A Final Flurry Of Activities

It has been a busy week with Memorial Day and change of command, but a little fun was had too.
Fallen Soldier Memorial

Here are pictures of the fallen soldier memorial. It was presented to Camp Phoenix on Memorial day. Each of the plaques inside this case represents a soldier who paid the ultimate price for freedom. 7 soldiers died under Oregon's command. 4 from Oregon and 3 from Oklahoma. General Pritt on the left and Command Sargent Major Conley, (both from Oregon), read each of the soldiers names during the ceremony. The case was placed in the chow hall and is the 5th of such cases placed around the building.

This is 1st Lt. Dennis Stahlnecker. He is a Chaplin from Oregon. He gave the opening prayer for the ceremony. It was a very touching moment.

Specialist Gary Huddleston, the builder of the memorial and one of my buddies over here. From southern Oregon. He ran the wood shop. He had spent a lot of time and effort on this and should be rightly proud of the job he has done. He helped and gave great suggestions on many of my Battle Field Furniture projects. A good man and a good friend.

If I learn to fly, he has a plane to sell as well. Honey?

Change of Command ceremony from Oregon to South Carolina.

Patriot Plaza :
Area outside the chow hall is where we had out change of command ceremony. Most of Oregon has left, but a good representation was still there. We also had soldiers from the ANA and theater command. You can see ANA and ANP personnel in the foreground before the formal start of the ceremony. Soldiers in the background in formation.

ANP in the blue uniforms.

General Pritt giving his address under the flags. The man behind him is a terp and would repeat the generals words for the local soldiers and policemen.

Flag raising ceremony on Memorial Day.

It took all day to get it done, but wow it was amazingly cool to see the colors fly. Some of the soldiers from the TMC put together a honor guard team. Each of them had done it before but in their services style. Each brought that style to the ceremony and made it something very special to behold. Chris sent some flags over specifically to be flown on Memorial Day. The entire ceremony was silent and incredibly honoring to all fallen soldiers.

We had to get permission to lower one of the existing colors in order to fly ours. Good thing about it was that we were able to do it later in the day after the heat of the day and some cloud rolled in. Bill also recorded the ceremony on video.

D-Lo and Morin folding of the colors after flying one of the flags.

All of us in this picture. I'm the guy in the foreground with no hair. In the background you can see the 41st BCT symbol on the wall.

The team: Left to Right

Me

Wilfredo F Delos Reyes Jr. "D-lo"

Kathleen J. Lavender "Kat"

Blair Morin

Off camera is William (Bill) Stutts

There professionalism was incredible. They made the ceremony so wonderful and truly memorable. It made the day a standout and brought the true meaning of Memorial Day.

Weapons Test Firing Day

A day of Testosterone at the foreign weapons test firing range.

Russian 50 cal, loud and pretty good but jammed a lot. Have video I can show you when I get home of me firing it at a target about 500 m out.

All of the toys to be test fired that day. They have been repaired by Afghan armors. We let them take the first shots, just in case. There were U.S, Canadian and Polish troops out there firing.

I missed the shot of them fixing the weapons with hammers. Notice the baseball cap?

This is the first of the AK47's I got to shoot. Notice the modified weapon stock. It had a bayonet on the end at first. I guess you could use it to dig a hole for a fighting position, then use it to defend yourself. It fires the 30.06 or 7.62mm round.

I look pretty cool all armed up with an AK, M-4 and 9mm. Do you think I put fear in the enemies hearts?











Thanks again for tuning in to my little adventure. It has been a good experience, and one I hope you have come to understand a little more about. It is almost time to leave. It is a little sad, but I won't be looking back. I can hardly wait to get home and spend time with Chris, Caitlin and Luke.

Take care, god bless.

mike

The count down is on.

Hey y'all,
Before getting to the main events of the week here are some photos snapped around camp this week.

Looking east from legoland top floor toward the chow hall (big building in the center) and some of the mountains close in to us, getting near to dusk.

This pair of doves has been on the wheeled stetcher outside my room almost every morning for the last week.

Sorry it has been a little while. Problems with the Internet, all the new guys are using a lot of bandwidth with Yahoo phones, it's cheap but sucks the energy out of the system at night when I try to do my work on the net.

It has been a slow week anyway. Finished up most of my projects. Will be helping the new guys in the wood shop over the next week or so making their cubicles home for the next year. I am trying to make 2 more shelf sets too.

Three highlights this week to talk about, plus a class taught to the new and old medics.

One - I found a phone that does not have a 15minute timer on it, and doesn't cost an arm and a leg. It was so nice to talk to Chris, Caitlin and Luke for over an hour. I didn't feel rushed and didn't have to worry about Luke taking a long time to tell a story. I had enough time to listen to every wonderful event of their lives from the past week. I wished I had known about it a long time ago.

Two - I went shopping again at the bazaar on Friday. I wasn't really planning to buy anything, just keep Bill from stopping too long. It is a good way to kill some time on a usually slow day. I went by the rifle dealer just to take a look. They have a lot of old English Enfield rifles here. I hear they can be worth a lot back in the states. I've been learning about them from the people interested in them. Anyways, I got to looking through what he had and found a really cool one. It has camel bone inlaid over the entire stock and the wooden part under the barrel. That was pretty cool, but I've seen that before. The bonus was that all of the exposed metal of the rifle was engraved with some very nice designs. The rifle is a work of art, as far as a gun goes. It was raining a little too and the shop keeper did not have much business so the bartering was on my side. I only went up 10 and he came down 30. It feels like a good deal. I'm not going to sell it, but put it up on the wall at home as a piece of art and a reminder of this land and the time I've spent here. It reminds me of the beauty of the people, their culture and the deadly game of war being played out here.

