The money.  I've always been about the money, ever since I was a wee lad.  I think this was mostly driven by my father, who in response to my pleas for a baseball glove, a fishing pole, a football helmet - whatever it was - would unfailingly say, "Sure.  You can have (x).  Just find a way to earn the money and you can buy yourself whatever you want."  The message:  If you want it, go out and get it.  Heard that message loud and clear dad, and in retrospect - it is greatly appreciated, although not so much at the time.  So off I trundled, helping my brother with his paper route (I loved collecting every month and looking for the pre 1965 sliver coins), finding golf balls in the woods and water hazards on the local golf course, doctoring them up and selling them back to golfers, or buying Craigmont soda for 13 cents a can, putting them in a cooler and pushing a wheelbarrow up to the tee right  before where the vending machine with sodas was.   Sold them for 25 cents, a handsome profit of 12 cents, almost 50%, with no overhead.  As I grew older, I worked as a busboy at Pals Pancake house in New Jersey and when I moved back to the Marshall Islands, I worked a variety of jobs, snack bar, lifeguard, and when I was back for summers and Christmas, I worked in heavy equipment, construction, whatever job I could cobble together.  I also found and sold rare shells, fished and sold what I didn't/couldn't eat, pretty much anything that would bring a few shekels in.  I was always on the hustle for the pennies to save so I could squander them on some pretty bauble later on.
   There are soooo many things I could write about when it comes to money and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.  Corruption.  Graft.  The cost to get all of the equipment there.  The cost to sustain it.  The cost to get it out.  Military pensions.  VA costs.  Contractor's profits and business models.  Serious, long term injuries. Defense Base Act claims.  And the absolutely incalculable cost of lives.   Each topic really deserves coverage more in depth than I have the time to devote, but here's  a morsel on pay earned by contractor's.

     I'll admit it.  When sequestration was looming and Afghanistan winding down, I smelled one of the last chances to earn and save some of the stupid money.  And that's why I came back.

     "In all countries engaged in war, experience has sooner or later pointed out that contracts with private men of substance and understanding are necessary for the subsistence, covering, clothing, and moving of any Army."
     Robert Morris
     Superintendent of Finance, 1781

     The quote just goes to show you the contracting game has been going on a loooonnnnnggggg time.  Any government can't do it all by themselves, so they contract out to companies to provide support services.  Requests for proposals are put out, companies submit bids, are selected, and pile in to do whatever work is required to assist with the military mission.  That's the very simple version.  In some cases, the work done is quite mundane - think running a small town or city.  The  Logistical Civil Augmentation Program (LOGCAP) contracts really deal with the logistics of operating a base, the power generation, roads, sewer, water, housing.  The carpenters, power plant operators, electricians and the like are earning 6 figure salaries.  Other contracts maintain equipment/vehicles or do secret squirrel stuff.  When you add up what you don't pay for while overseas, housing, utilities, food (in Afghanistan) and throw in the 95.1K tax exemption, well, you're talking about some serious coin.  The tax exemption alone adds an effective 23K to your salary, if you assume a 25% tax rate.  That's what you would have paid in taxes if you were back in the good 'ole U.S. of A. but don't pay overseas which allows you to save at a much higher rate.  But most people do have responsibilities back in the States - spouses, houses, children, cars and other money drainers.  These jobs allow them to take care of those bills and breathe easier because most of those folks wouldn't have been earning six figure salaries back in the U.S.  Very far from it.  I know of one young woman who was earning 26K/year doing administrative work somewhere back home.  And in Afghanistan, with the 35% uplift for danger, 35% uplift for hardship and her bonus...90K+.  So we are talking, at the very low end, a group of employees who are not the best and brightest (this is no dig at craftsmen, whose skills I respect and value highly, this is a dig at the fools who work over here) getting paid quite well.  And that's at the low end.  Although the freewheeling early days of Iraq and Afghanistan are over and salaries and profit margins are quite a bit tighter then they were in the gravy years, it can still be quite lucrative, particularly given the difficulty of a lower skilled person looking for jobs in the U.S.  Some contractors pay a higher hourly rate but only give you the uplift on the first 40 hours, others pay a lower rate and uplift all wages.  It works out to be pretty much the same.  And there are quite a few higher paying positions as well.
     As we draw down, and quite thankfully prepare to partially exit Afghanistan, the perks that soldiers and contractors overseas enjoyed are diminishing as well.  There is a huge push to save money and be cost conscious.  'Bout time.  They used to have at least 5 flavors of ice cream at the DFAC.  They are now routinely down to 3.  And surf and turf night?  It used to be lobster.  Every Friday.  Do you know how many times I've had lobster in the 7 Friday's I've been here?  Once.  Breaded shrimp.  Catfish.  Crab legs.  I don't think they should expect American Jedi war heroes (and the humble contractors who support them) to have to suck on a crab leg to get a tiny morsel of meat.  What kind of  surf is that?  I'd be guessing the kind of surf that doesn't cost quite as much as lobster.
     And where there are foolish people earning large sums of money, there will always be some entrepreneur nearby, willing and able to help separate those fools from their money.  I stopped by a bazaar today just inside the base.  Those ersatz mink blankets you see in developing nations everywhere?  Well they sell them here as well.  Mickey Mouse and Confederate Flag blankets for sale, right here in Afghanistan.  If someone is foolish enough to buy that crap, someone else is smart enough to put it up for sale.  Well done, well struck my capitalistic friends.
 

