(This blog is a repost from an old Travel Blog)

This is a solo trip…it’s my deployment to the desert. Jeremy went the same time as I did, but to a different location. I left on Jan 13, 2006 and got back May 16, 2006…roughly 4 months. My deployment location was a base in Qatar called Al Udeid. We left from Hill (UT) and had to go to Nellis AFB in Vegas to catch our plane. It’s just a normal plane with flight attendants and everything, but it’s chartered by the military so there was only us on the plane…well around 150 of us. We flew out over the US and stopped in Bangor Maine to refuel. We got to Bangor at around 10 pm (local). They wouldn’t let us go outside and there wasn’t anything in the terminal…it’s just a tiny little airport. We were pretty bored to say the least! We finally left around midnight and headed over the Atlantic. I slept most the way and woke up just before we landed in Shannon, Ireland. The Shannon airport was VERY hospitable! We landed around 9 am (local) but they opened the bar and shops for us, and they had a caged off area outside so we could smoke! That was a relief! We were there for about an hour…enough time to have a taste of Guiness and do a little “duty-free” shopping. From Ireland we headed straight down to Qatar. Once we got over Iraq the pilot made us close all the window blinds. I though that was weird! I guess there was a good reason, but I was really looking forward to seeing Iraq out my window! Anyway…we got to Qatar around 10 pm (local) and then we were given the job of unloading the luggage and cargo. Last thing I wanted to do after a trans-Altantic flight is unload cargo! Luckily it didn’t take us too long. We found our bags and our shop contact, and were shown around the base, the shop, and given the quick in’s and out’s of the base before being dumped in our rooms. Our rooms were in little trailers. About 20 rooms to a trailer, and 2 people to a room. The bathrooms were their own building, we called them cadillacs, and they were communal bathrooms…like in a gym. They next day we had to go out to the shop and get our shift schedules and such, then it was just work for the next 4 months. We worked 12 hour days, but it was turned into 14 hours by the time your day was through. We had to be bussed everywhere…well everywhere that was too far to walk. So for a 6 am-6 pm shift, I would have to be up, showered, and eaten breakfast in time to catch a bus at 0530. Then at the end of the day, I would get on a bus shortly after 6…maybe 1815 (military time) and get back to my room around 1830 or so. Then I’d have to shower, eat, and be in bed early enough to get up at 4 the next morning. Day in and day out! We got one day off a week, mine was Sunday, then switched to Saturday halfway through. We didn’t really mind working all the time though…there wasn’t much else to do. And I did have time to do other things. Al Udeid was called “the club-Med of the desert”. We had everything there…well not everything, but everything to spoil a service member! We had a movie theater that was free admission (they showed movies about 3 months later than a normal theater), an olympic-size outdoor pool with a Dairy Queen. There was a coffee shop on base called the Green Beanery and it was like a Starbucks. They had the best sweet tea I have ever had! I would pay the $.75 to get one almost everyday! There was a Subway, Pizza Hut, and Burger King at the BX. The food places were just in little trailers…like a mobile snack bar type thing. The BX was a giant tent with concrete floor…nothing special. You could buy movies, CD’s, clothes, local art, domestic items…think Wal-Mart but on a much smaller scale. There were also local vendors at the BX area, so you could buy items from the local country. They had some really interesting things, and they could get you anything you wanted. Plus, they would haggle the price with you! That’s always a plus! Pearls, Persian rugs, marble…all really cheap. We ate at the chowhall…which was of course free, and open 24 hours, and laundry was accomplished by a service brought on base. You would drop your laundry off in a little trailer and pick it up 3 days later…and was also free. Al Udeid was not a dry base…which means you could drink alcohol. We had ration cards and were allowed only 3 drinks per day. And no, you couldn’t skip a day and have 6 the next…we tried! There was a morale area that was a stage and a bunch of picnic tables set up under a canopy. We would get the USO tours come though and perform. There were quite a few when I was there, but no big names and no one I remember specifically. Al Udeid was also one of the few bases where you could go downtown into Doha….you’d have to find a driver, sign up on a long list, get security checked 6 times going out the gate, 12 coming back in, and sell your sister, but you could go! I got lucky and had a friend who worked with a driver. So I got to go downtown with minimal waiting. I went around April, and it was already really hot there…like in the 1-teens everyday. But their culture is a lot different than ours and while we are in their country, we had to abibd by their culture. So women going downtown couldn’t show any skin. I had to wear long pants and a long sleeved shirt. It wasn’t too bad…I wore a uniform everyday in the heat so wearing long clothes didn’t really phase me. It was definitely eye-opening! All the signs, menus…everything, was written in Arabic and English. And since we read left to right, it appears that the English comes first, but they read right to left, so to them the Arabic is coming first. Just a weird little fact! We went to the mall…wow! It was 4 stories in a circular shape. They had an ice-skating rink on the first floor and everything just circled around it. We went to eat at the Chilis…ha ha…and they had menus that were in English and ones in Arabic. I asked for the Arabic one just to see…lol. We walked around the beach and the little walk along the Gulf…the Persian Gulf. The people there are very strange! The men are pretty normal except for their clothes, but the women are rude! Well, rude by our standards. They aren’t allowed to speak unless they are asked to by a man…so they’ll completely ignore you. They act like you aren’t there…like you are invisible. I was trying to get into a bathroom and one was blocking the door…I said excuse me, tired to get around her…she didn’t budge. And I was in a grocery store looking at some product on an isle, and one of them just came and stood right in front of me, exactly like I wasn’t there. It was very irritating. Anyway…back on base…Jeremy was in Kuwait at the time. He was an AF member at an Army base…that sucks! Luckily his commander was AF and was willing to allow Jeremy a 3-day pass to come to Qatar and see me. So they arranged a trip for him from Kuwait to Al Udied to come visit me. It was so special. Those kinds of things are very rarely done…so we got really lucky! May finally rolled around…accompanied by 120+ degree temps, and my time to go home! We left at night…around 9pm…and we stopped in Bahrain for a few hours to pick up some more people, and then in United Arab Emirates for the same. We didn’t even get off the plane in UAE. We got back to Shannon…I vaguely even remember the return flight. After 4 months of the desert your body is so worn out…everything is just a blur. I know we were in Ireland because I have the paraphernalia to prove it, but I don’t really remember anything about it. The next thing I remember is landing in Virginia. We landed in Norfolk in the afternoon…around 3 pm maybe…and we took a taxi to the Naval Station there. We had to stay over night and headed back to UT the next day. It’s all really a blur. I don’t even have pictures for that time! I think I was sleeping for most of it. Maybe I was just too preoccupied with something green to notice anything else! The desert was just rocks and sand…no grass, no trees, no bushes, plants, or anything else. Everything was sand colored and the only color we really got to see was the sun and moon. When we went into Doha and saw the flowers I about fainted! I did throw myself on the grass and roll around a little! Ha ha!