Three - While on call yesterday I got a call from the front gate saying a boy with a cut was there and also could I take a look at Rambo's knees. I was excited to be able to finally meet Rambo that I said sure. I don't know if you remember me talking about Rambo before I left to come over here or not. This man is a hero here. He had his entire family killed by the Taliban before the war or at the beginning of it, no one is sure. He's been living out in front of the base since we've been here and standing guard with our troops since then. He does it all for free and stands out there from early morning until about sunset. About a month before my deployment a VIED (vehicle borne improvised explosive devise) tryed to ram the gate and set off a bomb. Well he rammed the gate and got stuck, and while trying to make the connections to blow up his car bomb, Rambo ran over and reached through the open passenger window and pulled him out of the car before he could explode it. He beat the guy to the ground and subdued him before the security guards got there and took him a way. They figured he saved at least 30 lives as well as other injuries from occurring.

He does what he does because he believes in our mission and the hope that we'll bring freedom to his land. If that is not a hero than what is? It was a honor to help him, if only in some small way.

Extra: Had a chance to get rid of some materials that were going out of date and teach at the same time. Taught a basic casting class to some of the medics. For most of them it was the first time they had ever tried to put on a cast. It was a lot of fun and some of the casts were pretty good. We had red and green casting material to get rid of. Don't know why, the army says that a cast can only be black or white for a soldier. Go figure.

This is Ingram one of the new medics from South Carolina. I had to let him practice on me because he let me give him a shot on his first day here.

Above are two other medics from South Carolina practicing their new skills. We wear bigger holster here than the one I keep my scissors in back at the clinic. To the left is another finished product being shown off for the camera.The class was fun to teach and everyone had a good time. The biggest challenge was getting them to use the cast saw. Power tools made them nervous. I had to go around and show them that it wouldn't cut if you kept it moving.On the more stern news front - there have been at least 3 attacks on US troops in the past week, including a convoy. The bomber walked between 2 trucks and blew himself up. He caused some injuries to the soldier, but no US soldiers killed. I heard the street was crowded with people and many of them were killed or wounded from the blast. One throat guard on a soldier had metal stuck in it but it didn't penetrate through his armor. We have some outstanding gear! The only damage to the hummers was some of them ran flat tires after being blown out. The other attacks have not caused any damage as far as I've heard. Keep the soldiers in your prayers. Going out of the wire can be serious business and these soldiers do it willingly on a daily basis to try and fulfill Rambo's dreams.

I promise to have more pics of the staff next week as well as finished projects. Thanks again for following my adventures! Miss y'all.

Getting Closer

HAPPY MOTHERS DAY

TO ALL THE MOMS,

ESPECIALLY THE ONES WHO HAVE SONS OVER HERE

The only flowers I've seen over here.

This is Ltc. Randolph's garden out by the running track. It is full of different Irises. He has been working it for sometime. He sent a picture of himself trying to break the soil with a pick ax to his wife. She sent it to Troybilt and they sent him, free of charge, a rototiller to work the ground. He is leaving it here in hopes someone will continue his work.

Not too much going on around here, which is good.
Some terrible news at the beginning of the week - 2 soldiers were killed in an attack by an ANA (Afghan National Army) soldier, who they now state was mentally ill. It was an up and down day for us at the TMC (Troop Medical Center). We were alerted that we had 4 casualities with gun shot wounds. Our system worked and the trauma teams came in while we set up our beds for treatment. We divide up duties like who would be in charge of each patient and who would work in triage. I did a little last minute studying of procedures and checking the equipment. About 10 minutes later we found out 2 were dead at the scene, and 2 were wounded. A few minutes later we were called again and told that the patients were going to the French base and then on to Bagram Air Base. There was some confusion after that about us getting the soldier's bodies. It was finally decided to send everyone to Bagram. The indecision and changing plans created a roller coaster of anticipation and sorrow for the troops involved. We all just wanted to do our part and get the soldiers the best care we could. No egos were hurt, our team just wanted to help in any way we could.

Please hold the families of the soldiers in your prayers.

Bill and a patient's guardian. We gave him some shoes and one of the medics gave him the sombreo. He was completly happy with it and wore it out of the building with a big smile on his face.

Other things going on are the routine progress of all the different missions run by the base and I continue to work on my projects. Oregon soldiers are heading home and South Carolina soldiers are coming in. Our replacements arrived this week and are beginning to get acquainted with the clinic and their new jobs. The transition seems to be going well so far.


I'm looking forward to getting home, it seems so close, but time is beginning to drag. We continue to workout 6 days a week alternating running with weight lifting. We seem to be getting stronger and can run farther than when we first arrived. It's been great having a workout partner, who pushes me. It is also great having the schedule here that allow me to workout without rushing. It's too much to ask for back home, as I'll need to take a lot off of Chris' plate when I get there. She has done sooooooo much, and done it well. I only hope I can let her know how much it means to me that she has taken such good care of me, the kids and our home.

A little boy that was severely burned when a gas bladder, used to contain cooking fuel, exploded. He lost 7 people in his family. The Florida guard with the help of the outreach program (where the clothes go that you send) sent him and his guardian to Chiacgo for treatment of the burns he suffered. He is a happy, healthy kid now. Severe scaring on his back and arms. No contractions so far. Keep him in your prayers!

He really likes Strawberry milk.


Each day is different but the same here. Unique things happen or are seen, but the days just seem to blend together.
You can be frustrated with progress at one moment, and in awe the next.

I just want to say thank you to everyone who has sent me cards, e-mails, and postings. They have meant so much to me and I look forward to seeing y'all very soon.
Next week should be a show case of battle field furniture and some pictures of the great people I work with here. Take care
mike

Working

Working on a new post for this weekend. Missed last week.