So here is the bay I've been living in the last two months. This was taken the first day, before we really moved in.
Yes, they are World War Two era Wooden Barracks, intended to be used for only a few years, yet still in use today.
If you notice the little hill peaking above the rooftops in the last picture, I zoomed in on it on one of the few clear days we had.
Inside the Barracks
My Rack, I have the bottom bunk.
Looking towards the next rack over.
The neighboring rack again.
Me and one of the officers on my team.
The team minus our other officer.
Then after weeks of training somebody had the great idea that we needed to know what it was like to live in tents. This was to prepare us for living conditions in country. Great idea, except for the minor detail of the tent city being far from ready and thus the conditions were much worse than they will be "in country".
At first it looks okay. Except the first night there was no light, electricity or heat in the tents. They scrambled and got us electricity during the night. But still no heat the next night. Then they got smart and took the heaters from the working tents we used during the day and hooked those up to the sleeping tents. So now we could be warm at night and in the mornings when we got up (unless the heater ran out of fuel during the night.) But those of us who worked in the tents froze all day.
The Shower Trailers which were only available for a few hours each night, assuming the water wasn't all used up too quickly, which of course would close them down sooner.
Inside the Tents
And the Heaters, except for the really cold nights they really put out too much heat. And luckily ours only ran out of fuel once and that was just shortly before time to get up so the tent wasn't too cold.
And finally, on April 1st, the First Sergeant came back from his nightly meetings to find his bed moved out of his room, and hanging about two feet off the ground in the middle of the bay.
7 comments:
Happy?
Of course not, only a couple pics of me, sorry. As I told Da on the phone, I usually had my camera with me but either forgot to pull it out, or more often left it tucked safely away to protect it from the less than ideal conditions.
I'll try to do better, and will also try to get some Video clips, but those'll have to wait until I get in country.
Thank you so very much for giving us a little insight into life at Ft Lewis Washington - you would be there during one of the cold spells - are they trying to prepare you for
Afghanistan weather ??? And you aren't going to be living in tents over in Afghanistan are you?
I am sure that Da was tickled pink with the whole blog - we realize that you will be taking most of the pictures so it makes it difficult to be IN the picture!
I bet you love spending time in the tent with it having such a high ceiling. It was nice to hear from you!!
Yay! Thanks for the pictures, honey! And the descriptions.
Who made the floating bed? And did he actually sleep on it like that? Funny pic
Dirk - you are in my thoughts and prayers as you head out tomorrow on you long flight to the other side of the world. Know that you are loved and missed by ALOT of people
Thanks, Dirk, for the post. I really liked being able to see where you were instead of just using my limited imagination. We pray for you and your sweet family.
Love, Marilyn
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