The American Military Brit

Unknown Speaker 0:01
This is the American military Britt, shedding light on the realities of military life. Now, here's your host, US Air Force Staff Sergeant Christopher Clark. Welcome to the American military Brit podcast where we're going to discuss different military stories, from different perspectives, according to myself, as well as different guests I will have from several branches of the military, I feel like there's several different, I guess, thoughts or perspectives or myths, if you will, about military and what the military is like how you have to be to be in the military. So I'd like to either bust those myths, or in some cases with some people that might just be confirming them, because I do hear people talk about the military and what it's like and whatnot, who haven't experienced it and haven't been involved in those specific situations like I have, and other people have. So it's important to tell the stories of what military life is actually like, and to say, say it how it is basically, I mean, I had different thoughts and perspectives on what the military was like before I joined and then I joined, and I realized it wasn't even the case. So we're here to discuss that for this podcast. Let me first start by saying, please do not call me Staff Sergeant Christopher Clark. For this podcast, I'm trying to kind of develop a military to civilian mentality, if you will. So I don't want to make I don't want it to be super, you know, uptight military vibe, I'd like it to be more casual. So you know, I'm going to start by first introducing myself. I mean, my full name is Christopher Clark, at least first and last name, there's more, but I'm not going to go into all that. Most people do refer to me as Chris or call me, Chris. I'm not sure why you'd want to call me by my full name, Christopher. But that's what you want to do, then go ahead. But just to get into how I joined the military, and whatnot. So I was born in Las Vegas. However, I did end up in England, I'm a military brat. So my dad was in the Air Force. And actually, while he was in the Air Force, he met my mom. So they eventually split up. And then we ended up in England, which is where she's from. So how the whole military thing happened was, I was kind of lost in life, I suppose, if you will, I was in England, I lived in England for 16 years. And I was sort of lost at that point in life. And I, I went in I, you know, had all these different jobs. And they didn't really mean much, they weren't really given me much meaning in life. And I just kind of thought, Where was I going to go? I mean, prior to that, I did go to college, from the age of about I was 19, to 21. And then I dropped out doing all these nothing jobs. And I just thought, I don't know what I could do. And I thought, Okay, what would be a way to gain structure in life. And it came to me that I should probably go and join the military and see what that's like. And I got that idea from my friend who he joined the army. And he kind of told me about the whole, you know, military thing. And I thought, You know what, I'll look into that. Because at first you think the military is just, you know, you get shipped off to Iraq, or Afghanistan, and you just fight a war and stuff like that. But there's actually more to it. There's different jobs that you can do admin positions, logistics, whatever you want to think of sort of thing, financial jobs as well, different things like that transportation. So I looked into it, and I initially was going to join the British Army. And then I looked, you know, my mom said to me, she said, Well, you know, in case you forgot your America, and so I was like, oh, yeah, you know, I could go move to America, because I've always been a fan of I've always loved America. And I always did want to go back eventually. So I looked into the American Air Force. So I was the American army at first but then I went to the Air Force because the Air Force has bases in England and as you'll see later in my story that comes into be a factor. So I joined the American Air Force and there was actually a recruiter who was there at Milton Hall, RAF Milton Hall, which is over in it's like near Cambridge in East Anglia is the area it's called in England so I went over there signed all the papers did all the medical work that you have to do and I and I wound up joining and I went to do I did intelligence, which is what I the job I chose to do. It sounds cool, but it's really not to be honest, which I'll explain throughout my, my podcast journey here from my intro, but yeah, it was something I did just because my recruiter made it sound cool. You know, he made it sound like you were going to be I was going to be James Bond or something, you know, and it did not turn out that way. But that's, that's a story for another section.

Unknown Speaker 4:53
The Airforce journey begins with going to San Antonio it's called Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio. Yo, so I flew from London all the way to San Antonio, I think I stopped off maybe in Dallas, I think it was, but basically flew straight through and straight into the, the depths of being intense into intense military training or intense Air Force training, if you will. Because I'm sure Marines are going to hear that and think, Oh, this isn't intense training and all that different stuff. But so fly over there, get to San Antonio, and I'm thinking, wow, this is a dream come true. I'm looking around. I'm like, Wow, I'm in America. I'm going to be living in America from now on and coming from Birmingham, England, that's, that's a dream come true to be in such a large place. And the weather was nice. It was May, May 17, I believe 2011. And to look around and be like, Oh, I'm in America, you see all the American stores or the American restaurants and all that it was all good. And then I'm walking around looking for where I have to go and I see you know, the standard MTL military training leader. I hope that's what it stands for military train MTI. Sorry, military training instructor or MTL is a tech school thing, which I'll get to later. But I see the guy and I go over there. And I believe I put, I put my folder of stuff I had like a folder of stuff that my recruiter gave me of, like, you know, medical records and different types of paperwork on myself and I put it on his desk, and he just yelled at me, he's like, get this get this off my desk, and I'm just like, Oh, crap, you know, I jump in on my car cheese like this guy. This guy just yelled at me. And little did I know that was a sign of things to come because obviously basic training is purely just people yelling at you. So yeah, we get to basic training, we ride the bus there to Lackland and you get there and you're on the bass and Lachlan is huge. And you're thinking, Oh, this is great. You know, this is amazing. Again, like when I got to America, but little did I know, obviously, we get the guy coming on the MTI coming on the bus screaming at us telling us to get off and, you know, everybody runs off the bus and gets in line. And we, you know, we go into the thing to do are in processing stuff and, and, you know, you're you're giving your paperwork out to different people, you don't know what's going on you just kind of running around thinking what is going on here and how, you know, this is my new life. And, you know, for anything new, it's going to be kind of a shock to the system, isn't it? Where you just got to think, Okay, I've got to, you know, kind of adapt to this, but this isn't what I'm typically used to, and things of that nature, you know, you're not, you know, home, you're not comfortable. And that's what basic training is all about is making you uncomfortable, basically. So let's back up a little bit to a, I want to back up to a story of when I was training to go into the Air Force, so I was intensely training, doing a lot of running. I'm not really a running type person, at least I wasn't back then. So I was running a lot. And I developed an injury. I actually had little did I know it was a stress fracture in my I think it was my left leg that I had a stress fracture in. And it was, it was it was painful. And and I told my recruiter before I left I said, Is this going to be an issue? And he said, No, just go just go there with the with the injury, and they'll, they'll sort you out when you're there, which they did. Because it was the first practice PT test that I did, where I realized like something wasn't going wasn't working properly. I finished the run and I was just limping, like really bad. And my MTI immediately came over to me and he just said, Yeah, you got to go to the hospital. And I went over to the hospital did the whole you know, they did the tests. They said, Yeah, it's, it could develop into a stress fracture was what they were saying. So they basically put me on crutches. I was on crutches for I believe it was from week one until week five, or may have been week two until week five. But yeah, so that happened. That was the biggest story of basic training was I was on crutches. But basic training was It was hilarious in a way because there was a lot of yelling from the emptyeyes I didn't get yelled at that much. It was only a couple of times I got yelled at.

