You’re Being Stationed Where?

The story of my time living on Diego Garcia, a place few have ever heard of and even fewer will ever live. 

An aerial view of Diego Garcia.

Upon completing my military journalism training at the Defense Information School (DINFOS) in Indianapolis, IN, I took leave with my family in Philadelphia before departing to my next duty station – Diego Garcia.

Commonly known as “DG” or “The Rock," Diego Garcia is a British territory and living coral atoll, located 7 degrees south of the equator in the middle of the Indian Ocean. Ever heard the phrase “middle of nowhere?" Well, it’s just beyond that. Depending on the map, it may show up only as part of the Chagos Archipelago. 

As my leave was ending, my parents drove me to the Philadelphia International Airport with my two sea bags worth of uniforms and personal effects as well as a carry on bag packed with a CD player, CDs and lots of extra batteries. As this was prior to 9/11, my parents were actually able to wait with me in the USO lounge until I made my way to the gate for my flight. Soon enough, we said our goodbyes and I was off to DG.

The trip from Philadelphia to Diego Garcia was a grueling bit of travel. Including flights, layovers and refueling this trip generally took over 40 hours to complete. My plane flew from Philadelphia to Lajes Air Base in the Portuguese islands of Azores. From Azores, we flew to Sigonella, Italy. From Italy we flew to Bahrain, Saudi Arabia. And from Saudi Arabia we flew directly to Diego Garcia.

Descending into Diego Garcia by plane for the first time is awe inspiring. I quickly realized that this was probably the most beautiful place I would ever live. Nothing else has even remotely come close. And then getting off of the plane, you’re hit with a Mack truck sized wall of heat and humidity.

Exhausted, all of us were led into the tiny flight terminal where British customs agents proceeded to line up all of our bags and counsel us on the dangers of bringing any sort of contraband onto the island (drugs, weapons, chinchilla in your pants, etc.). And then, to prove how serious they were, they brought out a drug dog for a demo. Prior to every flight arrival they would hide a marrow bone impregnated with heroin somewhere in the terminal just so they could let their dog lose to find it in front of groups of weary travelers who would want to think twice about the naughty stuff they’ve attempted to smuggle onto the island. The customs process took about an hour – really the absolute last thing you would want to do after traveling for that long.

After the demonstration, we were free to go. Just outside of the terminal, I met Rick Vane, my sponsor. He was supposed to write me while I was at DINFOS to let me know a bit more about life on Diego Garcia. Apparently, he forgot. I guess I should have just been happy that he remembered to pick me up at the airport that day. We hopped into a tiny white van and drove off toward the populated end of the island.

We briefly stopped at what would be my place of employment for the duration of my tour – Naval Broadcasting Service (NBS) which, a few months later was rebranded as Naval Media Center Broadcasting Detachment. I would just come to know it as “The Det." I was introduced to a few of my coworkers (some of whom I had already known from my days at DINFOS) before handing in my orders and being assigned a barracks room.

One of my former DINFOS classmates, Laila, recommended that we catch up later that evening for dinner. With everyone knowing how arduous the trip to Diego Garcia could be, I was allowed to head to my room, settle in and sleep for the rest of that day. In my daze, I set an alarm and passed out for a few hours.

Laila knocked on my door at 6:15 p.m. As we walked to the Peacekeeper Inn, the nicest restaurant on the island (well, perhaps outside of the Officer’s Club… but I was enlisted and they didn’t allow my type there), Laila talked about working at the detachment and a little bit more about life was on the island.

Diego Garcia had its fair share of quirks and interesting policies. First, there was no indigenous population on Diego Garcia. Well, there was many years earlier but sadly they had been forcibly removed by the government to make way for the military build up. In addition to the U.S. military, a small contingent of British Royal Marines and other personnel, there was large Filipino and Mauritian population living on the island. These folks worked at and maintained many of the island services – from working at the base retail stores to operating restaurants, the island barber shop, running the sewage and fresh water treatment plants, pier operations, etc.

So why would you need a military base on Diego Garcia? I’m glad you asked. DG is strategically important to the military for a variety of reasons. First, it serves as a base for antisubmarine warfare squadrons who patrol the Indian Ocean. Second, the island hosts a naval communications station which refers messages throughout the fleet. Third, the Air Force operates the Ground-based Electro-Optical Deep Space Surveillance or GEODDS facility which helps to track all man-made objects in space. Fourth, sitting in Diego Garcia’s harbor and lagoon at any one time are around 15-20 maritime prepositioning ships operated by the merchant marines. These carry all sorts of military supplies and hardware – everything from tanks and Humvees to meals ready to eat (MREs) and tactical gear. And lastly, at 2.27 miles long, the runway on Diego Garcia is not only capable of supporting large bombers, but also served as an alternate landing site for NASA’s space shuttle.

The weather on DG, while beautiful like any tropical locale, could also be oppressive and turbulent at times. For the entire duration of my time there (14 months total) the temperature never dropped below 74 degrees. Never. Most days it was over 90 degrees and extremely humid. And then there was the day when I walked to work in six inches of water. Then again, it was a tropical island so was I about to complain? Absolutely not.

With Diego Garcia being as isolated as it was one of the things the base command focused on (and put a lot of money behind) was what the military refers to as Morale, Welfare & Recreation (MWR). On Diego Garcia, you could find and practically do anything the island locale allowed for – deep sea fishing, speed boat and sailboat rentals, golf (they had a nine hole course), watch movies in the open air movie theater, swim in their Olympic sized pool, skeet shooting, softball, basketball, racquetball, volleyball, etc. They also supported a ton of island wide events – from BBQs to running and biking competitions and much more.

There was no drinking age on DG which meant that everyone – from the 18 year-old sailor fresh out of boot camp to anyone else who happened to step off the plane – was able to imbibe. And they did. In some cases with reckless abandon.   

A coconut crab on Diego Garcia.

One thing that was plentiful on DG was wildlife. There was a standing rule that you could be fined $5,000 per incident for “molesting” any of the wildlife. Wildlife was everywhere on DG. There were feral chickens and cats roaming the island, a herd of donkeys, all sorts of tropical fish, sharks and turtles in the waters. And then there were coconut crabs which were pretty damn scary. The pincers on these things were created to tear coconuts in half. They were downright prehistoric looking.  

Next, there were no families on the island. If a married person received orders to Diego Garcia, their spouse and other family members would remain living at their previous duty station until their return. This made wedding and engagement rings sort of a novelty item. For some people, they simply didn’t matter. And let’s be honest, even though this was the military, it was still a tropical locale where the humidity was high, summer clothing and beachwear left less to the imagination and people were generally thumping like bunnies all over the place.

If you did happen to meet the person you wanted to spend the rest of your life with on Diego Garcia (and it did happen, believe me), the couple were permitted to get married and have one night in the finest room island accommodations could offer. The next morning, one of them was immediately put on the first departing flight – whether it was going to Thailand, Japan or elsewhere as they were not permitted to stay on DG as a married couple.

Lastly, the ratio of women to men on Diego Garcia was well in favor of the women. If a girl ever wanted to have her pick of any man in her geographical area, she should get stationed on DG. Even the ugliest of girls could expect to have a bevy of potential suitors at her disposal.

And, speaking honestly, my friend Laila was not the most attractive of girls – not by a long shot. Beyond that, she had an especially coarse and spiteful personality. A common reply of Laila’s to practically anyone she ever interacted with, regardless of military rank or station, was a sarcastically tinged, “Thanks. I’ll blow you later.” With that being said, prior to us heading to the restaurant, we stopped at the Enlisted Man’s Club so she could grab Tommy, her merchant mariner boyfriend who was going to join us for dinner.

The Det where I worked operated two television stations (for entertainment and informational purposes) as well as one radio station. All of the television shows we aired were relatively current (within a few weeks) and sent to us on broadcast quality Betacam tapes from the Armed Forces Radio & Television Service (AFRTS). As far as radio programming, the station was manned by our on air staff from 6 a.m. until the early evening. After that, we would simply simulcast a satellite feed available to us from AFRTS headquarters in Washington D.C.

The next morning, I reported for work at The Det. All incoming personnel were immediately assigned to the most boring and mundane task the exciting world of broadcasting had to offer – running boards. In order to keep all of those fancy television shows on the air, someone had to be there physically inserting the tapes and playing public service announcements (in the Navy, these took the place of regular commercial spots). This was literally a 24-hour a day operation where someone like me was seated at a control board with a bank of video players making sure that everything was played properly and on time. After all, people tend to get kind of pissed off when you play Guiding Light in the time slot where General Hospital should be.

My training commenced immediately. From the time I could run the boards on my own, following the precisely designed schedules timed out to the minute, I was assigned to work 12-hour shifts. While it was tremendously tedious work, I still gleaned a lot about how the station operated. The television boards were located right next to the television news master control room and just down the hall from the radio studios.

Within a few weeks, running boards became a duty assignment as opposed to a full-time job. Some people on military duty are tasked with walking a perimeter with a machine gun. Me? I got to make sure that The Simpsons played on time. After exclusively working at running boards for a few weeks, I was put to work writing, voicing and producing radio announcements. And not long after that, I was given my first shot to work as a radio DJ – playing Top 40 and other popular music from 6 to 10 a.m. every week day.

Me standing in Diego Garcia's radio Studio A.

Working as a DJ was fun – even when I made really stupid mistakes such as mispronouncing words like Tagalog (a dialect spoken in the Philippines) or playing the wrong CD. Eventually, it got easier and I became a little more relaxed behind the microphone. I was even doing well enough that I received a unique piece of fan mail – a postcard from a listener in South Africa. Apparently our AM signal reached that far and he used to tune in each day to hear me.

With the constant cycling of personnel coming to and leaving DG, The Det held what they referred to as “Hail and Farewell” parties each month. These were BBQs where we as a group would take some time celebrate those who were leaving DG and also to welcome new people to the detachment. Also, it was a great excuse to leave work early and go have a party on the beach.

