We were scheduled to go to Cambodia for a few days, then home to Japan in mid-December. I was getting off early, on November 19th, to do some heavy maintenance on a few aircraft in the rear.

Nature intervened, and Bangladesh is underwater. People are homeless and dying. We have a saying, that a Marine should be "No better friend, no worse enemy." So we're making some friends. Three separate MEUs, including mine, are sailing at full steam for Bangladesh. We'll be flying the hell out of our helos, dropping off water, MREs, bags of rice, and blankets for the Bangladeshis.

Some of the troops are unhappy, because it means we'll be missing Christmas and the the New Year. But the way I see it, for the last 18 months we've been doing "joint trainings" with regional powers that are all really just dog and pony shows. Here's a chance to do a real mission, and help some people that are in dire straits. Christmas can wait.

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A Wild Sheep Chase is the eigth book by Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami. The English translation is by Alfred Birnbaum. I find the fact of it's translation amusing, as Murakami has translated a number of English novels into Japanese. But ability to translate isn't necessarily transitive, I guess.

Muramaki is a celebrity in Japan, to the extent that he lived abroad for several years to gain some privacy. His most famous novel is Hard-boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, which I intend to read one of these days. He's been compared to Kafka, and I can see why- he doesn't have Kafka's tragedy or mysticism, but his characters live lives of confusion, and the world pushes them about with no regard to their concerns.

A Wild Sheep Chase is about- well, a lot of things. It's complicated. Our nameless protagonist is 30, half-owner of a small advertising business, just divorced, with a new girlfriend he doesn't understand. His best friend from childhood disappears and sends a couple mysterious letters. His business partner is slipping into alcoholism. He's not depressed, he's just sort of aimless. Life isn't the grand adventure he hoped for after college. His job is good enough, but it doesn't thrill him anymore. He's not sure he wants to keep doing it, but he's not sure he should just up and start over, either.

(See why I identified with this novel?)

Into his life a mystery comes. The assistant to Tokyo's most powerful yakuza boss summons him to make an offer. You see, the narrarator had created an ad a few weeks earlier that used a photo of a bucolic hillside, with sheep. With close inspection, one of the sheep was an anomoly: Japan has relativly few sheep, all accounted for. But this sheep is of a breed never before seen, and it has a peciliar birthmark on the flank. Where is this sheep? Where did it come from? The mobster gives the confused narrarator one month to discover the sheep, with the price of failure an ugly one.

The narrative takes twists and turns, on themes of death, exploration, love, leadership, and sex. The childhoon hometown that's never the same when you come back as an adult. The quiet peaceful small town that's dying as the children all leave. Fun stuff like that.

On the whole, I recommed this novel, but not if you're already feeling depressed.

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When we're in port, sometimes birds fly onboard and bed down in the antennas. Then we sail away at night while the birds are sleeping, and they wake up and hate life, scrounging for food from people on watch.

Today we had a formation on the flight deck for unit photos, so we were all wearing our green camoflage utilities. We looked enough like a forest to make some sparrow-like bird quite happy. We were trying to maintain our military bearing as it flew back and forth between the ranks, looking for a branch. Eventually it landed on a cargo pocket flap and sat there while we got photographed. I bet the poor thing was sad when we fell out.

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The ship has two continually-running movie channels. We don't have a TV in the shop, so I don't watch them very often. Still, last night I wasn't busy for a bit, and I stopped by Maintenance Control, and saw Nathan Fillon onscreen. You know, Mal from Firefly? So I watched for a bit.

He was in a movie called Slither. If you are ever trapped in a room with that movie playing and all you've got is a sharp stick, don't poke your eyes out. Because it's much easier to poke your ears out first, and _then_ poke your eyes out. That movie made my inner child cry. From what I saw, it didn't fall into the "So bad it's funny" category (E.g. Battlefield Earth). It sat solidly in the "Just plain bad" category, like a dog turd stuck to the shoe of the cinematic arts.

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Working hard, that's the Marine Corps way. We've got big troop lifts of Korean Marines for the next couple of days, and that's going to kick us hard. American Marine infantrymen are bad about abusing the safety gear. But at least we can yell at them in English and they'll understand. The Koreans may take better care as they feel like guests, but we have more trouble explaining what they need to do to care for it.

Then, the Quality Assurance shop realized that they hadn't done any audits for a while. As a CD/QAR, I work for them too, not just my shop. I got tossed the Maintenance Control/Maintenance Admin audit, which is the longest and most difficult one. No, I'm not exaggerating there, it's 27 pages long, 20 questions per page, and each question requires reading some cryptic manuals and looking over paperwork that I've never encountered before. So that's consuming many hours, and I have to get it done by Friday.

Then there's the cruise book, essentially the yearbook for the MEU. I've got 41 pages to fill. That's not "we", that's "me", because this was dropped on my lap and I've got basically no support. It's looking like I'm going to have to take all the shop photos, too. No worries though- I've got to get it all done by the end of the week.

Some of the guys wonder why I'm getting out, because I'm not visibly bitter like a lot of people counting the days until their enlistment ends. I'm not bitter- I love the Corps, and I'm proud of my accomplishments. But there are two ways to be a Marine- cruise by, or charge hard. I'm not good at maintaining a low visibility to cruise, but the charging is just wearing me out. But part of that's the MEU. If we hadn't "volunteered" to extend, I'd've probably signed reenlistment papers by now.

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For the first part of the float it was just rotorheads on the flight deck. Quite pleasant, really. But good things don't last forever, and the Harriers of VMA-214 joined us. The maintainers flew in C-130s down to Korea, then we met them in Pohang.

