Bye Blogger!

I decided to switch blogging platforms so i can blog on-the-go with my iphone. I will no longer be blogging from http://mik3sb7og.blogspot.com/. The new site is http://mik3sblog.wordpress.com.

See you there! Don't forget to bookmark!

Wk 7 is Done - Happy 4th of July!

Week 7 was all MCMAP (Marine Corps Martial Arts Program). One word comes to mind when trying to describe MCMAP...OUCH!
The program was established in 1999. The Marines had a program before MCMAP (the name escapes me at the moment) but it was basically a program that taught how to disable the enemy in a fight. Marines soon learned that if fighters were high on pcp or lsd or other drugs a broken limb would not stop their attack. MCMAP was introduced to kill the enemy.
There's 5 levels, tan, grey, green, brown, and black. The past week we covered basics for the tan belt. We test next week. The first lesson we learned was body hardening, that was real fun (can you hear my sarcasm?). Body hardening consisted of pairing up with a "buddy" that you would share blows with in various parts of your body over and over and over again. Forearms, back of the arms, outer and inner thigh, stomach and hands. The worst for me was the blows to my thighs. Each kick to the same spot made my leg want to buckle and fall to the ground but you had to keep standing and return the favor to your buddy. The only major bruise/welt i had was on my left thigh. After all that body hardening we proceeded to some body aching workouts. Nobody felt like moving much less running around with weights and doing pushups but we complained and moaned and pushed through it. The rest of the week we learned puches, kicks, unarmed manipulations (like armbars), a few body throws, chokes, and how to counter each one. Our bodies were sore all week, walking was laborous. But that week is finally behind us thankfully!

One of my favorite sayings our Staff Sergeant told us when we were complaining was, "they sell cans of suck-it-up at the exchange, go pick some up after this!"

We're finally headed for week 8! All the hard stuff is behind us and now we're closing up our time here. I think this will be my last blog about CREST! Hope you enjoyed it as much as i did!


The Gas Chamber

Here I am getting out of the gas chamber.

Here we are receiving instruction before a Sunday morning service from RP1 Dizon, our advisor. I'm in the front next to my platoon sergeant.

Chaps asked me to help with distributing the elements during communion. I didn't find otu until later that he's an A/G man as well!

Ending Week 6...from the Field

Here we are ending week 6. I haven't been able to write in a while because we've been out in the field or i've been too busy or tired to make it over to the wifi area to get online. Things have been very fast paced lately and free time is scarce!

We just came back from the field, we were there Monday-Thursday. We learned a whole lot while we were there! First we marched with full packs probably 3 miles to our camp site all tired, sweaty and panting. After we got there we set up our two-man tents and then proceeded to our first training which was throwing hand grenades. That was pretty fun, but our training grenades didn't pack a punch you were expecting, i guess thats a good thing and a safe one. After that we did some Land Navigation. Thats a nice way to say that we all got lost with compasses out in the woods. We all had maps and points to get to but my group never found our marks, but it was cool being out there wandering in the woods. The next couple of days we worked on patroling, setting up ambushes, and attacks. What made it better is that we were given blanks to fire off at each other during our training simulations! What didn't make sense was that we were in the woods in our desert cammies, instead of our woodland cammies, but it was all fun and games either way.

I never took baths with baby wipes before until I got to the field. The whole time we were there we never had running water to shower in, sometimes in the field you won't be able to shower or change for days. It wasn't fun but it was tolerable knowing everyone else was in the same boat. What was kinda hard was shaving at 0500 in the morning with no daylight! We did our best either way and tried to make the best of it.

Yesterday we took our HMMWV course which was driving 4 different lanes with some obstacles and then driving 5 miles around the base. It was really fun driving the HMMWV (High mobility Multi Wheeled Vehicle...incase you were wondering), we then learned we were getting just permits. To complete our license we have to log 250 more miles!

I finally got some pictures on my hands, here's a few...

Here i am on patrol...

Here's us messing around waiting for the next period of instruction.

Here's my platoon in the mud pit after the obstacle course! we were covered head to toe in that mud! we had to crawl on our bellies through it first though at the end of the course without getting our rifles muddy!

Killing the "Paper Taliban"