One of the new people we welcomed during one of my first Hail and Farewells was Dave Winters who had just come to us from the naval air base in Jacksonville, Florida. Dave had become a journalist by “striking” into the field through on the job training in the fleet. While he had no formal broadcast training, he had perhaps the most natural radio voice of anyone I’ve ever known. Dave and I hit it off immediately and he is still one of my closest personal friends to this day.

I had recently been moved to another room on the opposite side of our barracks and given a different roommate – Petty Officer Second Class Brandon Hamilton – who also happened to be in charge of the television news division. Brandon, a proud native of Omaha, Nebraska was a nice enough guy. I was just generally disgusted by his habit of dipping (using chewing tobacco) and leaving his spit cups at random places in the room.

One Friday evening I had gone to bed early. I had to be up very early the next morning to run boards. Brandon knew I was attempting to sleep but chose to hang out on the balcony just outside of our door drinking – straight Jack Daniels, I might add – with another of our coworkers. A few hours had passed when Brandon opened the door and drunkenly walked into our dark room toward our bathroom.

From my bed, I saw the bathroom light flick on and then I heard it. A retching. Then a delay. Then a tremendous splash of regurgitated Jack Daniels. I jumped out of bed to investigate. “Holy shit! You puked all over EVERYTHING!” I said, seeing my formerly white bath towel now half brown and sticky. Brandon, still loopy from just having exorcised the contents of his stomach, responded to me sincerely, “Well, not anything above three feet.”

“You’re cleaning this up. Right now. I have to be at work in two hours and I’m planning on getting a shower before I go in,” I responded angrily. I went back to bed, leaving Brandon to clean up the mess on his own. A few days later, I was allowed to move into a room with my friend Dave.

A few days after that came a drinking incident of my very own. I was 19 years old when I arrived on DG and had never really drank alcohol before. As there was no drinking age, I generally took the path of least resistance – a few wine coolers here and there. One of my coworkers (and not one that I knew very well socially) named John was due to leave the island soon. We were all gathered at The Det and he was asked if there was any last thing he wanted to see before he departed. For some inexplicable reason, he pointed at me, “I want to see him drunk.”

Half-startled, I pointed to myself, “Me? Why?” His response was simple and to the point, “Just because I think it would be fun.” I kind of shrugged my shoulders, “Okay, but you’re buying. Where do you want to go?”

Where we ended up was a particular establishment that not everyone frequented on DG – the FilMau Club. The Filipino and Mauritian population of DG had their own section of the island. It was kind of a shanty town of bungalows and other structures. Their club, although nice, was kind of the dive bar of DG. The group of us grabbed a bunch of tables and they started feeding me drinks – in this case, wine cooler bottles of which 2/3 had been poured out and replaced with vodka.

Lacking in tolerance, I began to feel the effects of these weighted wine coolers almost instantly. But I was also intent on keeping in the conversation and enjoying hanging out with my coworkers. Suddenly feeling hungry and lacking any sense of taste or other sort of inhibitions, I began grabbing at the bowl of pork rinds the table had ordered. And then, getting bolder with each drink, I began dipping them into the screwdriver of my coworker Stan whenever he wasn’t looking. The rest of the group could see what I was doing and when Stan finally noticed he went ballistic.

After he was calmed down, someone suggested we hit the dance floor. I really, very rarely, dance. It’s just not something I’ve ever felt I was designed to do. Apparently, vodka changes things – a lot. Not only was I dancing that night. I was actually asked to leave the FilMau Club (okay, I was kicked out) for dancing on the tables. Thankfully, after my headache subsided the next day, things went back to normal.              

Keeping in contact with family from DG in those days was tough outside of letters and packages. Mail sometimes took up to two weeks to reach the U.S. The Internet was in its infancy and not widely available in any way. I was able to purchase calling cards to reach home but the time difference was always an obstacle. And the cost, at $20 for each 10 minutes, wasn’t easy to deal with either.

In addition to work, there was a lot to keep me busy. My coworkers formed a softball team and, possibly out of pity, allowed me to play with them. Sometimes a few of us would head out to the Brit Club, a favorite haunt of most people on DG, and then put together a catching and batting practice around 2 or 3 a.m. The fun part was that after we turned on the lights to the field, we would have to chase away frogs which had come onto the sand along the baselines to keep cool during the night.   

The Det was soon assigned a new officer in charge – Senior Chief Petty Officer Michael Dunbar. We were lined up at attention to be inspected and addressed (something which was practically unheard of under the previous officer in charge).

Mostly bald and wearing Teddy Roosevelt style glasses, Dunbar spoke with an English accent. “I am not here to be your friend. I have my own friends. I am here to make you work. And I plan to squeeze all of you. Some of you may pop, but others will flourish under my command here. Does anyone have any questions?” he asked. Silence. He continued, “We are going to make the productions which come out of this detachment some of the best in all of the military. I will guarantee you that. If anyone has a problem with that, don’t cross me because I will kick your ass. Do you understand?” We all responded with a loud, “Yes, senior chief!” and were dismissed.    

One of Dunbar’s first actions seemed almost entirely at odds with his speech – he instituted a casual Friday policy. We were all so happy we almost didn’t know what do with ourselves. It was a simple gesture but one that we all admired. And in that moment we all knew that life under Dunbar’s tenure was going to be a good thing for everyone.

By this time, I working as a radio DJ on the midday shift, playing alternative and rock music during a show called Choice Cutz (don’t blame me for the name – it came with the time slot). Also, Dave Winters and I had taken over hosting duties (we traded off) for the island’s hour long music video show called FMTV.

FMTV gave us an opportunity (and a good reason) to visit all sorts of interesting places all over the island. And, have some fun while doing it. That’s how I found out one of the best views of the island is from the top of the air traffic control tower. Or that Marines, unless properly trained, generally have absolutely no idea how to talk on camera or show a decent sense of humor. In addition to on camera interviews of everyone we could find, we also wrote and filmed comedy bits or other segments for air.

During one particular heavy metal themed show, my friends Barry, Mike and I took over DG’s musical instrument practice room so we could perform a song as “Roadkill,” a heavy metal band that demonstrated and personified every rock stereotype known to mankind. We lip synched to Cinderella’s “Gypsy Road” like no other band before. I would share the video, but someone could blackmail me with it.

Christmas was approaching. A few of my coworkers had decided to make the trip home. In most cases, people who took leave from DG chose to take their entire yearly allotment of military leave – 30 days – all at one time. With the amount of travel involved to and from, there was just no sense trying to do it any other way.

Instead of traveling, I picked up a few calling cards and reached out to family for the holiday. I had to thank them for the box of gifts they had generously sent along to make me feel at home. They were kind of jealous because in Pennsylvania it was cold and snowing. On DG, the weather was pretty much the exact opposite and I intended to spend Christmas celebrating with my coworkers at the Plantation recreational site on the other side of the island.

In the military, you tend to gain a new appreciation for those who work hours other than 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. This is primarily because in the military, whether you like it not, you’re going to have a job, task or duty that falls outside of those hours – or on holidays. Or both. I mention this because I was lucky enough to be assigned to run boards – for a 12-hour shift – which began at 11:30 p.m. on New Year’s Eve 1995 and ran until 11:30 a.m. on New Year’s Day 1996.

A few of my friends, some drunk and others not, were kind enough to take a break from their celebrations to stop by and visit me. It was one shift I was more than happy to be over and done with.

Not soon after the start of the year, I was asked to sit down with Senior Chief Dunbar. I knocked on his door jamb and he looked up. “Kaminski. Come on in and have a seat. I really, really like what you’re doing here on the radio and FMTV,” he said.

Coming from Dunbar, that was a compliment of highest order. What many didn’t know was that prior to joining the military, Dunbar had been a civilian radio DJ – and a damn talented one at that. Dunbar had originally apprenticed under the famous disc jockey Wolfman Jack and for a few years in the late 1970’s had the number one rated radio show in the country working out of Los Angeles. He chose to step away from it because, while he was well known, he still had little money or anything else to show for it. As he later advised me, “Fame without money is worthless.”

Anyway, seated in his office, he continued, “I like what you’re doing on the radio and I really want to see you translate that as our next TV news anchor.” I looked at him kind of sideways, “Me? Wouldn’t you really like to see someone else in that seat instead of me?” I protested. Never having been a fan of anchoring the news, I also knew that many other people at The Det had been interested in the role. Our current anchor, Karen Flynn, was winding down her time on the island.

Dunbar was insistent. “I’ve made my decision. You’re going to be my next news anchor. You’ll train for a week starting Monday and then the week after that you’ll be on air. Your last radio show will be the end of next week as well.” While I was unsure of myself, Senior Chief’s words certainly helped bolster my confidence a bit.

That Monday I arrived at The Det to begin training. I did my radio show in the morning and worked with Karen that afternoon on script writing as well as inputting everything into and operating the teleprompter. So far so good.

And then, Tuesday arrived. As soon as I arrived at the Det, I was told that Brandon Hamilton needed to see me. I found him working in our camera and equipment locker. “You need to go back to you room and get a uniform ready ASAP. You’re going to be anchoring the news tonight,” he said. I looked at him dumbfounded. “What?!?! Why?!”

“You didn’t hear? Karen is in the hospital with a burst appendix. Now get out of here.” With that, I scurried back to room to 1) find a uniform suitable to wear on camera and 2) iron it so I didn’t embarrass myself.

My first attempt at anchoring the news was absolutely pitiful. I still have the tape and it’s truly cringe inducing. I look like there’s a midget terrorist pointing a gun at me off camera telling me to read a ransom note. But, like with my time on the radio, I progressively got better and more comfortable with practice.

Around the middle of March, we floated an idea to Senior Chief Dunbar – we wanted to do a special April Fool’s Day newscast. We weren’t sure of what stories we wanted to focus on or how we wanted to execute just yet, but he told us he was completely and entirely on board with whatever we came up with.