     Bagram is a mature base.  By that, I certainly don't mean it is filled with mature individuals with mature thoughts.  The graffiti certainly bears that out.  I mean it has been here for a while, and doesn't appear to be going anywhere, even after 2014.  In addition to the many DFAC's, there is Burger King, Subway, Popeye's, Pizza Hut, a few Green Beans Coffee (Honor first, coffee second is their motto), as well as places to buy a sim for your GSM phone or a GSM phone, local goods, to include carpets, gems, clothing and pirated DVD's.  Do you like Clint Eastwood?  You can get a boxed set of every movie he's ever been in.  Or pretty any much any other action type figure.  Very enterprising, those Afghani's.   There are also places to get your haircut and a massage from one of the girls from Krygystan.  Fancy a local meal?  There is Afghan restaurant off Disney named Aziz's, should you want to try something more entertaining instead of the free food provided 3 times a day.  For my palate, the DFAC is absolutely...adequate.  Aziz's will most likely not separate me from any of my pennies.   So  how mature is Bagram?  So mature that in one week, I've received mass e-mail blasts inviting me to:

March Madness 3 on 3 basketball tournament.
Kickboxing aerobics.
Country night two step dancing.
Body 4 life step aerobics.
Latin dance competition.
Texas Hold 'em (for prizes, not monetary gambling).
Friday night movies!
And I saw an ad while at the main PX for a DJ battle/face off - something like DJ T Money vs DJ DRama.  Or something like that. 


     That's in one week.  Sounds like a cruise ship or some kind of vacation, right?  I know what you're thinking - accommodations, a buffet meal three times a day, activities - where do I sign up for this kind of vacation and  how much does it cost?  As the infomercials say on late night television, "But wait, there's more!"  They pay you while staying at the resort.  That's right, you get paid to be here!  Unbelievable, right?
     Unbelievable for a reason, my friends.  Think Carnival Cruise gone wrong.  But here's what I think really sets Bagram apart - there are a few websites set up to sing the praises (or not) of life on Bagram. I Love Bagram (ILB), R.O.T.W (Reason Of The Week) and DFAC recipes.  There is also nakslist.com.  Nakslist.com is the craigslist of Afghanistan, but only for the bases, not for those who really live in Afghanistan proper. I bought a bicycle off of nakslist the first week I was here. And if you look at nakslist, there are really only posts for Bagram and Kandahar - all of the other FOB's don't participate. Like many things in life, it's a numbers game.
     ILB is just what it sounds like - a bunch of posts, all satirical, on all the special things that brings one pleasure while deployed here.  If you browse ILB, you will quickly find out that Bagram is not as much of a vacation resort as all of the advertised extra curricular activities might lead one to believe.  Most of the comments/posts fall into these categories:

1.   Food and the DFAC.  Mostly complaints about food and sightings of women in the DFAC.
2.  Sex (and lack thereof) and masturbation. 
3.  Related to sex, #236.