The past Friday to Friday we've been at the range shooting. I can't remember how many rounds we shot in all it had to be somehwere in the range of 200 rounds. I didn't think shooting could get tiring but it does! It could've been because we had to wake up at 3am everyday and we were outside in the heat all day. All we ate were MRE's all week except for a few times when we made it back to our barracks in time to get to the chow hall to have a hot meal. It was tough b/c of our schedule we were up at 3 and then we had to meet outside in the dark together around 4 - 430 and that was our "breakfast" time, who eats that early? I certainly couldn't, especially a heavy MRE. I usually had a piece of fruit and another light snack from the MRE's like the bread and cheese or a fig bar or cookie. Its a treat when you get peanut M&M's or a fruit and nut mix in your MRE, it provides precious energy for the long day ahead when you're crashing and you need a jolt of energy. What kept most of us up through the day were the ol sunflower seeds! I'm a new fan of jalapeno salsa flavored seeds.
One thing we did like about being away from our base camp was our barracks had air condition! back at our usual barracks the a/c is broke and we literally sweat anytime we're in there, especially with 50 other guys!
As for my shooting I did pretty good! we shot from 200 yards, and 300 yards the first couple of days. Then we had a day of class to help us refine our technique and then we moved to rapid fire and learned where to hit a guy to stop him dead in his tracks. We also practiced on moving targets. We didn't do any qualifications, it was mostly for familiarization. It was good training.
One of the toughest parts of the entire training was operating the targets. The targets themselves were huge, probably 5ft x 6ft that were tied on to some wooden posts on a metal railing system that fit two targets. when one target was up the other was down, which were operated by pure Navy muscle! We literally had to pull them up when they were shooting and then pull them down to score the hits and show the shooters where they hit. We all became very familiar with the sound of rounds flying past over our heads breaking the speed of sound and cracking through the paper...it was beautiful music! We were all protected by a big burm and a concrete wall and concrete overhead, incase you were wondering. It was kinda scary at first but if you did what you were told and obeyed all the rules you wouldn't get hurt. We were told stories of guys who were messing around and got injured. One put his hand up over the edge and got his hand shot off! dummy!
As for the Paper Taliban...dead.

Mmmm....Food!

If you were wondering how I've been eating out here, here's a picture.

Its definately better than Navy chow! So far my favorite dinner has been fried chicken! Tonight i couldn't resist the pecan pie, it was really good! I usually don't eat this much...ever! but here we do so much we burn alot of calories and you're always ready for the next meal. My body is officially in a messed up routine. When I was up at 3:30 this morning my stomach was hurting because I was so hungry! We have breakfast promptly at 5am everyday, except sat and sun. I thought I ate alot before i saw one of my guys get 2 trays of food for himself! One Saturday during brunch he had breakfast, which was cereal and eggs, bacon, potatoes...THEN he got two hotdogs and some fries! He's not even fat, he's more fit than I am! I'm sure his pigging out days are numbered!

Week 2

Gas! Gas! Gas!

The highlight from this week was definitely the day we went to the gas chamber! I wasn't looking forward to it but i was also just as much ready to get it over with. I didn't sweat it b/c i knew what to expect out of my experience from boot camp. This time it was definitely more entertaining! We all had to line up with our masks on outside and march into the gas chamber one day this week. Above the doors read a sign that said, "Even the brave cry here." Yay! I can't wait!
Anyway, we all marched in with our masks on then after we were all in we all realized our masks were in good working condition b/c we could all breath easy with no problems, but that was only the beginning our our "exercise." After that we were told to "break the seal," meaning the seal our masks had around our face to let in the gas...and so the suffering begins! I took a few breaths and immediately started chocking and coughing and my eyes burned and started watering. We all had to keep the seal open with our fingers until they came around and checked every body's broken seal. As each second passed I couldn't wait to close it and clear my mask and breath regular air again! It was horrible! But apparently we were all doing much better than this other guy about 4 guys away from me! In his struggle he panicked and threw off his mask and sprinted across the small room for the door! One of the instructors yelled, "we got a runner!" He then slammed hard against the locked door and the next thing i knew he was on his hands and knees with his face in his hands trying desperately to breathe! It was hilarious! seconds later he was picked up and dragged outside. After the rest of us composed ourselves and completed the rest of our "exercise" we all marched happily outside to air out. The guy who ran out found himself at the back of the line to do it all over again.
Many people said they felt like running, i guess its a natural impulse when you can't breathe properly in that gas but everybody knew you'd most likely be doing it again if you left. One of my friends said it barely irritated his eyes the whole time and could breath just fine! I wish I had his lungs and tolerance! That definitely wasn't a fun day for me!

Week 1 continued...

I failed to mention a story that i had to write about! If you don't like gross stuff please navigate away from this page immediately...consider yourself warned!

We were on one of our conditioning runs one day last week and we went through the woods. it was a company run, around 300 people running in formation broken down by battalions. I'm in 2nd Battalion and we were running behind 3rd Battalion. As a squad leader i was running in the front row of 2nd Battalion and we were about 20 feet away from 3rd Battalion's stragglers. Anyway, we were making our way through the woods and i started to smell sewage! It was really gross, i couldn't tell if it was a skunk or maybe we were passing by some porter-potties we couldn't see through the woods. After about another quarter of a mile the horrible stench didn't go away! it was really gross! and when you're running hard you can't help but take deep breaths as you run! When running with alot of people you do get the occasional cloud of fart that you pass through but that usually goes away after a few seconds...but this stench stayed with us and the guys at my side were just as grossed out! Then i started scanning the guys in front of us and i noticed some brown stuff on one of these guys' legs! so i followed up his leg and sure enough this guy pooped his pants and was running like it was nothing! SO GROSS! ...and INHUMANE! I pointed it out to the other guys and we were all disgusted and finally one of our advisors got him pulled from the ranks and got him to the rear of the everybody else so we didn't have to smell him anymore! It was so gross. He is now called Mr. Poopy Pants.