One of the ideas we ran with was that the Smoke Free Navy initiative, something which the Chief of Naval Operations had been championing and planning to institute within five years, had instead been instituted immediately. In order to sell it as our lead story, we talked with (and interviewed on camera) the manager of the island store about how all of the cigarettes on the island would be destroyed. And then we got footage of his staff removing every single carton of cigarettes from the store shelves.

To further bolster our cigarette story, we interviewed the island’s senior medical officer who talked about what a great idea the new policy was, saying that it would make for a healthier Navy and that it was simply the right thing to do for all of our sailors.

For our sports segment, we enlisted members of the merchant marine football team (who were stationed on ships anchored at DG) to participate in a rather raucous game of “tackle golf.”

All other aspects of the newscast, from upcoming island event listings to flight schedules and weather forecasts were completely bogus. We also featured a human interest story about a bowler who wasn’t quite playing with a full set of pins. The entire newscast can be seen here.

As soon as it aired, the calls started pouring in to The Det. One poor Brit who didn’t realize it was April Fool’s Day immediately went out and purchased 50 cartons of cigarettes. The base commanding officer tracked down Senior Chief Dunbar to express his displeasure with the stunt. To his credit, Dunbar not only stood up for us, but actually thought the newscast was highly entertaining.

That May, we began ramping up for a multi-day fundraiser The Det did every year to support the Navy-Marine Corps Relief Society called Radiothon. The premise of the fundraiser was simple. For a donation (and in some cases, a series of increasing bids) we would give the radio airwaves over to the populace of Diego Garcia. If someone didn’t like a song being played over the air, they could simply call in, make a donation and “bump” that song off the air with their own selection. Of course we would play a clever sound effect (fire alarm, toilet flushing, etc.) to demonstrate that a song had just been bested by another donation.

We began to brainstorm in earnest about how we should promote it. My friends Dave and Barry, put together a great deal of the spots to promote Radiothon, all of which were simply fantastic. One, shot in black and white, was themed after a European silent film and starred various feral chickens from around the island.

I helped to write and act in one of them myself which, due to some incredibly bad timing, caused a bit of controversy. In the spot I was playing the role of a slightly unhinged person who just happened to be on the roof of our building with a radio listening to my “favorite song” during Radiothon. That song being Randy Newman’s “Short People." Below were a number of my coworkers pleading with me not to jump off of the roof. The camera cuts to another person who calls into the Radiothon hotline and requests the Van Halen song “Jump." I scream like mad, run and throw myself off the roof and my coworkers clap as I land, throwing myself 30 feet down against the grass. We actually borrowed a CPR dummy from the hospital and filmed it flying off the roof dressed in my clothing. When we went to the medical clinic to ask permission to borrow it their response was, “Ummm…. you’re going to use this for what?”

The problem came on May 16, 1996, a day which, as I was still also the island’s news anchor, was pretty tough. Apparently distraught over an upcoming feature article disputing his authorization to wear certain decorations along with his military awards, the then current Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Jeremy “Mike” Boorda committed suicide by a self-inflicted shotgun wound to the chest.

All of us immediately switched from making fun Radiothon spot mode to news gathering mode. Senior Chief Dunbar, who had worked with and knew Admiral Boorda personally, took the news especially hard.

With Senior Chief’s valuable input, we put together what we felt was a very respectful and touching tribute to Admiral Boorda for the newscast that evening. As the Navy-Marine Corps Relief Society was a charity which the Admiral championed, we felt comfortable in the decision to keep our ads promoting Radiothon in full rotation leading up to the event. That was until Senior Chief Dunbar, as the officer in charge, got a call from the island’s resident psychologist.

“Senior Chief, are you aware that you are currently playing a commercial where a sailor commits suicide over a song being changed off the of the radio and that the Chief of Naval Operations recently killed himself?” she scolded. As much as Dunbar liked the spot, even he agreed it would have to be permanently shelved.

A few days later, Radiothon commenced. While I wasn’t scheduled to be on the radio during the fundraiser, I was given a very special sort of assignment. Essentially, I was to be the taunter-in-chief. In many cases this meant I spent a good part of each day on the roof of our building with a bullhorn screaming at, yelling and cajoling people into opening their wallets for this worthy cause. In addition to me working from the roof, other teams from The Det were traveling around to various parts of the island, film crews in tow, doing their best to amp up the island population and get them donating to the Navy-Marine Corps Relief Society.

As part of Radiothon, one of the large donations we received wasn’t for a song that someone wanted played over the air. Instead it came from a couple of female British Navy “Leading Wrens” (Wrens comes from WRNS, an acronym for Women’s Royal Naval Service) who temporarily wanted my job as television news anchor. For a combined donation of $1,000, Leading Wren Jessica Pauley and Leading Wren Laura Baker took over anchoring the news for one night. I got to be their coach just off camera as they spewed all sorts of British jargon I couldn’t understand.

Not soon after Radiothon wrapped up, I again sat down with Senior Chief Dunbar. Due to some extraordinary circumstances, The Det was going to be short-staffed for the coming six months. Even though I was scheduled to move on to my next duty station in a few months – as a staff journalist aboard the USS Belleau Wood, home ported in Sasebo, Japan – he asked if I would consider a short extension on the island. Without hesitation, I immediately agreed to extend my time on Diego Garcia by two months. A few days later, I made the return trip to Philadelphia to take my 30 days of leave (minus all of that fun travel time) with my family.

On my return trip to DG, we boarded the plane in Sigonella, Italy. The captain came over the loudspeaker to inform us that there was a problem with engine number three of our DC-8 aircraft. A few rows ahead of me, an older gentleman jumped out of his seat and immediately went into the cockpit (we later learned that he was a traveling flight engineer/mechanic). He exited the cockpit, went down the stairs onto the tarmac and up a ladder to inspect the engine in question. A few moments later, he began, rather violently and in full view by the entire one side of the plane, banging on the engine with a very large hammer. After a few minutes, he again boarded the plane, went into the cockpit and then took his seat.

“It looks like we’re ready to resume our flight,” said the captain over the loudspeaker. You could see a look of fear in everyone’s eyes that had seen the supposed “repairs” which were done to the engine. It was actually so bad that people began, in earnest, to request that the flight attendants begin serving alcoholic beverages BEFORE the flight departed. As we took off bound for Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, it took nearly a full hour before people realized that engine number three was probably going to get us there. Thankfully it did – and back to Diego Garcia.

As we landed at Diego Garcia, the British customs officers proceeded to line up everyone’s luggage for their hour long or more customs demonstration. One of them recognized me from my time as the island’s news anchor and pulled me aside.

“Scott, you’ve been through all of this before, right mate?” he asked. I said that I had. “And you didn’t bring anything especially fun with you back from home, right? Drugs, knives, etcetera?” I said I hadn’t. He pointed to line of bags. “You can grab your stuff and go then.” I thanked him, grabbed my bags and headed out of the terminal. As I left, I could hear a collective groan as well as a, “Hey! Why does he get to leave?!?!”

The week after I returned, all members of The Det were subjected to something which we had heretofore never experienced: a good, old-fashioned military room inspection. Dave and I were standing at attention outside of our room as our inspector, Chief Sal Guardino, arrived to review our quarters and entered. Guardino worked at The Det as well, overseeing all of the technical staff who kept the facility (and every piece of equipment) up and running.

He quickly surveyed our room and then stopped. “Kaminski! What the fuck is this?!?!” he said, pointing to the matching Mickey Mouse sheets and comforter that adorned on my bed. “That? That’s Mickey Mouse, Chief,” I responded, somewhat sarcastically. A smile came to his face. Laughing, he told us that our room had passed and to get back to work.    

My final months on Diego Garcia went by very, very quickly. While I was no longer anchoring the news (my time in front of the camera ended in late June 1996), I did continue to put together and file stories for the news as well as worked on various other projects for The Det.

In my final week, I packed up the majority of my belongings and shipped them off to my parents in Pennsylvania. Not knowing how much space I would have aboard the Belleau Wood, I figured it best if I didn’t show up with a mountain bike, electric guitar and amplifier and everything else I had accumulated while on The Rock.

My flight was scheduled to depart around 8 p.m. one August evening bound for Okinawa, Japan. Dave drove me to the terminal, we said our goodbyes and he left to start a shift running boards at The Det. My plane, an Air Force KC-10, was massive. Intended primarily as a cargo plane, this particular model had been outfitted with approximately 20 passenger seats just outside of the cockpit. 

I boarded the plane and was greeted immediately by one of our pilots (there were three total on the flight) who pointed me to a seat. Besides the pilots, the only other humans on board were a rather large Marine (approximately 6’4”, 260 lbs.) in camo fatigues (who happened to be wearing a set of handcuffs) and two Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) agents who were escorting him off of the island. Obviously this 14-hour flight was going to be a blast.

The pilots began preparing for take off and instructed us all to buckle up. And then about 15 minutes later, one of them came out of the cockpit to inform us that we weren’t going anywhere. The engines simply wouldn’t fire. I collected my two sea bags, got off the plane and called Dave at The Det to inform him that I wasn’t going anywhere just yet. He arranged for coverage on the boards and ran back to the airport to get me.

I dropped my gear off in Dave’s room (I was not technically supposed to be living there any more) and set off to the Peacekeeper Inn to grab a late bite to eat. Dave went back to The Det.

For a good portion of my time on DG, I was somewhat infatuated with a Filipina girl named Cassandra who, at various times worked as a server at the Peacekeeper Inn as well as working at the island’s package and beverage store. I was always too shy to ever confess my interest in her in any way. As I arrived at the Peacekeeper, she just happened to be there working that night. As it was so late, we were the only two people in the entire restaurant. Not having anything to lose, I finally struck up a conversation with her.