Last year the weather was so bad that the ship couldn't dock, so they sent we rotorary types ashore on LCUs. It was cold, wet, and unpleasant. But the ship's captain apparently liked how it worked out, because this year we didn't even try to go pierside, they just shuttled all the Harrier guys onboard with a couple of LCACs. That's a six-of-one, half-dozen-of-another comparison: the LCUs are slower, but the LCACs are wetter.

Just to add insult, when the got on the ship, the well deck drain mechanism was broken, so they had to wade off the LCACs into hip-deep water with all their gear. Very very cold hip-deep water. Those guys were not happy when we met them.

Then they complained about their night. The C-130s delivered them the day before, and they'd spent the night in sleeping bags inside a hanger. Oh, the horror. Fixed-wing guys are pampered because they need runways and stuff. They got not sympathy from us. Our last time in Korea, we were in drafty tents on the ground. A concrete floor in a hanger is not ideal, but it beats rocks and tree roots. Plus they had no cold drafts, and a furnace to heat the room! Bunch of pansies. Why, back in my day...

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I'm back working the night shift. Yay! It's blue LED flashlights up on the flight deck time again. It has advantages though, mostly in that there are fewer annoying people to bother me.

With the wonders of modern transit, a week ago we were basking in the Philippine sun. Now we're in Korea in the winter, and damn is it cold. While I normally like cold weather, I do hate fiddly dextrous work that requires me to take off my gloves as the wind howls.

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Today is the US Marine Corps's birthday. I don't have anything deep to say, so this'll be short. I think it a fine tradition that we keep a day in mind to remember all our brothers and sisters in arms, past and present, wherever they are.

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We've had email access, but the boat's not allowing us web access while we're at anchorage. So I apologize for the delay in blog posting.

Hong Kong is cool. It's like New York City 2.0. Like NYC, money is in the air (plus smog). Skyscrapers crowd the sky, taxis prowl in prides seeking their pedestrian prey, double-decker busses roam about seemingly at random, trolleys tootle along. Crowds rumble across street crossings at the whim of flashing green signs. There were even a few scramble crossings to add excitement.

But I said it was NYC 2.0, remember? Hong Kong is clean (except for the smog). There was no more litter than on a military base. In three days, we saw one graffiti, and I was so surprised that I took a photo of it. While everyone hurried everywhere, there was none of the outright rudeness I expect in NYC. Of course, this is China, not Japan, so people weren't what I'd call polite. But I saw no yelling, cursing, or shoving.

The boat was anchored in the middle of the harbor, so getting ashore required a thirty-five minute ride on a small boat. (Capacity about 30 passengers.) The water shuttles put in at Fenwick Pier, a small complex dedicated to the Anglo-American naval community. They gave out free maps, advice, and a terrificly handy instruction booklet.

We cruised restraunts and explored the subway system. That in of itself was a challenge. We were required to be in liberty teams of four, which is kind of insulting in a safe city like HK. So my team had Ose and I as comfortable in cities, but LCpl Drews is a total Texas hick and Sgt R is used to Southern California sprawl. So those two were kind of intimidated an unhappy. Just getting them into the subway was a challenge- the only other subway those guys had been in was in Australia.

The most interesting sight was the Big Budda. It's a 37-meter tall bronze outdoor Buddha statue. Getting there required a half-hour subway ride to the end of the line. Then a fifty-minute bus ride over some hair-raising roads. We're talking one lane except at the switchbacks, sheer dropoff past the guardrail, and a slope of one part in eight, according to the warning signs. Our poor bus must have the clutch replaced on a monthly schedule.

Once we got to the monastary, there was a mighty staircase to climb to the Buddha himself. When we got to the top, it was magnificient. The national forest land spread out below, the giant Buddha towering overhead, the breeze blowing. Then I had to put on my professor hat and explain the religion to my compatriots. You can make a Marine live in the orient, but you can't make him learn the culture if he doesn't want to.

So. We dined on spaghetti, on dim sum, on noodles, on sushi, on Starbucks, on Krispy Creme, and at the Hard Rock Cafe. We admired the skyline at night and cursed the smog in the day. We bought books and Ose got a local girl's phone number even though it was our last night. Hong Kong is truly a world-class city, and three days was not enough to scratch the surface (especially when chained to two reluctant non-urban explorers.) I'd like to spend a month here. Of course, I'd also need a lot of money, because Hong Kong was crazy expensive, and I got to sleep for free on the ship.

Also, I got sick for the third day. Painfully sore throat, low fever, post-nasal drip. Just yucky. I refused to let that stop me, but I'm certain that I'll be paying the price for the next few days. In fact, as I write this I'm waiting for our all-hands muster at midnight. I'd really rather be in bed. Working tomorrow is going to be unpleasant.

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Hong Kong at last! We finished with the storm as the sun was rising, then we had to hose down all the aircraft with fresh water, as they were covered with sea salt. The decks were gritty with salt crystals everywhere. I thought about collecting some to cook with later, then I remembered how many petroleum products our helos drip onto the decks. So, perhaps not.

After I post this, I'll be getting on a liberty ferry to go ashore in one of the world's great cities. We have to take little ferries because we're at anchor, instead of pierside like normal. I'm told that the ship is too tall to make it under the harbor bridge unless we spent way too much time disassembling the radar antennas. I'm suspicious that it also may be a question of money- the bigger the port, the more expensive the pier space. And Hong Kong is one of the biggest ports in the world.

The sun is already going down, so I don't think we'll do much sightseeing today. More likely we'll eat dinner then the others will get hammered. Tomorrow I'll try to steer the guys towards some of the city tourist spots: at a minimum, I want to take the tram to the top of Victoria Peak to look over the city, and I want to see a temple with the Tian Tan Buddha that's supposed to be around here somewhere.

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