You can't make this shit up is a refrain heard in the contracting world overseas.  And you really can't.  I learned two things scrolling through ILB (I had to look both of them up).  The first was does the carpet and drapes match?  #236 originally got that wrong.












Here's the original #236 post:

236. Yes, I am a female. Yes I look good. Yes I have red hair. Yes the friggin curtains match the drapes, and no you can't see for yourself you stupid mouth-breathing, knuckle-dragging, trailer-trash, swamp-ass, flea infested idiot. # 249 called her out and said it was the carpet and drapes, not curtains and drapes.  And yes, I had to look it up in Urban Dictionary.com.    Something else I saw liberally mentioned in ILB was the term 'fleshlight'.  I am a bit green when it comes to sex toys, I guess that's the category it would fall into.  I had to look that up on the internet.  And unless you want to be seriously grossed out, don't look it up.  The rest of this blog is devoted to #236, who either never existed, or who is gone, gone, gone. But the myth lives on. 243. Angry red heads. See number 236. 244. Hey 236, you'll be a four again soon. Enjoy your moment of glory. 249. Smart-assed "deployment self-assured" women who run their mouths, and don't know what they are talking about. Hey 236 - "curtains" and "drapes" are the same thing. The question is, do they match the carpet? But really, who's running carpet these days? 253. Looking at every fat readheaded female and wonering if its 236. 272. Wondering if the large red head whose ass looked like two wildebeasts fighting in a gunny sack while I was behind her on the eliptical machine is number 236. 281. 236...will you marry me? 282. Taking the time for search Bagram for mythical things that may or may not exist...personal space, privacy, clean showers, unicorns, and oh, hot red heads...here's to you #236. 283. The chicken bones and used condoms in the bunkers over by the new RLB's. I'll bet #236 knows how they got there... 298. Red heads with blue eyes... pretty sure 236 was in the green bean today. I'd follow her around all. day. long. 306. Having conversations about #236 and not even knowing if she is really a girl or a guy quoting what he was told by a Desert Queen. 322. For that hot blonde who enjoyed her Popsicle to the fullest on Weds dinner at aviation dfac, thank you for refilling the bank. I don't think 236 stands a chance against this talent! 345. Could #236 be the third? Or is she the one who got convinced to have a three-some? 351. You can take a shower with 236 and get 6 minutes of water. 378. Hey #236, didn't I divorce you, if not, consider this message as being served. It's over. 393. Walking from the BX to the four corners and not seeing one officer! I'm taking that luck to Vegas! 236 I've got an extra ticket for you since you're now divorced. 417. Using "#236" references in everyday conversation, and everyone knowing exactly who the fuck you're talking about. 428. Putting 236 and 375 together and making an '8'. Ladies, you know we love you. 435. Over hearing an Airmen at the greenbean, that he is #236. 545. Relooking when DADT is repealed so I can date #236. 620. Be nice to 236: maybe "curtains" and "drapes" is all there is...maybe the carpet is gone. 648. Side tracked at sick call wondering if the carpet matches the drapes too... lmao, I almost called her 236 675. Because I hate Justin Beiber and I hate #630.... but I'm definitely willing to become a lesbian if #236 is! It goes on an on and on.  3,672 posts at last count and #236 just won't go away. I'm almost tempted to buy the t-shirt.  But I won't.  She isn't real. But this one takes the cake: 540. The hilariously awkward way my roommate acted when I caught him staring at the tattoo of #236 naked on my leg. A #236 tattoo on his leg.  That's a piece of Bagram lore to take with you for the rest of your life. Up next - the money.

Graffiti

                Let’s get  this out there:  I like graffiti.  I like witty, urbane, interesting,  cutting graffiti.  The type of graffiti you find in bathroom stalls in graduate school.  Clever.  Kind of like the anonymous precursor to facebook, where a discussion may be started by a Marxist, dissing Reagan’s Capitalism and his trickle down theory of economics as fatally flawed.  Once the discussion is started, the perpetrators always return to the scene of the crime (the same stall) to see who has commented on their thread.  They like to return well before the call of nature has tooted its clarion horn.  ‘Cause they want to see who responded to their post.  Fun stuff.  