I encouraged her to sit with me and tell me her story. To my surprise, she happily obliged. I learned that she came to Diego Garcia because good paying work was relatively scarce in her hometown in the Philippines. She was single and, after a few years of working on Diego Garcia, expected to be able to return to her country with enough money to build a home of her own and hopefully go to school to become a teacher. After I finished eating, I thanked her for taking the time to hang out with me and set off to The Det to find Dave.

I borrowed Dave’s room key (I had already turned mine in) and collapsed on the bare mattress which used to be my bed. I awoke the next morning to a knock on the door from Dave, who had just finished his overnight shift running boards.

I went to The Det to figure out how I was going to make it to Japan. I was put on the next outgoing flight to Okinawa which was scheduled to depart the next day. With Senior Chief Dunbar’s assistance, we called the public affairs officer (essentially my new boss) aboard the Belleau Wood to explain the situation.

After reviewing my flight and travel times, he determined that I would actually be arriving in Sasebo, Japan approximately two hours after the Belleau Wood would be departing on a trip headed for Vladivostok, Russia. He instructed me to check in with the personnel department at the base in Sasebo and insist that they arrange for me to “chase” the ship to its next port of call because I would be needed during the Russia trip. He told me that whatever the staff at the personnel office said, no matter how much they protested, that I was to insist that they make arrangements for me to travel and meet the ship. From his end, he would also contact them to ensure they understood that no matter what, I was to be on the Belleau Wood for the Russia trip.

My last hours on Diego Garcia were bittersweet. Dave again drove me to the DG airport, but this time the plane actually took off. Fourteen or so hours later, we touched down in Okinawa, Japan.

There were many things about life on Diego Garcia I would certainly miss: my good friends and coworkers at The Det, the amazing weather and island life and even encountering those scary ass coconut crabs. While Diego Garcia was a fantastic departure from civilization for a while (make that a long while), I was antsy to see and learn different things. And, come to think of it, I had a ship to go chase.

- Scott Kaminski

* - All names have been changed.

How I Became a DINFOS Trained Killer

Prior to leaving Navy boot camp in Great Lakes, Illinois for the Defense Information School (DINFOS) in Indianapolis, IN to begin my training as military print and broadcast journalist, I was advised to get some civilian clothes and then change back into my uniform on the train. (At the time it was a rule that you had to be in uniform when you reported to your next duty station.)

Arriving at night, it was a quiet taxi ride from the train station to Fort Benjamin Harrison, a rather sleepy Army base known as the home of the second largest government building in the U.S. (I’ve seen it. If you haven’t, you’re not missing much.) The guard at the gate directed my cabbie to the DINFO barracks. I paid my fare and, dressed in my navy dress blue “Cracker Jack” uniform, carried my green sea bag with me through the door to talk to the soldier on duty.

The barracks were U-shaped with three stories on each wing of the building. As all members of the armed services attended this school, space was somewhat limited. I was directed to “take the stairs to the top and go right” to the Navy’s floor. I topped the stairs and pushed the door open. Walking down the hallway toward me was a strikingly attractive Hawaiian girl named Leilani who just happened to be clutching a full fifth of Jack Daniels.

“Hey! Welcome to the Navy deck!” she said, excitedly shaking my hand. “What are we celebrating?” she asked me. I looked at her somewhat quizzically, but could tell she had already had a few. “It’s Tuesday! We’re celebrating that it’s Tuesday!” she exclaimed, raising her hands over her head. And then she walked past me, out the door and down the stairs.

I moved down the hall a bit and was met by Renee, a short, mousy redhead. “Hi! Welcome! Do you have your orders?” I put down my sea bag and handed her the marigold envelope I had been given upon my departure from boot camp. “I apologize. We’re a little booked up here at the moment. I’ll have to give you a room in one of the Army wings until the next class graduates and then we’ll move you up here,” she said. Renee handed me another packet with student rules and other important info and then escorted me to my room on the first floor in one of the Army wings.  

I had a week or so until another class formed up for the print journalism portion of my training. I spent this time doing admin tasks on the Navy deck, learning more about my classes from current students and seeing what life was like for students at various points in their training.

On my third night living in the Army wing, I ran into a small dilemma. I needed to do some laundry. My room was located at the far end of the hallway and peeking out my door I could see my Army neighbors were being subjected to a full dress uniform inspection by a very unhappy drill sergeant. She was literally walking from soldier to soldier with a ruler measuring the distance between their pockets and the ribbons on their chests.

Clad in my Navy jogging suit (dark blue with a big, white “N” on it), I grabbed all of my laundry items and headed down the hall toward the common area which housed the laundry facilities. I got past three confused soldiers when their drill sergeant wheeled around to address me, “And just what in the hell do you think you’re doing?” I mockingly looked around at the items I was carrying. “I have a bag of laundry and a box of laundry detergent. I was thinking about going sightseeing downtown,” I responded sarcastically. She glared at me, practically burning a hole through the “N” on my chest… just long enough for me to realize I should immediately proceed to the laundry room.

The next day I earned a roommate in the Army wing – Michael Murray. Michael, as I would soon find out, was a devout follower of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, more commonly known as the Mormons. We exchanged pleasantries and talked about our experiences so far in the Navy. Within a few days, he was openly referring to me as “The Antichrist.” Luckily for both of us, rooms became available on the Navy deck and we simply became future classmates instead of just religious adversaries.

My training was due to begin that Monday. For us in the Navy (as well as those in the Marine Corps), we were trained in both print and broadcast journalism. For members of the Air Force and Army, those roles were split up into individual disciplines and they had to choose one or the other. Members of the Coast Guard were only trained as print journalists as they had no need to be overseas, where most military broadcasters practice their craft. Either way, ahead of me was six full months of intensive training. In some classes only half of the people who began either program successfully made it to graduation.

The first three months of training consisted of print journalism writing, photography, print layout and public affairs training. They were actually training me to be the guy who would stand at a podium after a plane crashed who says something like, “We can neither confirm nor deny the existence of nuclear weapons at this time.”

The last three months of my training would focus on broadcast journalism including learning how to be a radio announcer, newsreader and disc jockey. I would also learn how to write, edit and record broadcast radio spots. For television, I would be trained on how to write, shoot and edit a news story for air on television as well as how to anchor a newscast. We also learned how to perform all of the roles associated with a newscast: running a teleprompter, operating a camera, running audio controls on a board, switching video and directing a newscast.

At roll call that Monday morning one of our more senior shipmates spoke directly to all those starting classes that day. “Look, you were all intelligent enough to get into this school which means you’re smart enough to make it class on time and on your own. Make sure to set your alarm clocks and don’t be late.”

The building we lived in was directly across the street from the school building. The sad part was that members of the Army were made to form up in ranks and were marched across the street as a unit. Soldiers glared at my classmates and me as we walked past them on our own to class. For those in the Army, this school was essentially a continuation of boot camp for them meaning that if someone told them to “drop and give them 20” they were required to do it. The Navy was still the military, but much, much more lax.

My print journalism instructor, Air Force Senior Master Sergeant Marvin Reynolds, was quite possibly the whitest black man that I’ve ever met. I’m not saying that to be critical. I’m saying that because it was true. Also true was this: He was a hell of a writing instructor. At one point I received an article of mine which he had graded. The red ink on it started to overtake the printed black text. “Really, Senior Master Sergeant Reynolds?!?!” I asked incredulously. “Did you run out of ink here or something?” He half-smiled, “That’s not funny, Kaminski. Especially because I did run out of ink grading your paper.”

We had been warned about a very specific form of torture that all DINFOS print journalism students are required to go through: Features Writing. For this, every student would go to class in the morning and determine with their instructor a topic for a long form features article (this would be akin to an in-depth article you might find in a magazine or other publication). From there, the student had to have a 10 page, single spaced article composed, edited and submitted to their instructor by 6 a.m. the following morning – less than 24 hours from when they received the assignment.

When it was a Features Night, you could tell. The Navy deck was bustling right up until the 6 a.m. deadline. Caffeine and adrenaline (primarily found in the forms of Mountain Dew… I would buy it three 2 liter bottles at a time and No Dozz awake pills) kept the lights on and the Brother word processor keyboards clicking.

Every morning after we had handed in a feature article, we were subjected to public affairs training or photography classes (presumably so our instructors could have the day to themselves grading our stories). Public affairs (or public relations as it’s called in the civilian world) can be an incredibly dynamic and engaging profession. Sadly, the woman that DINFOS had teaching it to us could cure practically anyone of insomnia. Luckily, our photography classes always kept us active and moving – even if we were left sleepily working in a dark room surrounded by caustic photo processing chemicals.

The cast of characters inhibiting the Defense Information School was so unique I selected one of them as a subject for a features writing assignment. Older than many of my other shipmates, Steve Phillips had previously served as a construction worker and builder in the Army and went on to gain his Masters degree (summa cum laude) in Engineering from M.I.T. After a successful yet unfulfilling stint as an engineer, he gave that up to join the Navy and become a print and broadcast journalist at DINFOS. Sounds like a pretty interesting guy, right? I thought so too.

Well, I wrote up my feature article, handed it in and got called out because my instructors didn’t believe me. One of the tenets DINFOS stressed, as all good journalists should strive to do at all times, is check your facts. Our class even had a somewhat tongue-in-cheek motto: “If your mother says she loves you, check it out.” I was brought before Harry Summers, one of our civilian journalism instructors to explain myself.

“There is no possible way that someone could be in the Army, graduate from M.I.T. with honors, start a lucrative engineering job and then give it up to be here. Did you check your facts?” Summers asked me. I said that I had. He told me to do it again. I found Steve back on the Navy deck later that day. “You’re not going to believe this but the feature article I did on you – they don’t believe it,” I said to him, pointing my thumb in the direction of the school building. I asked him again pointedly, “So I have to you ask you again: Did you serve in the Army, graduate from M.I.T. and work as an engineer like you told me?” He began shaking his head, “Yes. All of it.”

