I've been waiting to use that title for a while.

We're currently anchored outside Sihanoukville, Cambodia. It's a port city in the southwest corner of this country. It's got an interesting history, it was built by the French when the Phnom Penh's port was captured by the Vietnamese.

Anyway, we're here as a diplomatic gesture. We're the first American capital ship to visit this country in the last thirty years. That is, since the unpleansantness when Henry Kissinger was practicing 'peace via B-52's'. I say "first capital ship" because apparently a destroyer stopped by a few months ago, mostly to pave the way for this visit.

Problem is, this is a working port for us. The Navy is getting some shore liberty, but we're still working to schedule the shop some time on shore. We're flying very heavy schedules every day, sending medical and dental and engineering teams out to the hinterlands. (The engineers will be digging wells.) We're also doing community relations projects, i.e. visiting orphanages and dropping off school supplies and whatnot. What with all the flying, we maintainers are very busy at work.

Also, we had to scrub the hell out of the ship, because the American embassy is hosting a formal dinner inside the hanger bay tonight, for all sorts of Cambodian bigwigs. The ship had to be spotless for their inspection tour. Now, I can understand getting the hallways and the bridge and whatnot clean. But the four hour field day in our berthing was just silly. No visitor to this ship is going to be remotely interested in touring the Air Combat Element Enlisted Berthing. It's 300 guys living in less space than a typical American home. No matter how long you scrub, it'll still smell like 300 sweaty guys stacked three high and four deep.

Posted by: Boviate at 05:50 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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