BELPs and MREs!
Posted: Thu Aug 03, 2006 12:08 pm
As some may know, I left recently to go to BOT (basic officer training) for the US Air Force. Well I've been gone for almost a month, but thankfully there is still time in the evenings (and occasionally like right now, during the day) to check up the internet on a computer. So I thought I'd just share with you a little bit of what I'm going through. For those who have had similar experiences or gone through any sort of military training, feel free to add your own experiences to the topic.
All this morning we were out in the field for BELPs. (don't know what the acryonm means other than that B = Base and L = Leadership) Anyhoo, we were bussed out to a wide-open field with tons of markers, logs, ropes, M-16 guns, etc. There was NO shade and tons of fire ant hills and chiggers (little bugs that burrow under the skin and make a nest, not cool). Regardless, we were assigned 6 tasks where members of our unit in each task were either injured or had a role to play that we had to work around to solve the task. In addition we were given Talon knowledge questions and if we got it right, we were give one compass heading (eg. 300 degrees, 50 yards), if we got it wrong, we were given another compass heading which would NOT lead us to the next marker and clue where to go. So it was triple duty: Know your knowledge to get the correct heading, utilize the compass and navigate the terrain to the next marker, use your leadership skills to solve the current 'problem' in how to complete the mission at hand. It was blazing hot, we were crawling through the grass a few times and none of our groups fully finished a mission, some were just floundering. I did all right though, according to the teacher. I was at first a hesistant leader and from an objective view, no one would have been able to tell who the leader was in my group. But once we got going, I started picking up confidence and did well, although our mission was not completed.
Afterwards, what made it worse, we all sat underneath a set-up tent out on the field, and we dived into boxes for MRE packages. (Meals Ready to Eat) Its basically a self-contained package of 'food' that you must prepare on the spot. For example, I had to rip open my bag (hard to do with sweaty, slimy hands) Once opened, I received more packages inside consisting of: Crackers (very dry), Strawberry Jam (for the crackers, but I promptly threw out since it was too messy), Molasses Cookie (blech!), Bag full of sugar; cream; towelettes; and apple cider (of all things), a pouch of dried vanilla milk-shake mix (had to insert a 1/4 canteen of water and shake up the pouch and then drink it straight out of the pouch) and finally the main meal: Chicken noodles! Basically, you take the small pouch with chicken noodles, place it in a MRE heating pouch, pour a small amount of water in it to cause a HEATING chemical reaction, quickly seal it and set it aside. Let it cook for 5 mins and then try to figure out how to open the damn thing while its burning your fingers. Once open, you take a spoon, and just dig into the pouch of chicken and noodles and eat.
All in all, MREs suck! They are not the funnest things to eat or figure out how to eat. What is also not cool is that I have to do this all over again tomorrow morning and monday morning. So more BELPs and lord help me, more MREs! And what makes it worse is that you are basically getting a russian roulette with the MREs. Since they are unmarked on the outside, you do not know what you're going to get until you open it. So there was a lot of trading going on between OTs. Hopefully I get something just as good, if not better than what I had today. But once back, a nice quick shower was all I needed to get dry. Because I was sweaty as heck and filthy. I finally had to bust out my 'display' BDU (battle dress uniform) and wear that for the rest of the day, because there was no way I was going to wear the ones I used this morning. (although I will re-wear them for tomorrow morning and monday)
So there is BELPs and just a small taste of what is to come later in the 12 week course. I've been assured there will be worse exercises to come, so this should prepare me for them, right? Right? Right....
All this morning we were out in the field for BELPs. (don't know what the acryonm means other than that B = Base and L = Leadership) Anyhoo, we were bussed out to a wide-open field with tons of markers, logs, ropes, M-16 guns, etc. There was NO shade and tons of fire ant hills and chiggers (little bugs that burrow under the skin and make a nest, not cool). Regardless, we were assigned 6 tasks where members of our unit in each task were either injured or had a role to play that we had to work around to solve the task. In addition we were given Talon knowledge questions and if we got it right, we were give one compass heading (eg. 300 degrees, 50 yards), if we got it wrong, we were given another compass heading which would NOT lead us to the next marker and clue where to go. So it was triple duty: Know your knowledge to get the correct heading, utilize the compass and navigate the terrain to the next marker, use your leadership skills to solve the current 'problem' in how to complete the mission at hand. It was blazing hot, we were crawling through the grass a few times and none of our groups fully finished a mission, some were just floundering. I did all right though, according to the teacher. I was at first a hesistant leader and from an objective view, no one would have been able to tell who the leader was in my group. But once we got going, I started picking up confidence and did well, although our mission was not completed.
Afterwards, what made it worse, we all sat underneath a set-up tent out on the field, and we dived into boxes for MRE packages. (Meals Ready to Eat) Its basically a self-contained package of 'food' that you must prepare on the spot. For example, I had to rip open my bag (hard to do with sweaty, slimy hands) Once opened, I received more packages inside consisting of: Crackers (very dry), Strawberry Jam (for the crackers, but I promptly threw out since it was too messy), Molasses Cookie (blech!), Bag full of sugar; cream; towelettes; and apple cider (of all things), a pouch of dried vanilla milk-shake mix (had to insert a 1/4 canteen of water and shake up the pouch and then drink it straight out of the pouch) and finally the main meal: Chicken noodles! Basically, you take the small pouch with chicken noodles, place it in a MRE heating pouch, pour a small amount of water in it to cause a HEATING chemical reaction, quickly seal it and set it aside. Let it cook for 5 mins and then try to figure out how to open the damn thing while its burning your fingers. Once open, you take a spoon, and just dig into the pouch of chicken and noodles and eat.
All in all, MREs suck! They are not the funnest things to eat or figure out how to eat. What is also not cool is that I have to do this all over again tomorrow morning and monday morning. So more BELPs and lord help me, more MREs! And what makes it worse is that you are basically getting a russian roulette with the MREs. Since they are unmarked on the outside, you do not know what you're going to get until you open it. So there was a lot of trading going on between OTs. Hopefully I get something just as good, if not better than what I had today. But once back, a nice quick shower was all I needed to get dry. Because I was sweaty as heck and filthy. I finally had to bust out my 'display' BDU (battle dress uniform) and wear that for the rest of the day, because there was no way I was going to wear the ones I used this morning. (although I will re-wear them for tomorrow morning and monday)
So there is BELPs and just a small taste of what is to come later in the 12 week course. I've been assured there will be worse exercises to come, so this should prepare me for them, right? Right? Right....