I thanked Steve and went back to find Professor Summers, telling him that I had indeed double-checked my facts. Summers responded that he would look into it himself and let me know within a day or two. Until then, he was holding my article (and my grade).

A day passed and Summers sought me out in class. “So I called M.I.T. and spoke to their dean of admissions. As soon as I mentioned the name Steve Phillips, he perked up on the other end of the phone saying, ‘Steve Phillips! He was one of our best students. How’s he doing these days?’” Summers handed me my graded article back with large, red “A” at the top of it. “Good job on this,” and then directed me back to class.

Within the next few days my print journalism class would be graduating. During our graduation ceremony, the commandant of DINFOS, an Army colonel spoke to the Army, Air Force and Coast Guard graduates saying, “Write and file the stories you would want to read and you’ll do just fine out there.” And then he spoke directly to me and my Navy and Marine classmates who were continuing on to broadcast journalism training, “Make sure you don’t bump into each other in the hallways on the way to broadcast announcing class.” We took our diplomas and headed back to the barracks for a well deserved weekend free from homework.

My Mormon classmate Michael Murray had been set up to room with another member of our class, Ed Burke. Over the course of our print journalism classes, all of us had become a little closer but I’ll say it: Burke was a weird dude. I’m not quite sure if he had one too many acid trips or what, but he was slightly off kilter. Murray, one of the few of us who had a car at DINFOS, had decided to go out that Friday night with some friends downtown. Burke, as odd as it may sound, specifically asked that he not leave him alone in their room. Upon returning to their room in the wee hours of Saturday morning, Murray was surprised to find the majority of his and Burke’s possessions on the floor – all assembled into multiple, neatly drawn and intersecting lines covering the entire floor (this was all reminiscent of a scene out of Pink Floyd’s The Wall). To prove that he wasn’t making it up Murray did two things: 1) Show me and 2) leave everything exactly as he found it for when Burke woke up. The next morning Burke awoke, took one look at the floor and said to Murray, “See? I told you. You shouldn’t have left me alone.”

We filed into our broadcast announcing class early and were introduced to our instructors: Air Force Technical Sergeant Steve Mulligan, civilian instructor Jack Linden and Navy Petty Officer First Class Daisy Dalton. If you tried, you couldn’t find three more different people. Mulligan was amiable enough, but could be bitingly sarcastic. Linden was an older, retired military broadcaster. He had the type of booming voice which could fill a room (no microphone required). And then, there was Daisy. I have never met another woman more physically imposing in my life. It’s not that she was big or stocky. Instead she was muscular and incredibly well-built – she looked like the bodybuilder version of Condoleezza Rice. The buttons on her uniform shirts just barely held in her ab muscles as she inhaled and exhaled. And also, as befitting an instructor of broadcast announcing, her enunciation was dead-on perfect.

The purpose of broadcast announcing class was to train us all to speak clearly, minimize any sort of pronounced, local accents or lisps and allow us to be able to get in front of a microphone to expertly deliver news and/or entertain the masses. In the far corner of the classroom was a pile of hockey sticks. Every day that a student messed up in broadcast announcing, they were made to pick out and carry one a hockey stick with them everywhere they went that day as some kind of half-assed scarlet letter. I got quite familiar with the best stick to grab for all occasions – especially for taking with me to the restroom.

We had all sorts of vocal exercises which we went through constantly. Some of us required more attention than others. For instance, one my Navy shipmates, Carolyn Bert, hailed from Little Rock, Arkansas and had a very intense southern accent which our teachers were seeking to rid her of.

And then there were classmates who had other problems. An Army private in our class, Tom Barry, was incredibly cocky and annoying. He claimed to have been a civilian broadcaster and said that he didn’t need the training. Clearly the instructors disagreed as he carried a hockey stick with him way more days than me. Things came to a point one day when he got into an argument with Daisy. He made the vital mistake of attempting to end said argument by saying to her, “You know, you’re pretty cute when you’re angry.” And that is when Daisy simply put threw him up against one wall of the classroom, got her hand around his throat and, with one hand, lifted him off his feet until 1) he requested air by pointing toward his windpipe and 2) ran off out of class, never for us to see him again.

Later that week, another incident occurred. This time it was between Daisy and my wacky little friend Ed Burke. During a one-on-one instruction session, Burke kept insisting that Daisy’s voice reminded him of someone. Daisy, in her perfect intonation said, “Well, who do I remind you of?” Burke encouraged her to keep talking until it dawned on him. “Wait!” he pointed at her. “You’re Jocelyn Elders!” (For those of you who may not remember, Jocelyn Elders was Surgeon General during the Clinton administration and was considered highly controversial for her stances on legalizing drugs and distributing contraceptives to school aged children.)

Daisy glared at Burke as he continued in a mock southern drawl, “Do you want to legalize drugs?” And then he paused for effect, “Do you want to hand out condoms to elementary school children?” With that, all of Daisy’s perfect inflection went out the window, “Fuck you, you conservative pig!” she said as she grabbed Burke by the collar of this shirt, forcibly dragged him from the classroom and slammed the door behind them. Our civilian teacher Linden broke up the silence, “Back to work everyone. Now!”

From broadcast announcing we moved onto radio news reading and disc jockey training. Our instructor, Marine Staff Sergeant Rick Sands was a hard ass with a great sense of humor – as many Marines I’ve known over the years are prone to be.

As part of our DJ training, we had to put together radio shows including gathering content to share during breaks between songs, picking out music and then putting it all together into a finished product for air. We had to do this across formats, meaning you had to do a country music show as well as a rock show, pop music show, etc. In order to grade us, we would each be placed into student DJ booths equipped with a radio board, cart machine (similar to 8-track tapes, these are what commercials were recorded onto), CD players, a record player, headphones and, of course, a microphone. Each studio was monitored by Staff Sergeant Sands via a video monitor and audio feed. He could give us directions via a one way intercom. To make it especially fun, all student radio shows were recorded so we could review them that evening.

Staff Sergeant Sands laid out his rules for us very succinctly: 1) If any student were to curse at any time while the microphone is live, they would automatically fail class for the day. 2) We were warned that if we ever forgot and left our microphones on during a broadcast, he would make us regret it and 3) If you faded out the Queen song Bohemian Rhapsody before the actual, true end of the song, you would automatically fail class for the day.

It was stressed to us that if any sound fell below a certain threshold on our Volume Unit (VU) meter, that we should immediately fade it out and move on to the next portion of our show. Bohemiam Rhapsody is tricky because it does this late in the song intentionally. Thankfully, no one took the bait and placed that song in their rotation.

Putting these “shows” on and knowing that you were being monitored by Staff Sergeant Sands was nerve-wracking at best. You had a ton of stuff to keep track of and on top of that, your job was to be entertaining. During a country music show which I had put together, I decided to lighten the mood a little bit, specifically by “sending out a special request to one Staff Sergeant Rick Sands.” The song? Jose Cuervo by Shelly West. As the record played and I turned off my microphone, Staff Sergeant Sands came over the one way intercom with a one word reply, “Nice.”

Some of my other classmates were not as lucky. My Mormon friend Michael Murray at one point got mixed up and messed up his show so badly that he, in full on exasperation, said “Fuck” on his live microphone and auto-failed for the day. Another one of my classmates was doing well enough but left his microphone on. Staff Sergeant Sands made him regret it by coming over the in studio intercom and reading that day’s weather forecast – thus ruining his show.

After getting the hang of it, I found the idea of working as a radio DJ invigorating. I wasn’t very good at it, but why should a little thing like having no talent stop me? Either way, we were mostly through with our radio training and it was on to television news reporting, anchoring and directing.

I have what is commonly referred to as “a face for radio” which is one of the many reasons why I simply didn’t feel comfortable in the television anchor chair during my time at DINFOS. Luckily for me, we cycled through all of the support roles as well including broadcast camera operator, floor director (the person who gives time cues and other messages to on air talent), teleprompter operator (a really easy way to mess up someone’s day is by toying with the order of their copy), mixing board operator, audio controller and overall news director.

My time as news director was marred by the fact that my mixing board operator, a female Marine private first class named Sara Haney, didn’t agree with one of my directions to her and threatened to kill me instead of following through with my request. Eventually, we all made it through each broadcast news role at least once and felt like we may actually be learning something.

Toward the end of our time at DINFOS, all of us in the Navy were required to speak with a shadowy figure known simply as “the detailer.” This is the person empowered by the Bureau of Naval Personnel to assign you to your next duty station. Generally, a group of sailors would get together and all speak with them on the phone in quick succession as to most efficiently use the detailer’s time. The detailer I spoke with recommended for my next duty assigntment that I take a spot on the amphibious assault ship the USS Kearsarge.

As funny as it sounds, you know with this being the Navy and all, I actually wasn’t too excited about the prospect of serving on and living aboard a naval vessel. In a way, I was quite terrified. I consulted with my favorite M.I.T. graduate Steve Phillips to see if he had any advice. In a supportive tone he kept repeating to me, “Well, at least I’m not you.”

I had another call scheduled with the detailer where I needed to either agree to the assignment or request some other option. During my call, I inquired about other options. I was told that the only other slot open to me was a one year rotation as a broadcast journalist on a little known “remote duty station” called Diego Garcia. All I knew (and all I needed to know at the time) was that it land of some sort and not a ship. I decided to take a shot and say yes. Seafaring would have to wait.

Soon after choosing my assignment on Diego Garcia, I joined my fellow classmates at our broadcast journalism graduation ceremony. From that moment forward, we were all informally known as DINFOS Trained Killers, which is pretty much a joke because we don’t kill anything but computer printer ink cartridges.

I had set up to take leave (the military’s version of vacation) with my family in Philadelphia for a few weeks following my time at DINFOS. My flight from Indianapolis was scheduled to depart just three hours after our graduation ceremony. I corralled one of my classmates who had a vehicle (in this case a purple Mazda pick up truck) to take me and my fellow graduate Ed Burke to the airport – I ended up riding in the truck bed with our familiar green sea bags. I had little idea what was in store for me next. Heck, I hadn’t even found Diego Garcia on a map yet by this point. Either way, I was heading out “to the fleet” as a trained journalist and broadcaster. And I couldn’t wait to get to work.

