Tooth Fairy and Mail (Two things that don't exsist)
Warning: I'm now about to go on a tirade!! I've purposely trend not to complain about the Army system in my blog. There are just certain things that about being in the Army and being deployed that are frustrating; but I've now reached my breaking point.
I was always taught in the Army you don't mess with three things and soldiers will do anything.
FOOD: Ours sucks and it's not the cooks fault. They get nothing and to work with and they actually create something out of it. So shout out to the cooks. Down 20 lbs from when I got here, Jenny Craig should have sent Christy Alley here and she would have lost lbs.
PAY: I have now just jinxed myself by mentioning that my pay isn't messed up. Damn!
MAIL: And therein lays the rub! Our mail is broken.
Now when I say broken I mean really broken. Not like; hey this letter got bent-but this letter never got here broken. Maybe broken isn't the right word, broken implies that there was a system that work at one point and now it doesn't. We have no indication that that it ever worked. Here are a couple of examples:
CPT W assigned to Camp We Have Everything in the World (Phoenix) is reassigend to FOB Where the Hell. So that he doesn't have to hump his equipment over hells half acre ships his non-essential equipment to himself at his new FOB. Mail between FOBs is free; so I guess you get what you pay for. This initial transaction took place 27days ago. We know this because keep a running tally on our white board. No boxes. Where they are is a mystery right up there with the grassy knoll and can Chuck Norris beat up John Wayne. There really is no mystery to the second one as everyone knows that Chuck Norris was created from one of John Waynes ribs and thus they're the same person.
HOUSEHOLD 06 (My wonderful wife) mailed a box from the states in 9 NOV and it still hasn't gotten arrived at the FOB. Along with numerous other VAMPIRE Team memebers who have similar stories.
And now the coup de grace. I don't speak French so if I mis-spelled that then write me and tell me in a letter; which I'll never get. We just received mail for a soldier that rotated out of here five months ago, the postmark on the box showed December. I thought that was amazing, three days. Until I looked again and saw it was December of last year. Even Marco Polo got to Afghanistan faster than that.
Upper echelons have asked if we thought stuff was being stolen from the boxes, WE DON'T KNOW AS WE DON'T GET THEM!
They asked us if the boxes were slow getting to us, WE DON'T KNOW AS WE DON'T GET THEM!
You may see a repetative theme here.
Many wonderful Americans have mailed us stuff and I'm eternally grateful to them for doing it. From my foxhole the mail system is subverting the will of the people. The exact same reason the Army sent me here to kill the Taliban. We may have to attack the mail, but it doesn't come here and we can't!
With Christmas comingI've now reached my tipping point and I have gone over the edge. I think Ihave a better chance of Santa actually dropping into the FOB with his reindeer and delivering the mail than my team getting it through the system.
Santa, if you're reading this: LZ is marked VS-17 ORANGE. We'll pop smoke when we here the jingle bells, you ID and we'll start supressing known rocket sites. Tell Rudolph it's a blackout FOB but redlights are cool. Watch the eastern ridgeline we take fire from there a lot.
Maybe the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy are helping them sort the mail; I don't know. I just know my guys aren't getting their mail and it upsets me greatly!
For those of you who are sending stuff, please keep it up. It will show up one day and we will gorge ourselves on snack food and shower every five minutes with all the hygiene stuff for which we've been begging. I'm almost out of soap and deoderant, which by the way is in one of the boxes.
I've now vented and will return to work. A job in which I train the Afghan National Army to emulate the US Army; ANA get mail faster than we do.
If you're reading this blog at FOB Salerno, eating the food sent to me and showering with my personal hygiene products, please just send me an email or comment so that I can send a thank you note to whomever sent it. You can even forward me the empty box so I know who to respond to.
Great.....
By my calculations
The boxes that we sent should get to you by Easter. Just imagine Santa with bunny ears
Susie @ HIOUSA
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I would try to send you some stuff but now I'm worried I'd be wasting it. Maybe if I insure it? Would that make a difference? Shoot me a flare or otherwise let me know how I can help.JG
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Listen, I'm in pretty good with the Tooth Fairy and Easter Bunny, so I'll pass along the word that ya'll need a little hand getting your boxes. If all else fails, we'll call in Blackfive. He's magical.
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The Thunder Run has linked to this post in the blog post From the Front: 12/03/2008 News and Personal dispatches from the front and the home front.
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Oh, I got a mail story for ya! One year, I sent a christmas card to our family's "adopted" Marine in IRAQ. Well, for whatever reason, he never got it.
Till the NEXT Christmas... when he had just arrived for a new tour of duty..in...AFGHANISTAN! Yeah, somehow it found him a year later, in a whole different country. He promptly wrote a letter saying he was glad he FINALLY got the card, cuz he wanted to let us know he was back in teh sandbox but had lost our contact info, and could we adopt him again?! LOL
I swear on a stack of Bibles, that's a TRUE story. Still cracks me up.
Anyway, just had to share. Hope things get better for you soon. Sending lots of hugs and prayers y'all's way.
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Its funny, sad funny...cause I know what you are going through. There is nothing like finally getting those home cooked Christmas cookies only to find them molded and wasted because some REMF left your box outside in the snow as it sat at his huge base for weeks on end. He/she finally puts it on a bird to you after they get tired of tripping over it and stepping on it (which of course they will claim VA disability for once they get back to the States).
