I went to a “Yakiniku” restaurant in Yomitan city in Okinawa, Japan where you literally grill your own food. “Yaki” means to grill and “niku” means meat. So you go to this restaurant and choose which kinds of meat and vegetables you want and then they put some coals in the grill and bring you what you’ve ordered. Typically they will bring a bowl of rice too. Then you cook your food and enjoy your dinner. These are great restaurants to have a beer while you cook. What man doesn’t like to grill and drink a beer?
Cook Your Own Food Restaurant
First Thai Kickboxing Experience
While in Thailand for joint military exercise Cobra Gold I took the opportunity to see a live Muay Thai kickboxing event. During the event they started out with the lower weight classes and worked their way up to the main event fight. From my observations the lower age and weight class fighters were primarily just trying to get points, but as the skill level got higher you could clearly see the fighters were trying to knock each other out. It was a really neat experience to take in the Thai culture through this sporting event. Unfortunately at the time I did not have a high quality digital camera, so these are the best photos I was able to take.
Deutsches Haus
After a 12 hour shift and then a 1 hour bus ride back to the hotel, during Cobra Gold 2000 in Nakhon Ratashima, Thailand I enjoyed going out to a local restaurant called the Deutsches Haus. It was owned by the nicest German man named George. George would cook up some good food, sing karaoke, and he always kept the beer cold.
One night George even closed down his shop to go out to a popular local establishment called “Unique” and have some fun and watch the entertainment.
Welcome to Thailand
This is my first time ever to Nakhon Ratchasima, Thailand I took a couple photos looking out of my hotel room window to see what Korat had to offer. Then I decided to go for a walk to see for myself. While walking down the street there was a guy riding an elephant, so I asked him if I could take photo.
Explosive Ordinance Disposal
While at Ali Al Salem air base in Kuwait my commander was an ex-Explosive Ordinance Disposal (E.O.D.) person so he asked me if I wanted to go out and watch EOD blow some things up. That’s how I was afforded the opportunity to go out with EOD and watch them blow up 24 sticks of C4. They also used a thermite grenade on some classified computer systems and disposed of some British flares. It was a pretty cool experience.
Radio Tower View of Ali Al Salem Air Base
The view of Ali Al Salem Air Base from the radio tower. This definitely gives a bird’s eye perspective of what it was like on this base. You may notice a swimming pool in the photos. The swimming pool was only 3 feet deep and the main reason it was there was because it was the largest source of water in case of a fire.
Ali Al Salem Tent City
While deployed to Ali Al Salem air base in Kuwait I was afforded the wonderful opportunity to go camping in the desert 39 miles away from the Iraqi boarder. The United States Air Force was ever so kind as to setup tents with air conditioning. It was so hot in the desert that if you wanted to feel any of the air conditioning you needed to tape water bottle together to point the air at you. One of the worst days I can remember was 130 degrees at 9 o’clock in the morning. Whenever there was a windstorm you could count on not getting any sleep that night. It was also nice shaking sand, dirt, and the occasion scorpion or camel spider out of your boots as well. Here are some photos of what tent city was like both inside the tents and on the outside. Sometimes between the tents people would build a common area between the tents so people could play cards or read a book.
Air Force Predator Aircraft
During my time at Ali Al Salem air base in Kuwait it was common occurrence to see the Air Force Predator aircraft. This plane is pretty cool because it is an unmanned aircraft and has virtually a lawnmower engine to power it.
There was a lot of debate between different types of pilots about if the Predator pilots should actually be considered pilots because they sit on the ground and are in no imminent danger if something should fail on the aircraft. They have no threat to life or limb if they do something wrong with the aircraft. It is much like playing a video game.
Hardened Aircraft Shelter at Ali Al Salem
Here are some photos of the hardened aircraft shelter’s (HAS) at Ali Al Salem air base in Kuwait. The story behind the HAS was that they were built by the French and they were designed with 10 foot reinforced concrete. Apparently the French who built them for the Kuwaiti’s sold them as being bomb proof. When Iraq invaded Kuwait they took over these facilities and then during Operation Desert Storm the United States came in and bombed the heck out of them. I heard the Kuwaiti’s sued the French for the HAS not being bomb proof like they were sold as.
Okinawa Dragon Boat Race
Went to watch the dragon boat races at Tomarin in Okinawa. This was a pretty neat event. There were teams with Okinawan people from different places and there were also teams from different military bases in Okinawa. It seemed as though they were building friendships through friendly competition while experiencing some of the Okinawan culture.