CHARMKINS RIP

“Of course I am very sick of the war and would like to leave it, and yet I know I can't. I've been part of the misery and tragedy of it for so long that I feel if I left it, it would be like a soldier deserting.”-- Ernie Pyle, letter to his wife in 1945.

I just want to mention now that I have a lot of trouble getting on the internet. If I have not gotten back to you it is because I only get 30 minutes of internet at a time and it takes about 5 minutes to get my email open and another 5 to send a message without attachments. So, if I am lucky, I get out 4 or 5 messages in my 30 minutes of time. And Tribe.net rarely works. That is why I switched my blog to http://charmkins.blogspot.com By the way, if anyone has a video camera I can borrow, have an account for shipping. A fedex package can get here in 4 days. I am settled in my room in Kandahar. I share my room with other visiting journalists. But it is very comfortable, and spacious. We have 110 electricity and hot and cold running water. The concrete floors bet the wooden ones I had in Iraq when I lived in a tent there. The room has 5 bunks 2 being bunk beds, then my bed in the back. Being in back offers a little privacy, and is actually nicer than my apartment was in Gerlach. The area I am in houses many soldiers. It is something like a low income housing project in Southern Nevada. The mess hall is a block away from my complex. This place is a lot like the Black Rock desert and Burning Man. Lots of shipping containers and tents are sprawled out in the dust. Crazy military vehicles, and art cars. Well, art trucks. I shit you not. The military has leased giant art trucks for the locals. Pierre Pre$$ure was the first person to type me off on this phenomena of decorating trucks in Pakistan, India and Afganistan. I saw many trucks in Kabul. They are also on the base here in Kandahar. Yesterday, I stopped in at the hospital and updated my shots. They were out of Antrax shots. I probably don't need to finish that. But I got my last shot in the Hep A vacinations. I stopped by the PX yesterday. They have Subway, Burger King and Pizza Hut run out of semi trailers, as well as a 24 hour coffee shop that resembles Star Bucks, but is called Green Bean. Most places on the base do not allow you to have bags with you. The PX is an exception. The Mess Hall and Morale, Welfare and Recreation center (MWR), gym and computer center you can't have a back pack, or anything. This is after the attach in Mosul last year. A foreign soldier had a back pack with explosives and ball bearings in it. Many people were killed. I end up packing everything in my pockets. I feel in my element here. I am my own boss. I have free reign of the base, within reason. I set my own schedule and whatever I see that interests me, I can write about. In two days, I have my first mission on a CH-47 Chinock. I am flying around to a few Forward Operating Bases (FOBs). This where the Special Forces operate. I am flying to Kalat, which is a Fortress once occupied by Alexander the Great in 300 B.C. It is still in use. The 113th Co D. specializes in CH-47s. I am also interested in flying some combat missions on Black Hawks. That is another unit. But I am setting up a few rides doing that next week. And then, the other combat trip I am setting up is on the gun trucks that patrol in and around Kandahar. I can't go out this week. They have shut down the media embeds due to recent political unrest. But I will get in a few missions before I go. I have only been gone a week, and only in Afghanistan for 4 days. I have 26 more days on my visa. I am setting up 3 embeds in Iraq. Nothing is guarenteed, of course. But I may be in Iraq from 23 November to 7 January. As far as Pakistan goes, I filled a request to travel there for two days. If I get that, I fly over to Islamabad, then fly some aid routes around the disaster area on Ch-47s. Time permitting, I am going to write about the French and Canadien troops that are here. Remember, the Afghanistan invasion was UN and Nato supported, so many of the countries that did not support the invasion of Iraq are here. Currently I am writing up and in interview with a guard member that did aid work in Pakistan and just returned. I am also writing a column about CW4 Sean Laycox from Stead. I should have that stuff down tonight. Then will write more. . . So, I went for a walk and drank an N/A Beer while sitting outside. I started talking to a fellow named Peterson from Gardenerville, NV. He told me that this morning “someone” drove two HMVs into a the shit pool, where all the shit literally goes from the base. I hope I can get out there and get a picture. Real DPW like here. Ha ha ha. I am staying with two Army journalists currently. SGT Jackson and SGT Wilson. They do video and radio for the Pentagon channel. They are pretty cool, and have given me a lot of good advice. Last night SGT Jackson almost died. He was in terrible pain over the last week. The doctor he saw previously gave him antacid. Come to find out his appendix almost burst last night. So he is in the hospital for a while. I stopped in a set up a flight this afternoon on a Black Hawk. CPT Austin is in charge of that unit. I asked for “action and adventure.” He said that is the kind of stuff they don't like. He looked at the schedule for the week and told me that it would be after November 4th for “action and adventure.” So, I'll be flying into that in about a week. I am also going to set up some gun truck embeds. I want to drive around Kandahar and check things out from a HMV. In two days, I'll be flying out on a CH-47. . .
My address, if you want to Fedex me: Caleb Schaber Northern NV News Wire c/o US Army Press Office Building 5798, Room 7 DSN 841-1314 Kandahar Air Base Afghanistan