Faith in humanity restored

Its no secret that the media loves controversy and that the majority of what we see is negative. We'll get 100 front page stories of negative and horrible coverage and the few positive things may get a few tiny articles in the middle of the paper, or a short 2 minute skit on a news program. So in spite of all of that I'd like to just share a story and let people know that there IS good left in the world, and even the tiniest of things can impact somebody more than you could ever imagine.

A lot of people are confused about my avatar, and even more people are confused as to why a grown man has a pokemon character displayed in his house lol. Well here is why.

I am a military combat vet. My last deployment was rough to say the least. We lived in a rundown hell hole in the middle of Afghanistan with no running water and air conditioners that worked about 25% of the time and never during the day when it actually mattered. We had a tiny kitchen that the cooks used to cook for us but the food was scare so our portions were barely enough to sustain a 2 year old. So it was basically MRE's for the most part and if you were lucky you could find one of those rare cereal bowl things before the small amount of them got scooped up. Then it got to the point where the Taliban started hitting our resupply convoys pretty regularly, so the kitchen closed down because they basically ran out of food to cook for us so it was strictly MRE's. Man we were sick of MRE's. And since we couldn't get water resupplied fast enough and drinking the Afghan water resulted in immediate dysentery we had to use the water for drinking only. No more taking showers with the water bottles. Can you imagine how a tent stuffed with guys who haven't showered in weeks smells in 100 degree weather? One of our guys actually took his uniform off and stood it up in the corner of the tent. The ghost uniform guy was our friend for weeks, we called him Bob lol. Yeah we were disgusting to say the least.

After awhile we were finally able to get a tiny MWR going with a handful of computers powered by our generators and the internet so we could finally talk to friends and family back home. Then a few weeks later the Taliban started launching mortars at our base and they blew up our MWR. Damnit! We JUST FINALLY built this thing. Well there goes our access to the real world. Good luck getting computers back out here to us, they could barely get us water....

So needless to say....things were terrible, morale was pretty low and we were miserable. We were hot, people were getting wounded and killed, we smelled like hell, sick of MRE's, and tired of getting mortared every damn night while trying to sleep and having to get up and throw on battle gear and run to bunkers. And we were running out of damn cigarettes and dip. You can take away the food and the water and all that stuff but for the love of God we NEED cigarettes and dip!

Then one random day our little remote outpost received a random package. It was from a group of grade school children back in the US. The package was filled with little stuffed dolls of random little kids cartoon characters and a note that said something like "Dear Soldiers, we thank you for fighting and we want to help so we sent you these dolls to help you fight the bad guys".

It was really cool and it made us smile but we didn't know what the hell to do with the things. We thought about it for a bit and said well hell they sent them to us to help us fight so lets use them. So we each grabbed one and painted it up in camo paint or something and stuck it in one of our pouches on our vests and went on patrol with them from then on out. It was a hilarious sight to see, a bunch of Soldiers armed to the teeth with blue, yellow, and pink dolls hanging out of their pockets lol. One of our guys had a video camera so we made a video of all of us getting ready to go out on patrol with our new little doll Soldiers by our side. Our Commander gave a little speech and we sent it back to the return address on the package. A few weeks later we got a letter and a picture from the teacher and the kids in the class with big smiles and all giving us a thumbs up and little salutes.

The one in my avatar is mine. I still have the little guy and I will keep it forever. It smells HORRIBLE to say the least and its filthy but the impact that the little dolls had on all of us was greater than those kids could have possibly imagined. Like I said, things were going very bad and we were beyond miserable and a few of our guys were literally breaking down. When we got that package it literally changed us all. They became our friends. Our guys took them everywhere they went. Going to the portapotty? Doll is coming with you. If you misplaced one then it was like somebody went AWOL, stop everything! Find our little buddy. Afghan kids thought they were cool and would routinely try to snatch them from us on patrol. Guys would literally break patrol formation and chase 5 year old kids down to get their doll back lol. Yes, they meant that much to us. Morale skyrocketed because of our new little buddies. We went from miserable to bearable overnight. They didn't forget about us.

Those little kids had no idea who we were. None of us will likely ever meet them and they will likely never meet any of us. They took the time out to send some random Soldiers thousands of miles away a package to show that they care. They weren't one of our guys children or a friend of their children or anything. They were completely random kids from a place that none of us were from who had zero affiliation with any of us. But they sent us something anyway. To know that people care about you and appreciate you even though they have no idea who you even are is one of the greatest feelings in the world.

I have received multiple coins and citations and whatnot from high level Generals and members of Congress and even the Secretary of Defense. I've personally met plenty of them before. But no gift can even remotely come close to the little stinky doll that I have sitting next to my computer right now. Just to know that a group of random children thought about some complete strangers who were thousands of miles away fighting for their lives is....priceless.

"We thank you for fighting and we want to help so we sent you these dolls to help you fight the bad guys". Words cannot possibly describe what that meant to us that day. Those little kids did what nothing else was able to do. They boosted the morale of a band of miserable Soldiers and restored in us the will to keep going.

