Month 6 Day 14

Notebook entry
Fifteen reports to the Afghan National Army with Salim, weather and reports Afternoon Basic Intel

Journal Entry
Yesterday went to the RCT [Marine Regimental Combat Team Headquarters] in the morning for the staff meeting with the CO [Commanding Officer]. The OpsO [Operations Officer] LtCol Walcott said that he would again like to work on developing the ANA [Afghan National Army] staff again after the trip to Fiddler’s Green. He also says he wants to restart staff planning classes with them…ok, we’ll see how that goes. Downloaded a bunch of audio books for the trip by putting my laptop in Lt Fortenbras’ room. Mailed off my ‘I have been reassigned' letter to my 45 year old pen pal. I taught Salim how to do the weather at the CCoC [Combined Combat Operations Center]. That took about 1 hour. I told the RCT 2 [Intelligence] sgt how to come over and help them with their SigAct [Significant Activity] list. In the afternoon I got back and taught them a class on Basic Intel. They were pretty attentive because I guess the General Chewed their asses and said that he would send them to the extremes of the AO [Area of Operations] if they didn’t shape up. He also said that he was going to cut off Samir’s pay because he didn’t show up to his class. I got a class seat assigned for the Basic Analysts course in Kabul, that should be good for Qais. Originally it was assigned to Salim, but Qais made a stink about not having the education or experience (Salim used to be a cop), so he had the OpsO send him. Gunny brought up a good point in the meeting last night about Dinar, our head terp. The terps had no issues the entire month he was gone and now he comes back and shit gets ruffled up. He is a bit passive-aggressive, and I wonder if he doesn’t goad them into doing his dirty work for him so he can appear like the single, awesome candidate for this US visa program. The terps are an odd and interesting bunch. Tony, Dinar, Neckpai (General Pai), Sammy, Bashir (Bash), Fareed, Monsor (Monsenoir).