1,003.95 Euro.

Now we are talking business. And I will get this sum every month. At least 14 months long. Someone is happy!

I don’t like to talk about army. Usually. Because I am with the army, and it sucks to just have one topic: army. But try to enjoy my little survey of serving longer there.

I like the job I’m doing there. I like it to be waiter for officers, talk to them, organise their parties. I like to do the grocery shopping, I like to plan the next days what we’re going to have to do. It’s not my job. But I’m doing it, I like it, and whenever there are questions, the others are asking me.

In fact, I never worked before – just in teams at school. I was nearly elected as the leader of the team every time. So, basically: if anyone wants to offer me a job with lots of teamwork, contact me.

As you can see: I really like it there. I feel needed. That’s why I decided to stay longer there, since my 9 months of compulsory service are over at the end of March. At the beginning of February I tried to say: “yes! I will stay 14 months longer!â€? to one of my superiors.

Problem 1: Topkick left our unit. That means that your “motherâ€? ain’t there. The proxy for it was busy all the time – introducing the new Topkick. (if you don’t know what a topkick is: these are the guys who are wearing those nice orange cords)

Problem 2: The whole unit was on military exercise. So whenever I wanted to see the one of my superiors: they weren’t there. If I wanted to get some holiday, the office guys were gone. If I wanted to talk to my captain: he was on exercise, too.

Problem 3: Help? Anyone? What should I do? What do I need? Argh!

Finally, after three weeks, someone was there and told me what to do. I wrote a paper to the captain. The paper was wrong, of course. I wrote it again. Looked better, better text (simple, easy, boring). And even the proxy topkick was there! I was able to talk to him! I nearly freaked out!

On Monday, where I was just there for one day, I asked the office guys if I should stay one more day to sign some papers. Not needed, they said. So I drove back home to enjoy my free days.

One day later: call from army. “We need you to sign some papersâ€?. No comment…

Next week: medical days. I was checked before and when I went to army. I had to fill out the same papers again: “Do you have several illnesses in your family: tuberculous, diabetes, haemophiliac, [...] deathâ€? Death? In which family you don’t have some death?

“Have you been in medical care? If yes: when, where, why, name of doc� erm. Nearly 21 years ago, hospital, birth, dunno? Broke my leg 10 years ago. Reason: happened. Name of doc: it was 10 years ago ffs?

“Do you take certain drugs? If yes, how much daily? | Medicine | Alcohol | Cigarettes | Otherâ€? 1-2 beer at weekend is how much alcohol/day? Painkiller when having headache is… how much daily?

After being confused and entertained at the same time I gave this paper back. “And what about your teeth?â€? – “Need to go thereâ€? – “Go tomorrow then. Grah. Why haven’t you been there today? Then I could just have signed it easilyâ€? – “öh… byeâ€?

Wednesday: dentist’s. Opens at 07:00. So it’s said. At 07:15 the first guys came – not wearing any uniform. “What are you doing here?â€? – “Was sent here for the 90/5â€? – “It’s Wednesday. Just emergencies. What about tomorrow?â€? – “Need to shoot thenâ€? – “What’s more important: your 90/5 or shooting?â€? – “…â€? – “…well, come in. We’ll see what we can do.â€?

Task: teethchecking. No complicated operations. Took 5 minutes. But 20 minutes to read all texts (“You’re going to get operated today, see what can happenâ€? – “You’re going to lose a teeth today, that’s what we will doâ€? – “You’ll get painkillers, that’s what happensâ€?) and sign all papers – of course. What else.

Gave that paper back to the lady who works on it. First of all: she wasn’t there. Then she came, looked at me as if I was a stranger. She signed it and said that she’ll give it to my unit.

Friday, Saturday, Sunday: weekend service. Time to relax.

Monday: holiday.

Tuesday: came back to sign five papers. The so called 90/5, which was supposed to be there, wasn’t. Went to the medics. “Who are you? Never seen you beforeâ€? … “The papers? Dunno where they are. Will look for them.â€? You can imagine how pissed my topkick was.

Wednesday. Came back to ask for the papers. Office opens at 07:00. Who wasn’t there?
08:00. Next try. Lady wasn’t there, but someone else who checked for it. The papers are done, just not signed. Will take one more week. Supposed to be there on Monday. Doubt that.

So. Basically: I signed all needed papers. I really doubt that I’m done. I’m quite sure that tomorrow they will call me to get me back. That’s so called holiday… hellidays.

I love army.

I hate it, but it’s good: sport. I’m absolutely not athletic. Even my mates told me: “seems that you didn’t get power in muscles, but therefore more in brain” – true that.

Anyway, my captain is sportaddicted. Sport all the time. I’m not in the unit actually, because I belong to the waiter-team. Waiterteam? Häh? Sorry, I wasn’t able to explain it before, so just a short info: After I finished my basic education I was sent to a new unit – and I was asked if I’d like to be a waiter for officers. Why not! One week work, one week free – yay!

Two weeks ago my captain called me at the officersrestaurant and wanted me to do sports. I was like “no? We have 50 guests here and we’re just two waiters?” – “But you have to do sports” – “I can’t at the moment?” – “Give me that Corporal” – and THEN, suddenly, he understood, although he was telling him exactly the same.

