korean one), miller (which is imported here), and lots of sogu mied drinks and tequila for some reason. Yea idk how i was holding my own but i did. It was fun we went to a bunch of bars and stuff. The bars were in the ville which is the area outside of the base. It was cool but i have no plans of going out at night over there again. They have the infamous juicy girls that try and flirt with you and you buy more drinks so the bar gets money. I wasn't playing that but some of the officers were so i just bounced and went home because thats just stupid. But it was alright. Also MPs(military police) are everywhere over there making sure service members aren't being rowdy and aren't passed out in corners and what not. For the most part the people who go to those bars and clubs are service members.

So saturday i woke up at like 12 and was surprisingly not hungover. I got a hair cut for 11 bucks. But they don't just give you a hair cut. They do eyebrows, shampoo your hair, wash your face, and give you a massage. It was pretty nice. Also i got another phone because i lost my phone moving form the barracks to the new housing place i got. For teh most part the whole day i was tryna coordinate with some friends from LDAC to go to seoul but those plans fell through because one of them lost their phones. SO saturday i just watched horrible bosses on my computer and hung out with some of the other cadets.

Then today me and two other cadets went down to seoul to shop. It takes an hour and a half to get there but its a comfortable ride on the train. We went to all teh shops and tried to avoid the real shops like nike or addidas because those are expensive. We just hit all of the mom and pop type shops and tried to get deals. Even if there were good deals we still haggled because it was fun and we probably saved a lot of won doing that. I got a bunch of stuff. It was a shoppers paradise for sure. Crazy steals and stuff. I spent a lot of won but if i got the stuff i got here in teh US it probably woulda have cost double or triple what i got it in Seoul. I plan on going next weekend to get some other deals. Also apprently you can get custom made leather shoes for like 50 bucks which is crazy so i think i need to try and grab some.

So right now next week at work we are doing land navigation and and squad training exercises. So it should be fun. Next weekend i think me and some cadets are going to go to seoul and go to some concerts and club hope or something. Im pretty excited because i think now were getting into the swing of things so this next week and weekend should be really fun

CALL FOR FIRE

Here we have some privates. They somehow got in trouble and now have to pick up trash outside of the base. I've seen some of them pulling grass from sidewalks and other tedous and crappy jobs. Life as a private must really suck. There always told what to do and live in the worst place and get paid to much either. In Korea the only thing to do it seems like on the weekend is go out and party. Even though the drinking age in Korea is 19(and they have a weird age calculation type deal where they count your time in the womb as one year so your born at one) they still can't drink until there 21. That must really suck because they have alcohol everywhere here espcially in the px. I don't understand a private is capable of getting security clearances, drive 6 million dollar tanks, and deploy to countries and be the spearhead of our national polciies but they can't drink responsibly.
Anyway i talk to plenty privates because there everywhere and there all pretty nice and are knowledgable about Korea because some of them have been here for a lot of months. A lot of them are working on their bachelors here so i thought that was pretty cool. A surprising number of enlisted folk have college degrees.Anyway here is my usual breakfast. Im always starved after pt and i go up to the dfac and eat this much food. Its pretty good and it is free so im eating there regardless.



Heres a picture of the motorpool. Theres just a bunch of Bradleys here. Bradleys like a tank but i think technically its called a fighting vehicle. Its meant to support infantry and it doesn't have like a big cannon it just has a machine gun chain gun to shoot. There all old but right now there getting new ones so thats pretty cool. Its real hot inside of them though and it wouldn't be a good place to go if your claustrophobic.


Anyway yesterday I got to go the top of this hill in the city. We took some hummvess up and it was a rough ride because we were going up the whole time and the path up is unpaved. Also the road was kinda slim so there were times id look out of the window and there'd be a cliff. But it was fun going up. So we got up there and it was a really nice view. You could see the whole city (dongducheon) basically.
Anyway what we did up there was get up with a few air force guys and call in some air strikes on the city. No we didn't really fire anything it was practice of course. But i guess what we were supposed to get out of it was how to use distinctive features in the area to bomb so north korean guys if they attacked.
It was cool we had radios and crap and the planes came in and looked like they were gonna attack and stuff. I got a video of the airplanes. I don't know if the videos gonna work on this website but i have it on my computer if your dying to see it.

Anyway that was cool. And what else. O i still haven't gotten my housing done stuff because of the beaucracy. I hate it, this colonel in charge of the program said if we had any troubles to go to so im thinking about hopping the chain of command just to see some heads roll but i mean its not to bad and i think were getting close to done. the bureaucracy sucks but it sucks when the people speak very little English too. yuck. But i mean were im living is quality like i said before but im supposed to be in a better place and i just really wanna get unpacked and crap. I haven't been unpacked unpacked in like 2 months so its a little frustrating. But at least i get free food to comfort me.

Last night i got a prepaid phone for like 10 bucks. I got like 400 minutes and 45 texts to. I got a calling card too for like 10 for 300 minutes to the us. Im loving these deals. Also there are stores where you can get 4 movies for 10 bucks... and there bootleg movies so i think im gonna watch harry potter soon ha.

Today we got to meet this brigadier general. That was alright. The food was good. But you know we kinda got the same old advice.

O and today i went out to go shopping again. Got a new pair of shoes for 45. There probaby fake but they certainly don't look fake. I specificaly got shoes that didn't look fake but some of them were just so fake it was funny. Then i went to some of the tailors and looked around. I found this one tailor whose been doing it for 32 years and hes making me a 3 piece suit. Its gonna be 140 but what this would cost in the states is probably like 5 or 600. I looked at all the suits he had around and they were all quality and really well stictched. I got a regular black one. I took lauras advice even though the pin stripes looked very smooth. The crazy thing is this is just a small place to shop. Theres a place in seoul thats supposed to be like a heaven for shopping so im excited to go out there. Hopefully i have room in my bags to carry it all back. I might have to ditch my military gear hahah

Anyway i have no idea what im doing this weekend but i hope it involves shopping and drinking responsibly