Well, it was a bit of work getting the troops at Castle Greyskull to warm up to us last night, but warm up they did. With the kind of shit going on over here, it's amazing that anyone's laughing at all.
Case in point: Back at Camp Black Bear, our first stop on the tour, we saw a family of locals chatting with the guards at the front gate on our way back from the pirated CD shop across the road -- by the way, pirated CDs are the only evidence I see of any kind of economy over here. Anyway, I find out some ten days later that what was going down was this guy brought his kids over to the gate to tell the guards there that if they didn't give him money, he'd take them back home and kill them.
Saturday, July 19, 2003
Just came back from a visit to the caves that during WWII were the stronghold for Yugoslavian Partisan leader Josip Broz Tito. In fact, the entire town of Drvar is the site of a failed Nazi operation to assassinate him. You can read more about it by copying this link and pasting it into your web browser's address field:
http://www.eliteforces.freewire.co.uk/Waffen%20SS%20Text+Images/FAL_500.htm
You'll have to scroll down the page a bit, or search it for "Tito". I'd relay the story myself, but figured it would be better with at least a few pictures!
http://www.eliteforces.freewire.co.uk/Waffen%20SS%20Text+Images/FAL_500.htm
You'll have to scroll down the page a bit, or search it for "Tito". I'd relay the story myself, but figured it would be better with at least a few pictures!
Friday, July 18, 2003
Honest to god, they call this place Castle Greyskull!
What once was a flour mill has been converted into a small but imposing military base, nestled into the Bosnian hillside. And though the base is small, the living arrangements are just what we all needed -- not the M*A*S*H*-style close quarters tents like we had at Zgon, but nice long ones, with private, curtained off rooms and a powerful fan in each. Another great thing about a smaller base? With less bodies to cook for, the food is that much better!
I plan on taking it easy tonight, and rest up for the fifth show of our tour tomorrow. While I'm doing that, here's a story one of my new-found military friends told me, about the only time he's ever been under the threat of fire over here. It was a few years back on another tour, when he was the commander of a LAV (Light Armoured Vehicle). While passing through a town it was brought to his attention that one of the locals there was pointing a machine gun directly at him. The vehicle came to an immediate stop, and the big cannon on top whirled around to targeted the threat. The commander slowly and deliberately got out of the vehicle, walked up to the local and took the machine gun from him, no questions asked.
What once was a flour mill has been converted into a small but imposing military base, nestled into the Bosnian hillside. And though the base is small, the living arrangements are just what we all needed -- not the M*A*S*H*-style close quarters tents like we had at Zgon, but nice long ones, with private, curtained off rooms and a powerful fan in each. Another great thing about a smaller base? With less bodies to cook for, the food is that much better!
I plan on taking it easy tonight, and rest up for the fifth show of our tour tomorrow. While I'm doing that, here's a story one of my new-found military friends told me, about the only time he's ever been under the threat of fire over here. It was a few years back on another tour, when he was the commander of a LAV (Light Armoured Vehicle). While passing through a town it was brought to his attention that one of the locals there was pointing a machine gun directly at him. The vehicle came to an immediate stop, and the big cannon on top whirled around to targeted the threat. The commander slowly and deliberately got out of the vehicle, walked up to the local and took the machine gun from him, no questions asked.
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