So Long Korea - (Korea) Day 365

Woke up this morning at 0645. I got myself ready and then my wife and I headed to Starbucks on the base to get breakfast. Being from Seattle I gotta say that this Starbucks was a total disgrace to the name. The service was so excruciatingly slow we just had to laugh. If the Korean's working at this Starbucks tried to get a job in Seattle they would be laughed at and kicked to the curb.

After breakfast we said our good-byes and I headed to the little terminal while my wife headed back to the room. Unfortunately I am flying "The Patriot Express" from Osan and my wife is flying commercial from Incheon. I waited in the terminal for about 30 minutes reading a book on my iPad, then went through security. The security was the same here as any other airport, except instead of TSA agents they were all air force personnel. Once through security everyone waited in some big waiting rooms for another hour or two. I spent my time switching back and forth from watching TV and reading my book.

The moment finally arrived when we could board the plane and slowly, but surely I was able to get on and find my seat. My excitement about finally flying and saying good-bye to Korea was premature. We ended up sitting on the runway for over 3 hours! We watched a movie and were served a meal before we even left the runway. The pilot kept telling us that due to fog we had to wait. It seemed the fog hadn't changed, but we were finally given the green light to fly. We headed to Japan and had a two hour layover while the plane was refueled and prepared for the flight over the pacific ocean.

The flight back to Seattle was long and uncomfortable. I ended up with a major headache and couldn't wait to get off the darn thing. They played about 4 movies which I watched a couple to pass the time. Once we arrived my brother-in-law picked me up and we headed to eat lunch before he dropped me off at my in-laws. I had about an hour to unwind before I took our car and headed back to the airport to pickup my wife. We are finally back in the U.S. together! Looking forward to spending some quality time with my friends and family.

Honor Guard - (Korea) Day 107

Just a photo I took of my desk and office area in the conference control room.

Work call this morning was at 0830 (normal time) and I actually went in at 0830 which was nice. I had a good sleep and actually felt pretty good before going to work. I had a chance to video chat with my wife for a bit which is always nice. We've been trying to figure out how to use the Patriot Express (Space-A Travel from Seattle to Korea) so she can come over with the kids for free and visit. It's been nothing except a very frustrating experience. There is an official memo from USFK that states that soldiers that are unaccompanied in Korea can have their family come once a year via the Patriot Express. The problem is that nobody seems to know what I need to do in order to make this happen. Everyone I talk to has no idea, or they make something up…or pass me off to another person who doesn't have any answers. I feel like pulling my hair out.

I went to work today and found out that the honor guard is doing a post-wide exercise. All the bridges over "shit creek" which I have to cross were guarded by soldiers in full battle rattle…no crossing. I had to walk around the block just to get to work. They also shut down all the gates except for two. It caused massive backups outside the gates and made SPC Roy and Special K's commute last 1 1/2 hours instead of 20 minutes or so. They randomly selected cars to search and people to search when they were coming in. There were Humvees everywhere and even sandbags setup with big machine guns posted. I had to show my ID just to get to work.

When I did get to work there wasn't a whole lot to do, so I started SkillPort again. Later on we went to the TMP and "checked out" our car for another week. We then played basketball again for lunch. This time we had a few more people from the office and our sister office come play. We played three on three. I was still pretty sore from yesterday and by the time we finished I thought I was going to die. My legs were like jello and my entire body was sore. It was a great workout, but I'm not sure if I can do this everyday.

After basketball I went back to my room with SPC Roy and took a shower, then we left and had lunch. We then went to our battalion headquarters and updated some paperwork we received an email about. I went to try and pick up my packet for BAS which I was told was denied. There is no sign of it. Sometimes I think the army just tries to make everything so difficult when it comes to getting money or a benefit so people just give up. My sergeant is going to go with me to the finance office tomorrow with the copies of all my BAS paperwork and try and get everything straightened out. There is still a small chance that I may get it, but I'm not holding my breath. I'm sure when we get there, they will tell us we need another paper signed by 5 different colonels and a general before they can do anything.

We then cleaned up from the one meeting that we had today. It was in the top secret conference room and while we were waiting for an escort, we chatted with the honor guard on duty at the desk. I hear they get in trouble all the time. SPC Roy asked if they had live rounds yet for the exercise and he said no. Then I heard the story about why they are not allowed to use live rounds anymore. I guess one of the guards was playing around with his pistol and accidentally shot himself in his foot. If that wasn't bad enough, he then shot himself in his leg. WTF? Since then there have been no live rounds given to the honor guard. I guess there are a ton of other crazy stories that these guys do, but I think this one tops them all.

After cleanup of the conference room we did a deep cleaning of the office…vacuum, dust everything etc. When we finished it was time to go. I swung by the PX and picked up a few supplies, then headed to my room to do a little schoolwork and then relax and watch a movie. Tonight's movie….The Road Warrior. The sequel to Mad Max which I watched the other day. It's an old movie, but still pretty good. It's definitely better than Mad Max. It has Mel Gibson again driving his muscle car in the future where fuel is hard to come by and he has to scavenge to survive. Lots of fast cars plus some blood and guts. Still a pretty good flick after all these years.