Gentleman and Lady

I was sitting in a briefing this morning when the speaker said, “Good morning gentlemen… and lady.” I get a kick out of it b/c even though there are lots of women in the military, there aren’t a ton where I work. I actually prefer it that way. In quite a few emails we receive it is addressed to “Gents.” Hey, I’m big into simple and short, so I could care less. Anywho, just something I found funny here! My replacement is finally here, so I’m working on training him, while at the same time making sure that we get all our work done. Now that he’s covering some of the meetings for me, I actually get to go to “tea time” (or get a frappe or Diet pop) and it’s quite nice to have a few breaks here. I can see why people like being a part of NATO haha!

Tomorrow there is a 4k run (not sure for the random amount, but sounds good to me anyways). It’s for the Queen’s Day – so many holidays around here that I’m losing track! I’ve enjoyed getting back into running over here, but on days that I don’t run, I feel like I’m coughing up a lung b/c of the dust that’s begun to sit inside. A guy before I left told me that it was dusty here. I know what dust is like, I grew up on a dirt road. This dust is very different though. It’s very fine, and even though you brush your teeth, wash your uniforms, you don’t feel clean for very long. The dust sticks to everything too-shoes, computers, ipods, books, water bottles (on the outside)… Think of something that has any moisture on it, and it’s going to be dusty very quickly. On the bright side, the rain has definitely helped, and I’m leaving in a few weeks! Please keep me in your prayers b/c there is an earlier flight out of Manas Air Base in Kyrgyzstan that I’m trying to get on. More time w/ Joe is always a good thing!

Sunday night I went to church, and it was interesting b/c I asked a few of the guys if they wanted to go when I told them where I was headed. They seemed like they almost wanted to go out of curiosity, but then their responses were all “pray for me while there” or “I can’t go b/c I’d burn up as soon as I stepped foot inside!” I explained to them that much worse has stepped foot inside and no one has dropped dead yet! I just have to remember that when a person says no to church, they’re saying no to God, not me.

So there are amazing cats around here! They’re absolutely gorgeous and I’d bring one home if I could. They sit around watching us eat outside meowing like they haven’t eaten in days. When instead it was probably 5 mins ago from some other compassionate person! According to the rules here we’re not supposed to feed them so that they’ll catch mice. I haven’t seen any mice in my time here, but I have no doubts they’re hiding! I was warned before leaving “Don’t touch anything with more legs than you!” and I’ve stuck to that! I am not taking home any diseases!!!