When you think of a passenger terminal you think of a sparkling concourse full of restaurants, bars, and shops. Call it a pax terminal and suddenly it loses its luster. Camp Taji’s pax terminal isn’t even indoors. There’s a small trailer office behind jersey barriers that holds the KBR flight operations. Right outside the trailer are two shaded wooden bench areas. Next to the benches is a cooler for bottled water. About 75 feet on the opposite side of the benches from the KBR trailer is another trailer that has more benches inside with a TV and AC. As you can see, we get only the best in travel luxuries.
Ok, now that you have that portrait in your mind it should be easier to visualize my day (and night). We had a flight scheduled for 1000. Our ride dropped us off at the pax terminal at 0900. About thirty minutes later we were told everything was on weather hold. The Sergeant who broke the news to us was quite easy on the eyes. She looked just like Jessica Alba. I kept referring to her as SGT Alba. The young Specialist on my team was convinced it was her and that she was role-playing for an upcoming part. Anyway, I digress… It was kind of dusty but it didn’t seem that bad. I’ve lost count on the number of times this has happened. Since the weather didn’t seem that bad we figured we’d be flying shortly. We were wrong. About lunchtime visibility had been reduced dramatically. We picked up our gear and moved it inside the AC trailer. About that time we were told that our original flight had cancelled and that we’d be stand-by for the next available. With that in mind I told my two guys to go eat lunch. When they returned I ate.
Once we were all back in the AC trailer it became a scramble for an open bench. Everyone had the same thing in mind – sleep. I let the Joes get a bench first. I had spied a cot in the back storage room earlier and intended to use it. Once all the Joes were satisfied I went in the back room to stretch out on the cot. Somehow a very fat civilian contractor had slipped in unnoticed and was now stretched out on the cot. At that point I was the only man left standing. The problem was that I wanted to be horizontal. I tried the floor and it sucked. I was about to get up when ingenuity overcame me. I noticed there were four padded stackable chairs. I lined them up side by side. Voila! I had a bed.
About an hour later when I woke up it was to the voice of Samuel L. Jackson. Someone had thrown a “Best of Samuel L. Jackson” pirated DVD on. This is an example of another interesting sideshow of Iraq. I’ve already mentioned the pirated movies for sale in the bazaars. Well these include multi-movie mega-DVD’s that highlight a particular actor. There may be as many as thirty movies on one disc. It could be Sylvester Stallone, Steven Segal, or even Meg Ryan. So getting back to my story, I awoke to “The Negotiator.” After that they chose “Rules of Engagement.” Both of these movies suck. I was just about to leave when they next selected “Pulp Fiction.” I had to stay for that. Once that Quentin Tarantino classic ended I went to the DFAC for supper. A whole afternoon had passed and still no flight out.
When I returned the terminal was even more crowded. There was no longer any room to lay down. Unfortunately, someone had switched Samuel L. Jackson with a George Clooney mega-DVD. I don’t know who but I suspect it was the two Josephines sitting right in front of the TV. First came “Solaris”. Holy shit is that a boring movie. Then came another stinkbomb – “Syriana.” Very fortunately for all of us, around midnight the weather cleared enough for flight activity. By 0100 flights were heading out. Around 0200 my team members and I loaded onto a big Chinook for the trip to BIAP. We arrived about 0245 but our ride was nowhere. I made several phone calls. Finally, around 0330 a ride showed up and whisked us back to Camp Liberty. I was in bed around 0415 and asleep by 0416. Now you know how to spend an entire day at a stinky pax terminal in Iraq watching mostly shitty movies the entire time. Yep, I’ve been there and done that (again) and just wrote the instruction manual for your future reference.
I think I set my personal record for time waiting in the pax terminal. It kind of reminded me of traveling home for Christmas as a plebe at West Point. It was my first time going home since reporting to WP at the beginning of July. Wouldn’t you know it? My flight was delayed out of La Guardia and I missed my connection in Pittsburgh. I ended up stuck in Pittsburgh for seventeen hours. Since I was a plebe I was traveling in Dress Gray with my long gray cadet overcoat. Boy did that suck. Well the airline did give me a food voucher. It still sucked to be the only 18 year old in dress gray in the entire airport. I guess you could say I started training early on for waiting around in pax terminals.
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