First week

Finally I am here in Korea! I left Dayton at 10AM on the 16th, and arrived at my base, Kunsan, at about 10:30 PM.. on the 17th. Long day of traveling and lost almost a day as well. Wed-Fri was kind of a blur, recovering from jet lag and a lot of trekking around base, inprocessing at the hospital and general base inprocessing. Its strange to be so far away from home, but to go to the Commissary and buy regular American food, magazines, have normal voltage american plugs. The weather is kinda like the midwest in the summer, except ever MORE humid, which seems impossible, but really, its frickin humid here. Most days are pretty hazy, overcast, and rainy since its monsoon season now. Over the weekend it was pretty nice. Saturday, a few of use decided to check out the Buryeong Mud Festival (http://www.worknplay.co.kr/buryeongsites/index.html), about an hours drive north of here. It was pretty fun, tons of people, very muddy. :)
On the way back, unfortunately, we got into a pretty bad accident. There were 4 of us in the car, driving around 60-65mph on the freeway, and one of the front tires blows, steering wheel now useless, lost control of the car. We swerved into the left side of the median, bounced of, spun around and hit the drivers side along the concrete barrier on the right side of the highway, spun around again, almost rolled the car, and then when we thought it was over, a big truck hit us. The back side door where i was sitting flung open and i guess i almost fell out, but the other dude grabbed my leg. Amazingly, all of us were alive with on some cuts, bruises. One guy ended up with a consussion, all of us had a little whiplash, and thank god that was it. Car is totalled, and I'm not too excited about driving in Korea anymore... I think bikes are just fine.
So, thats the crappy part I guess. This week is kinda a lost cause as far as getting stuff done. This base loves its "exercises" so we get to do this several times a year. The whole base shuts down, and we pretend we are going to war with North Korea. We have to trudge around in 40 pounds of protective gear, helmets, and full chem suit, even a gas mask during some exercises. You start sweating before you even go outside. 2 more days of this! I will post some pics of me in my awesome chem gear once i get the right cord!
So, thats about it for this week so far. There will be a big BBQ party on Friday after the exercise, and then saturday night going away parties, and my first use of my "party suit" (<-- more to come on that later, pilots are nuts!)