August 9th, 2004
Ok, it's been a while then. Lots and lots has happened, and I feel quite guilty for not
ever writing anything. I've thought about it constantly. Amy bought me a journal to write in, but
that doesn't have the same theraputic effect that this page does.
I'll write about the present first, working my way backwards to perhaps basic training time or something.
Of course, my whole outlook on the whole thing (army) has changed significantly since the days I wrote my
BCT journal. The comments are excellent though, It's cool as hell that I got so many letters in training and
so many comments on the site.
I am quite rusty with the webpage writing now... whew, it's been a long time... I bought a computer a
few weeks ago. Ordered all the parts online and put it together. It's so fast too, spent about 2400 smackers
on it, but it has exactly what I want. A lot of top of the line parts, and everyone in my barracks comes and
looks at it, listening to the plethora of music I have on it. I won't bore you with the actual hardware specs,
even though a large part of me really wants to.
I was fortunate enough to get stationed in Germany. I got here on the 5th of May. We have a very, very small
post in the middle of no where. It's nice, and terrible at the same time. You know, there is nothing
american about where I am at. The army stores that have american products are very small, and always out of stock,
so it's not really even worth wasting my time at them.
I came with an army brat that has been here for 1.5 years before joining the military, so initially, he helped me get
around. Because of a little bet we had, I ended up meeting these two German girls who are very helpful to me. I've
learned some German from them, they help me get used to the customs, so I really don't feel uncomfortable when I have
to go and buy off the German economy. I'm not great with German, I flat out can't pronounce so many words, and many
I just hammer, so people mainly laugh at me, but seriously, half of it is making an attempt to try to speak. Then
people don't think I'm just another shitbag american that expects the world to change for them, which about 90% of
americans here are like. It makes it not fun sometimes.
I love it here though, more than I ever would have thought I would. It's so very, very clean, and everything seems
so healthly. Things just make sense here. It's such a challenge too, with all signs being in German, and the hours of
operation for the stores (open till 2000 during the week, 1400 on saturday, and nothing is open on Sunday). Everything is
so crowded and wide open at the same time. People are just jammed into towns, houses on top of each other, the smallest
streets, but there is so much farm land. It makes sense though, because if people didn't jam into towns, and lived like
americans did, they would have no room for agriculture, which obviously would effect the food supply and such. Animals
roam freely, it's cool.
The autobahn is crazy. I was driving about 180 kmh, and this bmw passed me like I was in reverse. Driving isn't too
difficult, but the autobahn is a whole different world. No speed limits. Car crashes usually don't end up with
too many survivors. It's all quite efficent though, and the roads are set up for high speeds, so it's easy to travel
very fast without realizing it.
I take the trains to most places I go. I know some people in Nurnburg, which is about a 45 min train ride. I usually go
there most every weekend, because there isn't that much military there, and the city is a lot bigger than Ansbach and much
more fun. Just today I was driving around with a girl, and she showed me this huge museum (i think museum, but language
translations don't always go as they should), and we went to this place that Hitler used to speak at. When I get my
camera, I'm going to go to the spot he spook at get a picture of myself. Everywhere you look, there is history though. I
toured this castle in Ansbach, and they tell us the dates of everything, how things get painted over when different
countries invaded and such, I wish I remember more from it. But I'm keeping a scrapbook, which will be much better
if my camera ever comes.
James and I went to Paris for three days a while ago. That was fun. We just packed up some bags, and went. No plan, we
luckily ended up with some good deals, but for a while we stressed about places to sleep, and of course, transportation. We
saw a lot though. Eiffel Tower... don't even ask me about the elevator to the top that I almost passed out on. We took
the stairs to the second floor, which was probably about 2 million of them. Then the elevator to the top, which was packed
with people. I asked if it could hold this many as we crammed in, and everyone laughed! Phmfff... I was serious! I
was breatheing like a pregnant woman...trying so hard not to pass out, wiping enormous amounts of sweat off of my hands. Ugh.
I called my mom from on top the eiffel tower. It cost me 5 euros to talk to her for 26 secs, but how often do you
get that oportunity? We went on the Arch de Triomphe, which was a huge concrete arch in the middle of paris. If you
saw a picture of it, you'd know what I'm talking about. That was about 300 steps to the top. Notre Dame was my
favorite though. We went to a mass, heard the bells ring, then toured the towers. It was so cool, really hard to
imagine that I was really there. I saw the Mona Lisa in the Louvre, lots of old art in that huge museum. I bet you
could walk for 3 days in there and not see everything. There is a lot about that trip I have written in my scrapbook.
If I get motivated, I'll make up a page on this site for that.
A week after getting back, my unit went to Normandy France for the 60th aniversary of D-Day. That was so fun. 6 days
of pulling guard duty without weapons, but we got a lot of time to go around and see things. When you are looking
down on the beaches from the point of the view the Germans have, you'll get a lot more respect for what the Germans
did. We met "Private Ryan" (the soldier the movie was based on), along with every single person that attended the
event, because we had to monitor the front gate, making sure everyone went through the metal detectors. I think
the French have never seen a metal detector before, because no one knew what to do. There was so many people coming
through, I had to learn some french just to make things a little easier. I started that day not knowing anything,
and by the end I had a little vocabulary going. It was cool meeting all of the vets though. They all had so
many stories and just wanted to talk to us, because we could somewhat understand, living the army lifestyle and all.
Alright, I'd love to write more tonight, but I'm quite tired. Yeah, I know, it's like 1500 where you are at, but it's past
midnight here already, and I have lots of stuff to do yet. Either way, it's good that I got some stuff on this page
finally, so I don't have to worry about it anymore. So keep coming back now!
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