- Scott Kaminski

* - All names have been changed.

The Joys of Boot Camp: Part 2

The lessons they teach you in Navy boot camp are many. How to fold your clothes. How to iron your clothes. How to correctly tie your shoe laces. While it may seem that all of those things are about clothing (and trivial in the grand scheme of things) they are actually about attention to detail. The military needs you to focus on the details because if you don’t, people die.

In addition to the attention to detail, the military runs on order. This is why we march to places in boot camp. The Navy is kind enough to line you up in height order (tallest to shortest) and THEN march you places. As luck would have it, I’m relatively short. Which meant I was always stuck at the back of the line.

The base at Great Lakes, Illinois was divided by a highway with each portion connected by a tunnel. As a very specialized form of torture, every company of recruits had to learn the words to and sing “Anchors Aweigh” each and every time your company was directed to march through that tunnel.

The training aspect of boot camp is intense – as well it should be. This is the military and you are being trained to prepare for, live through and win a war. And with this being the Navy, much of the focus involves water and shipboard life. Early in boot camp, we were all made to jump 20 feet into a pool of water and then taught how to turn our uniforms into flotation devices. (Pro tip: It helps when the uniform pants they issue you are a pretty sweet set of bell bottom dungarees.)

Life in boot camp is rigid. And when you mess up there is always someone there, literally in your face, to tell you about it. The simple fact is that you cannot and should never take it personally, because it’s not. You joined the military, not the ballet.

The room or “compartment” you live in with your fellow 80 recruits features a large common restroom (that you will have fun cleaning) with no doors on the stalls and is sparsely furnished with simple bunk beds or “racks” and open lockers. As your clothes are meant to be folded in a very specific way, this makes it easier for them to be inspected. If even the simplest item is astray or out of place, you’re going to pay for it.

The most common form of punishment in the military is simple, good old fashioned exercise. It serves a dual purpose though as it helps get you into shape and it is, well, punishing. In the Navy, this is often called “cycling.”

Our company commanders would commonly call us all to attention. We would all have to rush to the end of our bunks and stand straight and rigid with our arms firmly at our sides at attention. From there our lead company commander, Boatswain Mate First Class Bill Chester, would yell, “Abandon ship!!!” and we would each run and pick up one end of the metal bunk beds then move them toward the outer walls. This would allow us more room to be cycled and/or otherwise generally punished. If our offenses were especially heinous we would sometimes be cycled to the point of “making it rain,” a rather disgusting practice of having everyone exercise and sweat to the point when condensation was literally dripping from the ceiling.

During one particularly fun, post-inspection incident the members of my company were called out for failing to do one very specific thing: tightly tie our shoe laces. Amongst all of the uniform and clothing items we were issued was a simple pair of black dress shoes. These were to be kept on top of our lockers with the laces run through the eyelets in a specified pattern and very tightly tied. Apparently, upon closer inspection, some of us had failed to follow the prescribed steps and needed to relearn how things should be done.

We were all brought to attention and Petty Officer Chester growled what seemed like his favorite phrase, “Abandon ship!” and we quickly moved the racks back. From there, Petty Officer Green, our female, slightly junior (but no less scary) company commander, took over. “I want every one of you to go and grab your dress shoes and place them four feet in front of you on the floor. Do it now!” In between following the order, I caught confused glances from some of my fellow recruits, essentially asking, “What the hell is about to happen here?”

Petty Officer Green walked up and down the compartment to ensure every recruit had complied and now had their dress shoes at the requested spot on the floor. “Now here’s what we’re going to do. You are all going to get in the push-up position and while in that position you will untie and correctly retie your dress shoes in the manner in which we have asked. And don’t even think of hitting the floor. Do you understand?” In between quickly exchanged looks of panic, we responded in unison, “Yes, ma’am!”

“Into the push-up position and untying and retying those shoes correctly, now!” barked Petty Officer Green. We all quickly got into a plank position, like we were about to do a push-up, with our arms firmly locked and holding us off the ground. Green began pacing back and forth among the recruits, shouting whatever she thought would motivate us to complete this task quickly and efficiently. “It may hurt, but you will get this right.” “We will not have this issue on any future inspection, will we recruits?” From our strained positions, jostling and balancing ourselves on one arm as we untied or retied the shoes with the other, we all weakly responded, “No, ma’am.”

And then we were all slightly taken aback, “I want these laces as tight as you want your girlfriends back home!” she barked. Petty Officer Green quickly bent down to inspect the retied laces of one unfortunate recruit, sticking her finger through the lowest portion of the tied lace. “Look at how loose those laces are. You know what your girlfriend is doing while you’re here, Seaman Recruit Buell? She’s fucking everyone in town! Undo and retie those laces tight right now!” she screamed. Being close to Buell, I could almost see him start to well up and cry but he did as she asked. Green and Chester each went from recruit to recruit reviewing how we had retied our laces, allowing us to stand again if our laces passed their inspection.

I remember one day in particular, a Saturday, where we as a company simply couldn’t get things right. Someone had messed up in some way and we were made to pay for it. We formed up and marched to breakfast. Along the way, we were instructed that our time in the galley eating would be limited. Specifically, the members of our company would have a whole :30 seconds to eat from the time our last recruit exited the food line.

Being relatively short (and near the end of that line) I had approximately :40 seconds to jam a few waffles down my throat, down a glass of milk and march back to our compartment where we were cycled for a full three hours. Chester paced up and down the compartment, shouting, “If we need to, I could do this all day!”

My friend and fellow recruit Bill Faust was a rarity. He was the only person I ever witnessed who seemed to revel in this form of torture. He was legitimately excited whenever cycling started. In a way, his enthusiasm helped the rest of us get through it all.

After our first round of cycling that day we were marched to lunch. We ate and during the march back, another recruit messed up (by dropping the notebook each of us carried, folded in our rear pockets out onto the street). Again, we were cycled for another two hours upon our return to the compartment and sat for an educational session on the military chain of command – from the lowliest recruit all the way up to the commander-in-chief. We went to dinner and then were cycled again for a full hour upon our return.

By this point, we were approaching our fifth week, generally known as service week. For a seven day period, all recruits are sent work at various places around the base. This could mean anything from mowing lawns and other yard work to the lowliest and most hated of all duties – working in the galley preparing food, washing dishes or other cleaning. Work assignments were picked by our company commanders who had been watching and evaluating us all of this time. Apparently, I didn’t impress them very much because I was assigned to work in the galley.

And then, as luck would have it, I contracted pink eye. Being highly contagious, pink eye meant that I shouldn’t be working anywhere near food. I was reassigned to an office role in the standards and enforcement division. This was the group of petty officers who carried out all of the base inspections and trained new company commanders. I was to do anything they instructed me to do.

When I first arrived, I was personally inspected to ensure that my uniform, boots and knowledge of my general orders were up to standards. Thankfully, I passed. Most of the week was spent making coffee and answering the phones during normal business hours and then cleaning the offices (sweeping and buffing floors) after hours.

My third day on the job I was given a task for which I was particularly well suited. A chief petty officer pulled me and another recruit aside. He was training a group of new company commanders and needed recruits to role play. We were given two scenarios to pick from: a recruit who was painfully homesick and a recruit who thought that they could do a better job running the company than the company commander. For the latter, they needed someone who could really get under someone’s skin. Appropriately enough, the chief picked me. “You don’t need to worry about anything you say in that room. Your intent is to agitate the petty officer who you’ll be role playing with. Again, you can say or do anything that comes to mind as he’ll need to deal with situations like this if he’s to be an effective company commander. I’ll have your back no matter what,” the chief instructed.

The other recruit and I followed the chief into the training room. It had been set up with series of racks and lockers as well as a few tables and chairs so the company commanders in training could learn everything they needed to there before taking command of an actual company. The chief began with the other recruit’s role playing session first and picked a female trainee to work with him. Everything went well for both the recruit and the company commander in training. The chief went over a few other ways in which the situation of dealing with a homesick recruit could have been handled. Now it was my turn. The chief selected a male trainee, a second class petty officer to work with me and instructed me to address him as Petty Officer Smith.

“Petty Officer Smith, can I talk to you for a moment?” I started off simply enough. The trainee smiled, “Sure. What can I help you with?” I paused. “Well, I don’t think you really have any idea what the fuck you’re doing here.” His smile vanished. “I mean how are we supposed to take the way you’re trying to train us seriously?” I continued.

The trainee searched for a response. “How would you do things differently?” he asked me. Even more confident, I responded, “Well, the first thing I would do is replace you with someone who has a clue about what they’re doing.” There was a table between us and the trainee lunged over it to grab me. His fellow trainees held him back and the chief spoke up. “Well, Petty Officer Smith, I think we have a little bit more training and practicing to do,” he then pulled a few dollars from his pocket, “Kaminski, go get yourself something to drink from the vending machine. I think you’ve earned it.” I took his cash and exited the room.

As a company, our days were filled with a wide variety of activities. We had classroom time where we were all made to take copious notes on everything from naval history to firefighting. Many of us learned early on that my friend Bill, an incredibly talented artist, took not only the best notes but also the most entertaining ones – accented with comically brilliant, cartoon drawings to illustrate every point.

From there, we would put everything into action: learning hands on firefighting, firearms training, use of a gas mask (yes, they do really gas you and you would be surprised how much mucous your nostrils actually contain… because it will all come out).

One night toward the end of boot camp, I got a call to report to the petty officer standing duty in our building. The recruit on guard duty in our compartment (who just happened to be my friend Bill) escorted me. The petty officer said I had received a box which he needed me to open.

