Afghanistan is in the rear view mirror. So is Qatar. Current residence is Kuwait. And now I'm stuck here.
When leaving Camp Eggers, most people are required to secure a letter of release from the command, certifying that you have reached the end of your orders, your replacement has arrived, and you have had adequate change-over time to teach your replacement your job. However, when I asked about getting a letter of release for myself, I was told that civilians were not required to do this. I was rather happy, as they are kind of a pain in the butt to get completed, and could have delayed me getting home. So I left Camp Eggers, letter-less, hoping for a quick journey home, but prepared to slog it out one stop at a time.
The MRAP ride to Bagram Air Force Base left bright and early at 0600. My office mates came out to see me off and help me carry my bags to the meeting point. We had one last Monty Python joke, hugs goodbye, and then I was off. Two hours later, I was in Bagram, prepping to navigate my way through the endless adventure that is space available travel.
Space available, or Space-A, is exactly what it sounds like. If the plane has seats available, then they take passengers. If they don't, then they don't. Most of the planes leaving theatre are not taking passengers specifically, but cargo from one base to another. How much cargo they will carry and how much room that cargo will take up isn't known until shortly before the flight leaves. As such, how many seats are available is not known until shortly before the plane takes off. These seats are given out on a first come, first serve basis, leading to a long list of sign ups to get to where you need to go. I signed up for a flight to Kuwait more than a week ago, and I was 62 out of 250 on the list. The first flights leaving for Kuwait were the next day, so I figured that I'd have to spend at least one night in Bagram, and depending on the amount of space, possibly more than one. But the officer in charge of getting people home from Camp Eggers had another suggestion.
Qatar is a small nation south of Kuwait occupying a peninsula bordered by Saudi Arabia to the south and the Persian Gulf elsewhere. It's also a portal into the Southwest Asia theatre (Iraq, Afghanistan), and a little known exit route. While few people choose to go through Qatar to leave Afghanistan, it's a pretty efficient method. The planes going to Qatar usually don't carry much cargo, meaning there are a lot of seats available, and there are several flights from Qatar to Kuwait each day taking people back and forth on 4 day pass. As it happened, there was a flight to Qatar leaving at 1515 the day I arrived in Bagram, and upon switching my sign up I was number 19 on the list. Sure enough, when roll call came around, I had a seat.
After manifest, loading bags, waiting out a small dust storm and a three and a half hour flight on a C-17, I arrived in Qatar around 2100. Annoyingly, I was made to go through immigration, even though I would only be there a couple of hours. Then through a brief customs check, before going to check on a flight to Kuwait. There were two leaving in the next 6 hours, and I was number 9 on the manifest. Yup, this was definitely a better idea.
Another perk about going through Qatar was the improved quality of the terminal waiting area. Bagram's terminal was a temporary terminal with a concrete floor, non-insulated walls, and not nearly enough space for all the people coming in and out. Qatar was an actual building, tiled floors, bright lighting, and the best bathroom I've seen since I left home. They also had free wi-fi (that actually worked for a change) and was about 12 times faster than the wired connection I had been using in Kabul. I was able to Skype with my wife and actually have video rather than a slide show. I took thorough advantage of this perk until the 0130 roll call for the flight.
After another round of waiting, we loaded the airplane around 0330 and rolled out around 0400. Given the time change, at this point I'd been traveling for 24 hours and was pretty exhausted. Sleeping on a C-17 isn't easy, given the way the seats are set up. The seats are along the sides of the cargo bay, with no arm rests, no head rest, and no way to recline, so you are forced to sleep sitting up. But as tired as I was, those issues were only minor.
Now at 0600, I had arrived in Kuwait. Here was the first known quantity about my travel. I had scheduled myself for a flight back to Ft. Benning, Georgia more than a week ago, was confirmed to have a space on the aircraft, and knew it left on Saturday. I was hoping to find an R&R flight leaving sooner, but knew that worst-case I would be leaving on the 18th. My biggest worry of the travel was getting to Kuwait before the check-in time for the flight on Friday, as I thought I was going to get stuck behind all the people heading home for leave. Now that I was here, I expected smooth sailing.
Not so fast. Just one more little wrinkle.
You remember that release letter? The one that I didn't have? Apparently it's required to have one to board the flight out of Kuwait. This is a new regulation as of a couple months ago, one that the personnel office at Camp Eggers apparently had no idea existed. It's also a regulation that the contractor running the flights home failed to tell me about until I showed up at the counter. I tried to find some way to leave the country without needing a release letter to no avail. Bottom-line: I'm not going anywhere until a letter of release is signed.
Being that I'm no longer at Camp Eggers, I'm relying on my colonel and NCOs to get things worked out for me. Usually the hold up with release letters is verifying when your replacement is going to show up and enforcing the mandatory 10 day turn over. By hold up, I mean that letters of release need to be started about 30 days before you head home. I've got three and a half days before my flight leaves. Ugh. Since my replacement is already working, and our turn over already complete, and I'm already gone, I'm hoping that things can be moved along quickly, but I really have no idea.
I trust the folks I'm counting on to get me out of here, but its not easy sitting in a different country, hands tied, with getting home in time for Christmas on the line. But if that's what I have to do to climb the last hurdle between me and home, then that's what I'll do. I just hope I don't go crazy.
Sitting, waiting, wishing. See you soon?
Out here.
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