For those unfamiliar with the popular show 'Jersey Shore', it is an MTV program that features 6 Italian American, 20 something, ne'er do wells that spend their days lounging around their furnished beach house, drinking, fighting and partying. One of the personalities, Pauly D, has come up with the term GTL - which stands for the most important things to do during the day. Gym, Tan, Laundry. Much to the horror of my wife (she may be filing divorce papers as she reads this), I actually like the show. I like it so much that I've tried to incorporate GTL into the day to day living here at Camp Bastion. It goes something like this:
1) Gym - I actually like to call this the 'sauna'. Granted, it feels cool when you first step in, but that is because you are going from 114 degrees to around 90. I don't usually like to work out in an 90 degree gym, but, hey, you have to take what you can get. They do have 12 treadmills, 12 stationary bikes, 6 rowing machines, a couple of stair climbers, a few free weights and a bunch of nautilus equipment - all of them from the early 90's. They also have 3 or 4 TV's (showing only British TV) - so I can enjoy Cricket or Benny Hill while I slowly run myself into cardiac arrest. Also, as you may well know, the Brits and Americans dress differently, especially when it comes to work out attire. Apparently, according to the Brits, I dress like a German Pedophile (I've been told this by several of them). I will defer to my sister to answer this, but I'm not sure I want to know the answer. Anyway, about an hour of this and I'm ready for an IV - so this leads me to...
2) Tan - Most of the UK has dreary, rainy, cloudy weather, with little sunlight and few beaches, so when the Brits get around the sun they love to try and get a tan. When I first arrived on day one, in the middle of the night, I read a posted notice on the front door of our 'dorm'. It laid out the appropriate attire for sunbathing outside. What! They do realize that we are in the middle of a desert. I was confused the first time I was outside my room around noon and saw countless people laying out - some even drug out there mattresses so they could adequately expose both the front and the back, making sure to have an even tan. After perseverating on this for days I decided that if you can't beat them, join them. Much to my good fortune, the two doctors that moved out of our room left two camping chairs - perfect for the sport (sorry, I'm not dragging my mattress outside, its much too dirty as it is). I soon found that sunbathing in Afghanistan is not for the faint of heart, so after 7 minutes and 16 seconds I packed it in - burnt to a crisp, although about 5 pounds lighter - which leads me to...
3) Laundry - I'm actually cheating on this one. The extent of my laundry doing amounts to carrying a bag of dirty clothes to the contractors just behind the hospital (more on this later - contractors that is). Every 6 or 7 days I drop my laundry off at 7 am and by 9 that night I have a wet pile of wrinkled, faded, and sometimes not even my own clothes. Sweet!
And there you have it, this is the extent of the stuff to do in your free time at Camp Bastion, brought to you by a sunburnt, dehydrated, wrinkled clothes wearing American who looks like a German Pedophile. All for now!
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