My grandparents, always interested in feeding me way, way too much, had actually sent me five boxes of different types of Tastykakes. The petty officer informed me that in order for me to take them back to the compartment with me, I would have to individually unwrap each one. I did as instructed and shared every single one of them with my company upon our return.

Soon enough the weeks remaining at boot camp turned to days and then graduation day. We all donned our navy blue dress uniforms (think of the uniform the kid wears on a box of Cracker Jack) and marched off to our graduation. Our ceremony was the last for that year to he held outside. Given the fact that we could all see our breath, it would have been nice to see the inside of the gym as opposed to marching by it one last time.

After graduation, we were all given a weekend to do as we pleased in Chicago or elsewhere (ah, the taste of freedom) and orders to our next duty station. For some people, this meant going directly to the fleet or other bases. For others, it meant going off to more schooling. For me, as I found out that my orders had been slightly messed up, I went off to a place called the Transient Personnel Department (TPD).

TPD is essentially a way station of sorts for people in the military coming and going. That could be people whose orders have changed, people getting out of the military and/or people on legal hold, accused of minor crimes or other offenses. For that very reason, they held daily, random drug tests. At roll call every morning they would call a random number. If that happened to be the last number of your social security number then you were required to pee in a cup before heading off to any assigned work detail. As luck would have it, my number was literally called every single one of the five days I spent there.

Soon I got the call telling me that the issue concerning my orders had been remedied. I was scheduled to leave the following evening by train from Chicago to Indianapolis, IN. From there I would take a cab to Fort Benjamin Harrison where I would attend the Defense Information School (DINFOS) to become a print and broadcast journalist.

- Scott Kaminski

* - All names have been changed.

The Joys of Boot Camp: Part 1

Many people have a certain image in their mind of what exactly boot camp or, in the case of the U.S. Navy, what is referred to as “recruit training” is like. Whether some glamorized version found in movies or something they’ve seen in documentaries, the truth lies somewhere in between. Then again, I can only really speak my experience so you’re welcome to believe whatever you’d like.

From the processing center in Baltimore, MD, a group of us boarded a bus to the airport and flew to O’Hare International Airport. Once in the terminal, we got our first taste of boot camp – a U.S. Navy petty officer who was not happy about drawing the late night duty and all too happy about yelling and then lining us up so we could board the bus which would take us to Recruit Training Center Great Lakes, Illinois.

Great Lakes or “Great Mistakes” as it’s commonly called is now the Navy’s only training base for recruits. A large base with a highway running through the middle of it (we’ll get to that later), its only purpose is to churn out young sailors to serve in the fleet. Before that happens though, you need to be scared, molded and shaped into being a sailor.

After filing out of the bus, we were walked as a group into one of the larger buildings on base to start our boot camp experience. We were told to line up alphabetically and then brought into a room and seated at school style desks to fill out more forms. The petty officer in charge of this station clearly loved seeing new recruits.

“I want every recruit in this room from Kentucky, Virginia, West Virginia, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee and Georgia to stand up and count off to 32!” he barked. A large portion of our 80 recruits stood up and promptly counted off as ordered. The petty officer smirked, “You know what you have there, gentlemen? That’s a full set of teeth standing right there.”

He glanced at one particularly tall and largely built recruit who was now standing amongst the group of recruits. “Goddamn! You’re a corn fed motherfucker, aren’t you?” The recruit, a Virginian named Watts, responded in a deliberate, slow drawl. “Yes, sir I am.” The petty officer smiled and instructed all of the still standing recruits to be seated. They complied.

A female lieutenant commander came into the room and we were all snapped to attention for the first time. “At ease,” she said and we were all instructed to sit down. She casually began going through each recruit by last name and conversing with many of them as we all sat in awe of our first officer. She came to me.

“Kaminski.” I stood up and quickly responded, “Yes, ma’am.” She looked me up and down, “Are you aware we have a baseball park named after you in town?” (She was referring to the similar sounding home of the Chicago White Sox, Comiskey Park.)

“Yes, ma’am,” I nervously responded. “Well, I’m not much a baseball fan anyway,” she said offhandedly. “Go ahead and take your seat.”

From this room, we were sent to the supply outfitting station. In a single file line, we told members of the supply depot our names. As we had all been measured for uniforms in Baltimore, each man received a pre-made stack of uniforms, boots (or “boondockers” as they prefer to call them) and toiletries, sheets, a wool blanket and was sent to stand in front of an empty cardboard box. At that point, each recruit was ordered to remove each part of their civilian clothing – everything from shirt, pants and shoes down to even their underwear – and place in the box in front of them. From the pile of newly issued clothes you were to put on a fresh pair of underwear and navy blue sweatshirt and sweat pants set emblazoned with a large white “N” for Navy.

Each recruit sealed their cardboard box containing the last shreds of their civilian life and wrote their mailing address on it to be shipped home. Years after this moment, my mother recounted how receiving this box from Great Lakes, Illinois seemed odd and unexpected to her. Not knowing the contents, she immediately opened it to find the clothes I had been wearing when I left home earlier that week. She got choked up when she saw it, even though she had been though the same experience with my brother just about three years before.

Once we were all neatly uniformed into our sweat suits, we were marched to a temporary sleeping compartment for the night, told to handle our business in the bathrooms and get to sleep. Whether we liked it or not, it was past “lights out,” a time when the military is kind enough to turn off the lights for you because they don’t trust you to get enough sleep on your own.

The next morning came early. Make that very early. And in a very Hollywood-like, stereotypical fashion. We were all awoken by a Navy company commander (the Navy’s version of a drill sergeant) waking us up by banging a nightstick around the inside rim of a metal trashcan. It was very loud and, well, very motivating.

We were introduced to our company commanders, Boatswain Mate First Class Bill Chester and Electronics Technician Second Class Erin Green. Each wore distinctive red ropes attached to their uniforms where their left shoulder and shirt sleeve met, denoting that they had each successfully shown that they were ready to train recruits.

Chester, the senior company commander, was obviously a man who had spent a lot of time at sea. His face seemed to be lined and weathered by the salt air – and he had an attitude and booming voice to match. Green, was more junior and, to our surprise, a woman. Either way, both were experienced enlisted sailors tasked with preparing us to join the fleet.

As you could imagine, our first full day at boot camp was a busy one. One of our first stops was to the barbershop. Being a barber in the military has to be one the cushiest gigs in the known world. There are no special requests and no complaints. You don’t even have to wield a pair of scissors – just mow scalp after scalp with an electric trimmer.

I can tell you from experience that the first time you lose all of your hair, it’s odd. Like a boy discovering that the thing between their legs has sensitivity, you can’t keep your hands off of it. The company commanders know this because they are the ones constantly yelling at you things like, “Quit touching your damn head, Kaminski!”

After receiving our fashionable, new haircuts, our group was led to a bank of phones and instructed to call home as this would be our only opportunity to tell our family members we had safely arrived until graduation. I called home, but apparently my mother was out (most likely putting together plans for what to do with a recently vacated room in our house). We were instructed that if we did not get through to someone, we would be given one other opportunity later on to reach out to someone and let them know we were still alive.

One of people I immediately become close with in my company was a fellow recruit named Bill Faust. He looked kind of like a human version of Mister Peabody from the Rocky & Bullwinkle Show. His father was actually an Army colonel, but Bill chose to enlist in the Navy instead.

Bill was an incredibly talented artist, able to sketch or draw anything in an instant, with his own style and unique sense of humor. I think what I liked about Bill the most was his childlike wonder at everything. People would ask him questions and he would respond in the sweeping, varying tones of someone who was just discovering something for the first time. He was also exactly the opposite of anyone you would think to see in the military.

Later on my second day, I was permitted to make another call to home or another family member to let them know I had arrived safely. Instead of my calling my familial home, I called my father at work. The owner of a small janitorial supply business, I was confident he would be there. The dial tone rang through and I finally heard his familiar voice. “Dad, it’s Scott.” I stammered. “How are you son?” he asked sympathetically. “I don’t think I’m gonna like it here,” I whispered cautiously into the receiver to him. He laughed. “You’ll be fine, son,” he said reassuringly. I was given a sign to wrap up the call. “I have to go. I’ll call you when I can. Love you, Dad,” and then I hung up.

As I was about to learn, I hadn’t seen anything yet.

- Scott Kaminski

* - All names have been changed.

I Miss the Old Man

Losing one or both of your parents, unless you outright hated them for one reason or another, sucks. I was 23 years old when my father passed away. And here I am at 36 years old, soon to have a child of my own, missing my Dad.

Born in September 1948, my father grew up in Northeast Philadelphia in a typical family home with my grandparents and his younger brother, my Uncle Charlie. He was raised Catholic but through his childhood years lost his faith in God. I remember asking him when I was a teenager what prompted the change. Ever the source of reason and logic, his answer was simple: “I saw kids afflicted with and dying of cancer. To me, no benevolent god could ever allow that to occur.”

He excelled in school, in some cases to the dismay of his teachers. He refused to carry textbooks or notebooks to class – any class. Instead, he would arrive each period and unfold a single sheet of paper (which he would use for all of his classes that day) on which he took notes. Despite his aversion to books and other school-related baggage, he did well and earned mostly A’s and B’s in all of his courses.

Having always been a tinkerer of sorts throughout his formative years (building model cars, planes and the like; constructing and wiring his own HO train platform; reconstructing and repairing his 1949 Zenith radio), he began to show an interest in more grown-up forms of transportation – primarily cars.

During his teens, he had begun working at a service station. He understood cars. They made sense to him and he was a natural at understanding what made them run, how they were taken apart and – somewhat more importantly – how they were properly put back together again.

During his senior year of high school, my father inadvertently influenced his high school administration to change one of their policies. At the beginning of the year, he discovered that he could schedule his classes in such a way that the last period of each school day would be a study hall. Instead of attending these study hall periods, he would simply get in his car and drive home or head to work. At the end of the year, he was called to the principal’s office and informed that he would have to make up the time over the summer in order to get his diploma. “Are you seriously going to make me come in over the summer for study hall? You’re kidding, right?” The principal relented and instead changed the policy.