Faith in humanity was restored in us that day. Don't be afraid to do something nice for a stranger every once and awhile. You have no idea how even just a TINY act of kindness could greatly impact somebody's life. Much greater than you may ever know.

Isn't that right Pikachu!

 

That would be wonderful and the troops were definitely appreciate that. Outside of making phone calls to family back home nothing brightens up the day of the troops overseas better than care packages. It's like Christmas, literally lol.

As far as suggestions go, well I'll be honest. These are all grown men and women and well...they smoke and dip. I mean virtually everybody does one or the other, especially the combat units in the smaller less built up outposts. Not trying to encourage bad habits but while they would certainly appreciate anything sent to them, sending a package of cigs and dip would make them love you lol. You can buy that stuff over there sometimes but it's the knockoff version of it which isn't nearly as good. Even when you go to a larger base with an actual "PX" on it the products are still knockoff. We used to LOVE getting real cigs from back home, the difference is night and day, we would ration them off because we knew they were few and far between lol.

The majority of people smoke either marlboro reds or newports. It's sort of stereotypical but it's true...The majority of white soldiers who smoke smoked marlboro reds and the majority of minority soldiers, mainly the black soldiers, who smoked would smoke newports lol. Those who dipped preferred Grizzly long cut, either wintergreen or the normal kind (forgot the name I don't dip).

Baby wipes are also a god send, the thicker the better. In the smaller outposts, and even on many of the larger ones, portapotty's are where you use the bathroom. Portapottys that are cleaned whenever somebody decides they want to clean them which is usually not very often, and it's 713 thousand degrees outside....you feel pretty gross in there, don't really want to use the paper thin toilet paper, it doesn't work very well. Plus as I said often times being able to take a real shower is out of the question. Best way to keep clean are baby wipes. They also make those huge ones for people who are immobile or something like that, waterless shower ones or something. Those are amazing.

As far as books are concerned I knew a lot of people who read to pass the time. They tended to enjoy the military style books, Tom Clancy, Lee Child, Vince Flynn, etc. A lot of people also have laptops that they bring and love watching movies. They would love some newer movies that may have come out while they were gone.

Food is greatly appreciated as well. Some troops are lucky and get put on a base that is built up and has a nice dining facility, some have a tiny kitchen, some have nothing. MRE's get old, fast and so does the food they feed you. Non perishable food items like canned chef boyardee and stuff like that is loved. Crackers, summer sausage, etc. Anything they can eat that isn't a round turkey (we thought it was turkey...they said it was turkey...) hockey puck with slime on it lol. Candy is also great, not candy bars or anything that can melt of course. They may or may not have a microwave to heat it up but they will not care at all. Cold ravioli tastes like filet minion when you've been eating non perishable dry turkey pucks for months.

Coffee as well. We had a cheap coffee pot that we hooked up and some family members sent up packages of coffee. The coffee in the Army is DISGUSTING and watered down and usually burned. Even though its 713 thousand degrees outside people still love their coffee in the morning. Tasting some Folgers after drinking burnt turpentine with coffee grounds stuck to the bottom is heaven on earth. Red Bull too. Can't usually get Red Bull over there, at least we couldn't, and when we got a few sent it was amazing.

If you send a package full of cigarettes, dip, and babywipes alone then you would literally be a random platoon's GODSEND. You will probably never meet them, and they may or may not be able to write you back to tell you thank you, but I 100% PROMISE you that you will make their MONTH and they will GREATLY appreciate it.

 

lol yeah thats one of the stereotypes that actually holds true, especially in the military. I'm black as well and I always smoked newports and so did virtually every other black guy out there. I remember one time I walked by and saw a black guy sitting on a generator with a bulging bottom lip. It just didn't "look right" lol. I did a double take and stopped and before I could even say anything he smiled and said "Ran outta Newports bruh" LOL

Seeing black people with dip just looks funny because its so uncommon. But yeah as you said, the white folks smoked marlboro reds and dipped grizzly long cut, the black folks smoked newports. The only time you saw one of those two races doing the opposite was when they ran out of their own kind of nicotine lol. Standing outside of the box looking in it does seem like we were all extremely racist. We'd all be in a circle smoking and you'd see a black or white guy walk up and ask to bum a smoke and only his respective race would offer. Not to be rude but because we all just knew if you were black you wanted a newport and if you were white you wanted a red.

I specifically remember one time overseas we were all sitting on the picnic table in our smoking pit. Our First Sergeant (white guy) smoked and he'd always come out there and smoke with us. Me and two other black guys were sitting there smoking and noticed that he didn't have a cig like he usually does. We offered him one and he said no thanks. He waited around for a bit then when a white soldier walked up he's like "Hey can I bum a smoke?". We asked him "I thought you didn't want a smoke First Sergeant?" He says "No I just don't want none of that toothpaste flavored crap you guys smoke I want a real cigarette".

We died laughing. Good times. Merry Christmas to you as well.