               The first time I had to use the toilet here, I noticed the stern warning taped to the outside of the entrance to the throne, “Warning:  This is government property.  Graffiti is prohibited.  Blah blah blah.”  I opened the door to find the walls covered with graffiti.  Nasty stuff.  Nasty and embarrassing that Americans, native English speakers who wrote that shit are that uneducated.  The graffiti is absolutely riddled with spelling and grammatical errors.  And then there is some downright racist stuff. 

                The demographics of the workforce amongst contractors in Afghanistan is interesting.  On Bagram, you’ll find primarily Americans from all regions of the U.S., but the Indians can outnumber Americans by a 2:1 ratio.  There are also Kosovars, Nepalis and a smattering of Afghanis.  I’m unfailingly polite to the Afghanis.  If there ever is an incident where the perimeter has been breached and some insugent group is looking for a few good infidels (and my infidel-ness is chart topping, I assure you), I hope they’ll point me out and say, “Not that one.  He’s a good man.  He knows my name and learned a few words of Pashtu.  Spare him.”  I’ll give him the big thumbs up and say, “Allahu akbar to you, my brother!  That’s what I’m talking about!”

                But the international workforce can sometimes lead to misunderstandings and differences, and can lead to some unpleasant graffiti (factoid:  the singular of graffiti is graffito).  Most of the stuff is appalling.  There is a lot of black/white name calling, which has nothing to do with the workforce from around the world, which is even more of a reason for it to be inexcusable.  There is the liberal use of the ‘n’ word.  There are proclamations of the end of the U.S.  because Obama was re-elected.  And again, Obama is a Muslim and was born in Kenya.  Like I said, not the stuff of graduate school.  Or high school.  Even Michelle is fair game.  Children.  Please.  Are Sasha and Malia next?   The black population hits back against Mitt Romney and the white establishment;  we’re all racist crackers.  Go home if you don’t want to be here, Obama won the election.  Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.   Clearly, there are some deep rooted issues at stake.  In 1991, Rodney King asked if we could just all get along.  Apparently, even after almost 23 years, the answer is no.  There is one person who uses a red pen to correct grammar, punctuation and spelling, without entering the fray.  Just things like, ‘Indefinite article not needed here.  No need for a comma.  If there is no pause when speaking, you don’t use a comma.”   My kind of graffiti.  But the rest is just uneducated, lowest common denominator crap.   

                 The most virulent graffiti is directed at the Indian workforce.  Some of the most interesting, educated, hard working and competent people I have worked with overseas have been Indians, particularly from the State of Kerala, which spends the greatest percentage of their budget on education, and from my perspective, Kerala is getting a bang for their buck. But the graffiti is aimed at  toilet habits, which apparently are unknown and foreign to those from the U.S.  For those who don’t know, many in the Indian subcontinent, and throughout Southeast Asia and East Asia use squat toilets and water to clean themselves.  By the by, there are a number of studies out there that show squatting while dropping a deuce has health benefits.  I won’t bore you with the nitty gritty, but if you’re interested, go ahead and google it for grins.  What really gets the sitters going is the empty water bottles (brought in to clean the nether regions after squatting) and what the sitters refer to as ‘ass water.’  The first time I heard that phrase, I couldn’t stop chuckling.  Really?  Ass water?  I chuckle even as I write this.  For those squatters who are not careful, when cleaning the nether regions with water, drops  may splatter on the toilet seat.  When a sitter goes in a stall and sees droplets of water on the toilet seat, they can rest assured they did not come from a pure mountain fed fresh spring.  No, those wet spots are…ass water.  Who wants to have to clean that shit up?

                The graffiti is really not fit to print, so anyone who was looking forward to the gory details of the insults hurled back and forth will be disappointed.   And don’t you think ass water is a detail that is gory enough?  We all live on the base.  We work together, we eat together.  The living quarters are segregated (not sure why that is, perhaps a morbid fear of getting too close to ass water prompted some planner to have the Indians in separate living quarters – not sure if the Kosovars are housed separately as well).  Living and working together should engender some sort of camaraderie – and it does, up to a point.   And that point, the Mason-Dixon line of Bagram, and I suspect throughout every FOB in Afghanistan is between those from whom the ass water comes and those who enter a stall to find the most unwelcome ass water.  The division is between the sitters and the squatters.  And baby, I’ve seen the graffiti to prove it. 