So, this week on Monday – where I was supposed to have holiday – I came back to do some sports. My tasks:

• shotput (8 metres)
• stonethrowing (left/right, total: 8.90 metres)
• long jump (4.5 metres)
• 100 metres run (13.6 seconds)
• 30 minutes jogging
• 3,000 metres run (13 minutes)
• 20 kilometres march with 10 kg luggage

My results:

• shotput: not even close to 8
• stonethrowing: 2 metres missing
• long jump: 3.2 metres
• 100 metres run: 17.1 seconds
• 30 minutes jogging: done
• 3,000 metres run: not taken, decided to swim 1,000 metres instead.
• 20 km march: next week, Tuesday

I’m good, aren’t I! I just rock in sports!

Today I did my 1,000 metres swimming. Goal: 1,000 metres in 26 minutes. I did it in 29.5. Damn! Give me more power!

…and nuke the kids when I need to swim! I was always fighting with those swimming mattresses!

And, please: very fat people, start a diet. It’s ugly to look at you. VERY. I know how it is to lose weight. It’s easy. I mean… if a 14 year old boy has boobs, something is going wrong.

I like shopping. It’s so much fun – if you want to have it. Just go to discount shops and you’ll see every kind of human life. You will find fat people who’re returning their empties, young parents where the husband want to support the wife although he knows that she could do better alone, seniors who check every product and try to understand why it can be that good for that cheap price (and what it actually is), bums who just buy new beer, children who are giggling around, hectic businessmen – everything, and you are in the middle. It’s better than TV. That’s pure life!

In Germany army is something – well, it exists, but it’s not needed. Soldiers are just fat guys who drink 24/7 and shout all the time. Stereotypes?

Why not shopping in armyuniform? It can be so much fun. Just smile to the people and greet – and they will be confused. They’re eating you with their looks. They will talk behind your back. It’s a funny experience. Especially if you greet people loud and clearly when they saw you and therefore look away.

I’ve always loved to confuse people. I think I will go shopping in uniform more often.

EAKK. Some short for conflict and crisis management – we actually don’t know, but that’s what we did this week. Our task: “show of force”. To show that we are there to keep the peace. And that we are strong. And supercool. Unfortunately we didn’t have our supercool sunglasses with us. But next time we will.

We got taught how to protect items – e.g. cars – from an aggressive crowd. Many soldiers in a long row, holding their weapon and each other. It was really interesting to see how it works – and how concentrated you are, that you don’t hear the commands of your driller although he is shouting.

Walking a patrol can be fun. You have to check the persons, you get shot, you find mines and you have to talk to persons to explain the situation. I was the translator for English, one other mate for Russian. It felt good to speak English again. (Yes, I still miss speaking English as in Finland.) I shocked my mates with it.

Why are you able to speak such a fluent English? Why can you give that straight orders and exact positions in a foreign language? Are you crazy?

Bad luck. From now on I am the official translator of every group.

Doing checkpoints is the most boring job you can ever have. My group had to do it from 3:00 – 5:30 am. It was cold, we’ve been freezing – and we had to check some persons who wanted to pass the checkpoint. Extremely boring, tiring.

It was great how real the actors behaved. You really felt like you were in a foreign country. I hope I can speak more English – that’s easier than trying to cross a 2.50 metres wall, something I am still not able to. But I’m working on it.

Our drillers must have noticed that this week was basically relaxing. On our way we did 3 km in 15 minutes – me with two guns instead of one (we had to transport the extraguns for our enemies back) and the luggage. I was running more than marching. But I did it. It feels so good.

I don’t even have any neckache. What the heck is going on with my body? Where is all the pain gone? Help!

Are you ill? You feel like shit? You want to sleep for hours? Time to say that you are ill!

You usually get up at 4:30 and you realise that you don’t want to work today – or your neck is suddenly broken – so you say this to your driller when he checks the attendance. You will be sent to the doc. At 9:30. So you have 5 more hours to lurk around. Including breakfast, maybe some lessons, but you won’t do something. At 9:30 (or earlier) you go to the doc and say that you are there. From now on the superrelaxingtime begins. Usually 30 more soldiers got the same idea of being ill. Prepare to wait til 12 – or later, because at 12 they have lunch and they open at 1 pm again. Then you can go to the doc and say what you want. If you have luck, you are freed from sports, marching and terrain. Or you are “ill at home” – so you will be send home, will get paid and let the sun burn on your neck.

I just wanted to have some shoe lifts. After famous three hours of waiting I finally got in and went out after 5 minutes. I got a paper so that a special centre can produce them for me. That meant: I needed to get out of the barracs. My friend (who needed the shoe lifts too) and me got a special driver who drove us outside to order them. They told us that we will get them on Wednesday morning. So we told our lieutenant that we needed to be driven out to get them. No problem, will happen.

On Wednesday we stayed in the barracs to get driven out. We sat around, slept til lunch on the table – and then we supported our mates who were ill and stuff to clean the houses, cars – everything useless. We asked several times when we will be driven out – not today.

Thursday we weren’t able to take part on the march, because we were freed from that. So we were driven back to wait til someone drives us to town to pick the shoe lifts up. After three hours of more waiting we finally got out – and the shoe lifts were too big. We shall come back on Saturday to get the smaller ones.

I decided to pick them up by myself (we get free on weekends and we always drive home) on Saturday. They didn’t fit, they had to fix it (and we fixed them at home, too). My friend, who lives more far away, wasn’t able to pick them up. He was waiting for the army to drive him there to pick them up.

He is waiting for three weeks now. Army rocks.