More "Life at Arifjan"

Sunday 10/29/06
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Well, getting that last blog entry published with photos has been a great example of “Life at Arifjan”. I started it Wednesday, and finished it Friday, and have been trying to get it uploaded ever since. It’s a perfect example of a standard feature of life here – it takes a tremendous amount of time and effort to do anything – even the simplest things.

Last night after work I made it over to the zone with the most reliable internet connection (after long delays on the bus ride), only to be met with a sign: “Internet Down – 3 hours”. That would have made it too late, so I went back to my room.

Today I had a long, lazy day – I got a few phone calls and did a couple minor things, but for all practical purposes I didn’t work. I even slept a little in the early afternoon. Then I came back over here to try to upload it again.

I got the photos uploaded to Flickr OK (I think maybe that website is just inaccessible from work, even though it didn’t come up with the standard “Blocked IAW Command Policy” notice that you usually get.) After that I got them uploaded to Blogger OK as individual entries. But then when I tried to integrate them into my previous blog entry “Life at Camp Arifjan, Kuwait”, I got error after error. Just when I was getting ticked at the internet people here (it seemed like a network error from the messages), I got a message from the Blogger website – “We are having trouble with a server and are looking into it.’

So the one time this week I was actually able to make it over here and successfully get a connection, another problem elsewhere prevented me from accomplishing my goal.

Welcome to Camp Arifjan. :-)

Since I couldn’t go to the mess hall for dinner (no bags allowed in the DFAC, and I’m nowhere near anyplace I could leave my computer), I decided to buy a pizza at Pizza Hut. This is the first commercial food I’ve bought here aside from a few coffee drinks. I got a Mountain Dew with it, and thought a photo of the can might be interesting:


Mountain Dew
Originally uploaded by hkp7fan.

Now that I’m done with my dinner, I’ll try again to go make my blog entries. If you’re reading this on Sunday, I was successful!

Today was a good day, despite these minor annoyances. While I was standing in line at Pizza Hut, I heard some people talking:

“What have you been doing?”…”Oh, about the same as usual. A week of kicking in doors and then a week of gun truck runs. We lost a few guys. How have you been?”…”Ok. I hurt my knee so they sent me down here. They gave me Motrin and a knee brace. Motrin and a knee brace! It hurts more to wear it than not to.”…”I’m heading back up to Iraq again tomorrow.”…”Where are you going?”…”I don’t’ know exactly, but this place is great! We’ve been eating MRE’s for nine months. Some Armor guys came through one time with hot chow, and we got what was left over. But nothing like this.”…”Well, take it easy”….”Yeah, you too. See you.”….

Being around guys like that makes my little frustrations getting internet access seem petty and insignificant. And it makes my job here of keeping the air conditioning running and the buildings in good shape seem like it belongs in a whole different world. I think this must be a lot like Saigon was during the Vietnam War.

Anyway, I had a nice relaxing day off (I think I needed it) and tomorrow it’s back to the war.