After high school, he attended automotive technical school while keeping up shifts at the service station. After graduation, my grandparents agreed to take out a loan so my father could open his own service station. After a few years, he was doing well enough that he repaid the loan and opened up a second service station.

He specialized in Volkswagen repairs. According to my grandfather, my father could have a VW Beetle motor removed, replaced and running again in about an hour. He also acquired a number of cars: a 1939 Pontiac, a 1955 Chevy, a 1963 Cadillac Convertible and many more. On the day I was born, my father drove my mother to the hospital through a foot of snow in his tow truck.

I, of course, only knew him after many of these mechanical escapades. But from the time I was a child, I knew my father knew how to handle himself around tools. The man could pretty much fix anything.

I remember one Sunday afternoon when I was around 10 years old that my mother had gone out shopping. My father was walking in our attic and slipped on a beam. My brother and I heard a racket of sorts and looked up at our dining room ceiling to see his leg dangling down through a newly made hole. My father had the ceiling patched, repaired and was vacuuming up debris by the time my mother returned later that afternoon.

During my late teens, my father was diagnosed with malignant melanoma or, as normal people call it, skin cancer. He had surgery to take care of it and was doing well – eventually going from three-month check ups to six-month check ups and so on.

Years later, after I returned home from my time in the military, my father went with me to help me purchase my first car. I took him from lot to lot on endless Saturday mornings looking for just the right car – no matter what the weather was.

When I got in driver’s seat of the 1987 Chevrolet Caprice Classic I eventually bought, I turned the key, but the car didn’t start. My father smiled and suggested that I pump the gas once or twice as the car was most likely carbureted instead of fuel injected (it was). 

Later that year, my father noticed that he just couldn’t shake a persistent cough. When he did go to get things checked out, the doctors discovered that cancer had again come back to his body. And this time around, it was spreading.

My father was quickly put on a course of chemotherapy and radiation. He went from having a strong, robust build to growing somewhat smaller and constantly weaker. Things really got bad in April 1999. That was the first time he went for an extended stay at the hospital.

As much as I hate to say it, I really don’t remember much about the time when he was really sick with a few limited exceptions. Two days before my father died, my mother called me from her vigil at the hospital. She had obviously been crying.

“The hospital says the only way your father can be brought home is if we have a ramp for his wheelchair,” she said over the phone, through choked up tears. “I need you to build something.”

Being the tinkerer that my father was, there were ample supplies to work with. In the sweltering, July summer heat, I cobbled together a very poor representation of what, if someone looked at it from the correct angle, one could discern was some sort of ramp over the steps leading to our front door. Sturdy? Yes. Up to code? Most definitely not.

I called my father’s hospital room to let my mother know that a ramp had been built. My father came home the next day.

As the ambulance pulled up, the EMTs surveyed my work. And then, being the type of kind, compassionate people who should be EMTs, they promptly swept aside my makeshift ramp and carried my father in his wheelchair up the small flight of steps to make it into our home.

Unable to breathe very well due to a tumor which had developed ever closer to his windpipe, my father slept sitting up in a reclining chair in our living room. The night was rough for him as he drifted in and out of consciousness, sometimes muttering random, dreamlike responses to unasked questions.

Early the next afternoon, the chaplain from the hospice arrived to administer last rites. My mother, brother and I surrounded my father in his chair and placed our hands on him, primarily because that’s what we felt like we should do at the time.

While my Dad wasn’t a religious man, he took his last breath and peacefully died while the chaplain was reciting The Lord’s Prayer. I’m not going to read too much into that. Why? Because I am my father’s son.

My father was capable of fixing many things during his nearly 51 years of life. Sadly, cancer was not to be one of them.

On the day my father passed away, I just happened to be wearing a Superman t-shirt. I only mention this because that moment was perhaps the most helpless that I’ve ever felt in my entire life.

Which brings us back to today. While I could spend time cursing the cancer which took my father from me and everyone else who populated his life, that would be doing a disservice to my Dad and his memory. Cancer simply marked the end of his life, it didn’t define the whole course of his existence. My task now is twofold: to use the lessons my father gave me and to pass those down to my unborn son. Oh, and also to never feel that helpless again (whether I’m wearing a Superman t-shirt or not).

- Scott Kaminski

Poke Me, Prod Me, Process Me

Early in the morning on August 22, 1994, I was scheduled to depart to join the Navy. In addition to my mother and father (my brother was still away doing his own stint in the military), three of my friends from high school – Ben, Mike and Sid – were at my house to see me off. To capture the moment, my mother and father had even borrowed a VHS video camera from a friend of the family (we could never afford such a luxury on our own).

At 5 a.m. that morning, my Navy recruiter Tom arrived to pick me up. My friends all wished me luck and told me I would be just fine. I suppose I looked like I needed that sort of encouragement at the time. In fact, the look on my face could probably be read simply as, “Oh my god, what did I actually get myself into here?”

My parents both hugged me and again re-assured me that I would be okay. I think my mother cried a bit at seeing her youngest son head off the join the Navy. Since I’m not 100% sure that she did, let’s just imagine she did and move on.

We set off to go to Penndel, PA first to pick up another recruit who was joining us. From there, we were going to drive to a recruit processing center in Baltimore, MD. There was one closer to my home right in Philadelphia, but I was sent here because I was, shall we say, a little on the chubby side. I guess the Baltimore office was a little more forgiving for someone with a diet and exercise plan as poor as mine. And besides, I was going to be doing a lot of push-ups and sit-ups in a day or two anyway, so what did it really matter?

Passing by Penndel’s Airplane Restaurant in the dark of the early morning, we picked up Eddie, the other recruit, and headed south to Baltimore.

It was at this Baltimore facility where I learned firsthand the term “hurry up and wait.” The processing center was really just a series of stations you were sent to in order for you to be checked out, checked in, poked, prodded, questioned and sent on your way to the next station. The hurry part was that you had to be at your next station as soon as they were ready for you. The wait part came because people obviously have different issues and speeds at which they work. Either way, it was going to be a long day.

One of the most embarrassing parts of the day for me was when the small group of recruits I was going from station to station were asked to strip down to our underwear (boxers for me… not a tighty whities fan) in order to measured for our individual height and weight. The military has a preset table of the minimum and maximum weight you should be for your given height. Having worked with the recruiters on this before, I knew that I did not fit within these guidelines – actually, I wasn’t even close. At 5’8” in height, the maximum weight the military expected me to be at the time was 176 lbs. It’s possible that I hadn’t weighed 176 lbs. since I was in the 6^th grade. At the time, I weighed 223 lbs.

The man at this station tasked with recording the height and weight of recruits worked fast and I was the last in the group to step on the scale. Recruits would hop on and off the scale quickly as he worked at an almost auctioneer-style pace, “Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.” Until he got to me: “Whoa! Fat boy!” Not fitting within the guidelines, he instead needed to measure my neck and waist to compute my body fat percentage. Having practiced this exercise with the recruiters (yes, that can be part of their job), I knew how to position my neck and suck in my gut for the best reading. I barely passed, but they would let me proceed.

From there, it was on to see the doctor. Most doctor visits are pretty standard. Everyone expects to get their blood pressure checked, have the doctor peer into your ears and then make you say “Ahhhhhh” when attacked with a wooden tongue depressor. This visit included two extra special checks. First, the doctor cupped my genitals and made me cough (always a good time). And then, made me lean over the table and spread my cheeks (not normally my expectation of a good time). Thankfully, this station was quick and relatively painless. To this day, I still wonder how he would have ever responded if someone asked him, “So, how was your day?”

The rest of the afternoon included lunch, more fun stations and a question and answer session with a Navy personnel specialist. “Do you squeak?” she asked me. “What?” I replied. “Do you squeak?” she repeated, as though it were the most normal question one person could ask another.

“What do you mean?” I asked quizzically. “Well, it’s just that every other recruit I’ve dealt with today has been in trouble with the law, had a drug problem, etc. You’re an Eagle Scout who doesn’t ever seem to have been in trouble. You’re clean,” she said. “Well, I guess I am. Or I just haven’t been caught yet.” “Good answer. And I recommend you don’t get caught. You can go off to wait for the bus now. You’re done.”

From there, I joined the other recruits to wait for the bus to take us to the Baltimore airport for our flight to Chicago and then on to boot camp. It felt odd to be traveling with no luggage. And, as I was soon to find out, a full head of hair.

- Scott Kaminski

* - All names have been changed.

So You Want to be a Sailor?

I had signed up to join to Navy during my junior year of high school. My father, ever the voice of reason, had given me an ultimatum of sorts: I was allowed to have the summer after I graduated high school off, but by that fall I had three choices. 

1) Start going to college full-time.
2) Be working full-time somewhere.
3) Join the military.

My grades in high school were decidedly average and I had honestly not even really looked into the prospect of higher learning opportunities. Also, my parents didn't have the means to support or help me in any way. At the time, college just didn't seem right for me.

Even though it wasn't the right time for college, it CERTAINLY wasn't time for me to up and join the workforce either. My mother had a high school education and my father had gone to automotive technical school but eventually opened his own janitorial business and then a janitorial supply company. I had no interest in joining the family business, or the civilian workplace right away.

While my father had never served in the military on account of a knee injury sustained during a Boy Scout camping trip, both of my grandfathers had served during World War II. And my only, older brother had signed up right out of high school and was close to finishing up his four year tour.

For me, the Navy held a tremendous amount of allure. Not only would I have the opportunity to honor my grandfathers and their service, but I could also travel the world on the government's dime, save a little money for college and hopefully make my family proud.

All I had do now was make it through the physical and mental screening processes and boot camp (you know, that place where they make you "drop and give them 20"). Little did I know what kind of fun was in store for me there.

- Scott Kaminski