Up  next?  Bagram, a mature base and an ode to #236.

What's Bagram like?

George Clooney doesn't wear cargo pants.

     What's Bagram like and why the hell am I here?  Well, the second question is easier to answer than the first one, actually.  I'm here to help draw down a contract (send contractors home) as the military closes Forward Operating Bases (FOB's) and winds down their effort in Afghanistan. As the military sends soldiers home, there will be a corresponding reduction in the contractors that provide their support.  This is also the last of the stupid money contracting overseas, so I thought I'd jump on that gravy train as it pulled out of the terminal for the last time.  You can think of me as kind of like George Clooney in the movie Up in the Air, but not as good looking or rich.  And  not as well dressed.  And I don't have as many frequent flyer miles as he did in the movie.  Ahhh, forget about it, I'm just here to send people home.  And that's a good thing.
     What's Bagram like?  Bagram Air Force base (BAF) is about 30 miles outside of Kabul and sits in a basin at an elevation of about 4800+ feet, surrounded by mountains.  It's kind of nice seeing the sun rise over the Hindu Kush, but then you remember you're in Bagram.  The T-walls and concertina wire are as much to keep us in as to keep those on the outside, well, out.  I don't know the exact size of the base, but around the perimeter road on my bicycle, it's 13.19 kilometers - there are also some off limit areas (like the infamous prison) that I'll never get close to, but it's still part of the base, so it's much larger than just the perimeter.  When it  rains, it's muddy everywhere, when it doesn't rain, the dust is pretty nasty.  There have been a few nice days after the rain when the dust has been tamped down and momentarily, it looks brilliant, but then you remember you're on Bagram.  BAF  is huge and has some fairly decent ameneties - Amazon ships out here with amazing speed.  There are a number of Dining Facilities (known on bases the world over as DFAC - haven't eaten at all of them yet, but am slowly working my way around base, trying the DFAC's one by one), a number of PX's selling  the necessities of life, coffee shops, Afghani shops selling pirated DVD's, pizza and a few fast food joints for those who don't want to eat the quite good free food at the DFAC's.  With the DFAC serving decent food, those fast food places will never get a fil out of me.
     It is a hopping place, with aircraft of all types - big, small, helicopters and  fighter jets taking off and landing all of the time.  The work is non-stop, 7 days a week, 12 hours/day for 4 months, then you get a break.  The living conditions?  They suck.  On the good side, where you sleep is temperature controlled, there are porcelain flush toilets outside and the shower facilities have steaming hot water.  Running water, flush toilets and electricity - good.  Living in bunk bed conditions in a room with 24 of my closest contractor friends, some of who snore almost as loudly as my wife - bad.  And because the toilets are outside, we old guys, who are wont to get up in the middle of the night to pee, stop hydrating at about 3:00 pm so we don't have to walk outside to said porcelain toilets in the dark, cold night.  I'm not in a tent, which is open bay life, I'm in a b-hut, which is one step above the tents.  B-huts are constructed out of plywood.  Privacy is lacking. I'm on the waiting list for a CHU (Containerized Housing Unit) but my number will come up well after I leave here, at the end of my year. But the beds are for sleeping and I can do anything for 4 months at a time.  Confession:  I did have a start when I was taken to my bunk.  I said, "Is this my permanent assignment?"  "Yes it is mon, it is," said the Jamaican who escorted me to my lovely sleeping quarters.  I nutted up, put my suitcase on top of my wall locker, went out and bought a pillow and some linen and settled in.  After the fat life in Kuwait, where we had a three bedroom, four bath luxury apartment on the Persian Gulf, the b-hut is, to put it mildly, a  bit of a let down.  This is kind of the overview of why I'm here and what the life is like.  Up next: racism on post, as told by the graffiti in the bathroom stalls.