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Love your attitude!
God bless, be safe.
Know that you are in my thoughts and prayers.
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Been there! Done that! But when it comes in what a blast. You keep re-reading what you got last month and hope daily more is on the way! Hang in there, be safe and come home.
Valentine, Sgt., US559-44-264
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Well, Sounds like life in Afganistan is not all it's cracke up to be. Since reading the blogs of people you don't know make it hard to know if people are really in over sees or not, It would be nice to know if you are really a vampire, or just a nice young man or woman who likes to hear from the United states.
Well, I live in the midwest, and just wanted to let you know that it's about 30 degrees, and we had some ice today. I don't check my email everyday, but if you would like some news, you can email me. I'm prob. the age of your mom, so don't get to excited, but I do like listening to young people. And I do reply. Hope you have a great day today.
Alane
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Dear Vampire, Maybe you should change your slogan from Alone and unafraid to " Not alone want my damn mail and afraid the enemey will smell me. Then you can sign it stinky vampire. lol Hope you receive all your packages real soon. Love you guys.... From, Oklahoma
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Hi Vampire,
Sorry to hear about your trials and tribs with your mail. I think that is just horrible! If the Army can get you there, why can't they get your mail there? That is just absurd. And you people there on FOB Where The Hell need your ish! Especially now over the holidays...maybe if you get smelly enough they can send in some dogs to track you down and bring you your mail. I have adopted several soldiers through an organization called Adopt-A-Platoon, but my adoptees have always been from Iraq. I have been sending care packages to Iraq for like three years with no problems. What can we do to help?? I am so sorry that something as simple as the mail has to get FUBAR! Take care Vampire, I enjoy reading your blog It is good to hear a first hand about what is actually going on there in the Stan. Your writing seems right on point and definitely illustrates the challenges of fighting the WOT where there are no front lines and no easy answers to the problems that need to be solved there. Thank you for your service. Please let us know when the boxes start raining from the sky! I will be happy to send you some food!!! Losing twenty pounds...wow. That must be some bad food. (Casting no aspersions on your cooks who are doing the best they can with what they have got) Apparently the Army doesn't give a rat's ass about Maslow's Heirarchy of Needs...food, water, and sleep being just a few on the very first level! I think your "rant" was well-deserved and actually very low key all things considered. Hang tough, maybe Rudolph will come through for you guys.
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I love the way you put thoughts to words; that is laugh-out-loud-funny save for the unfortunate fact of it being all to true. Just think of the snack and hygiene orgy you'll all have when it all finally shows up!
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It has been 42 years since I have been in Vietnam. I see that nothing has changed in those 42 years.
When they would send the pkg it was mutilated. We would eat the cookies with a spoon. Scrape the candy bars with a knife.
The only things that would survive was popcorn & beef jerkey.
God Bless All of You
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I love the way you put thoughts to words; that is laugh-out-loud-funny save for the unfortunate fact of it being all to true. Just think of the snack and hygiene orgy you'll all have when it all finally shows up!
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Vampire,
Appreciate the heads up on Chuck Norris and John Wayne…. Silly! I should have noticed the resemblance before.
Having spent some time in the Middle East (in the not to distant past), have a couple recommendations to make. In reference to your mail issue….
1) During hours of visibility. In lieu of letter’s via Army Mail system. You may want to consider Smoke Signals.
2) During hours of low visibility. Face direction letters would have gone (via Army Mail System), and YELL!
3) If noise and light discipline are issue’s on your FOB. Again… Face direction letters would have gone (via Army Mail System), and “talk” in loud short burst’s. Randomly change your location in between controlled burst’s of communication.
4) Packages: Notify friends and loved one’s to NOT address boxes with your name. But instead put “TOO WHOME EVER”. This will insure undetermined recipients of package can eat and enjoy contents with a free conscience. Guilt can negatively affect Army moral. This is counter productive to the war effort in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Oh! One last thing… liked your post! Read it this morning. Wife couldn’t understand why I was laughing…. and what could possibly be so funny at 5am.
Keep the faith and keep the humor my friend. Good luck!
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Vampire,
Take heart, I was stationed in Hawaii in the '80s. Dad sent a letter. I received it 6 months later after it had been routed through an APO in the caribbean. Didn't even know we had a base there.
Yeah, the cooks are miracle workers. We had a head cook in Germany who liked spicy food, real spicy. He whipped up some jalapeno and grape jelly syrup, after a failed resupply, for pancakes. We were popping fire all day, but it was good.
So my advice. Ask the cooks where the mail is. If they don't know, they'll do something about it.
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Vampire,
I have a dear friend who spent some time in your location and it sounds as though life there has only gotten worse and more depressing as time has passed. Your ability to write with humor about your totally dreadful situation speaks volumes about your personal reserves. Thanks for your service, I know it's harder than anyone who has not been there can possibly imagine. As someone who was a military wife for nearly 20 years, I also appreciate the service and sacrifice of your family.
You are in my thoughts and prayers and I'll talk to Santa about that landing.
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Thank you for you and your teams' service to our country and for the Afghanistan people as well. We pray for a successful mission and your safe return home.
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Good afternoon. For visions come not to polluted eyes.
I am from Namibia and know bad English, give true I wrote the following sentence: "For free airfare for best air fare or cheap flights on airline discount tickets."
With respect
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