Unknown Speaker 9:09
But just kind of seeing emptyeyes like flip out and throw beds flip beds, throwing stuff around and yelling at you and your face it was it was an intimidating situation. And I actually wanted to leave after the first day or two of being there. Because it was just such an uncomfortable situation like I was saying but it's just one of those things you had to get used to and you know, the scariest moment was when they were checking the check your locker on the I think it's one of the first days they check all the stuff that you bought with you just to make sure that you kind of you don't have anything that shouldn't be there basically and they're going like one person by at a time and when they get to you like I was shaking in my boots I kid you not I was so scared. And it's ridiculous. It's like why are you so scared of a person or just multiple people like they're not going to do anything to You and I'm pretty sure, you know if we did get into a fight, I think I could have taken some of those guys, but I don't know, I was just so scared. Alright, so let's talk about tech school, or technical training school, but tech school is the short version of it. Right? So you do your basic training, and then you go to technical training school or tech school, to learn your job, essentially. So we had, you know, different people in, you know, in your flight and basic training, you have about 60 people 30 to 60 people in there. And, you know, you'd go around before tech school and just say, see who has similar jobs to you, and who's going to the same tech school as you because you'd essentially make, I don't want to say more effort with those people, but you'd make sure that you knew those people just to kind of make sure you had friends when you got to tech school. So Lackland Air Force Base, San Antonio, went to San Angelo, Texas also in. So it's like, in the region of San Antonio, I think it was about a three hour drive away from there. And so go to San Angelo super small place for anyone who's listening who has been to San Angelo, you know what I'm talking about. But you go from Lackland, a huge base to you know, the little tiny base there and in San Angelo. And it was essentially like you get a little more freedom, right, you don't have to, you still have to march to places and whatnot. But you don't. You can basically there's, there's like a tier system. So when you get there, at first, you're in the lowest tier where you have to, you know, you still have to kind of make your bed and you have room inspections and whatnot, because it's more of a college environment, but it is still a strict environment. So you get there. And at first you have to go around in your military clothing. But after a while, I think it was called ATP. So something transition program. And, and eventually after, I think it was about one or two weeks, you get kind of that freedom to wear your own clothes and kind of walk around and, and not have to march everywhere sort of thing. And so it was like a little transition. And it was six months during tech school, and I did intelligence. And it was a lot that you had to do over those six months. And, you know, going to school constantly. Early in the morning, I think we woke up, I think it was five, five o'clock in the morning and start marching all of us in a group at six or something, something along those lines, maybe it was earlier, but at least it wasn't 445 Like it was in, in basic training. But tech school was, was interesting. I mean, it was it was fun on the weekends, but during the week, it was a lot of intense work and, and a lot was going on because to learn how to do intelligence is is a lot of a lot of work and requires a lot of clearances and a lot of like secret information and whatnot. So we got our clearances, we got our badges to get into school, all that different stuff. Sometimes we had to come in on the weekends. And it was it was a lot of work going on. But

Unknown Speaker 13:10
one thing in tech school was It was fun on the weekends, and you met some different people again, and I was dressing I mean, I look at some of the old pictures of myself and just think why was I dressing like that. But all of us were like, I got into hats back then I hate wearing hats now. So I don't know what that was all about. But it was a little kind of phase, I guess. But like I said, tech school is kind of, it's more of a college environment now from what I've heard, because I obviously I went like 11 years ago now so but you you know, you get to mix with the opposite sex again, which of course in in basic training wasn't really the case. You know, if you got near like, as a guy, if I got near a girl, I'd get yelled at if I got like within a certain distance of them. So you know, you go to tech school, and it's a different environment, like everybody wants to, you know, interact with the opposite sex and whatnot. And you get a lot of tech school marriages coming out of that. So a lot of people meet their future spouse there at tech school. And you know, I know a lot of couple of people who got married to someone in tech school or are you know, some cases people are still married to the person they met in tech school. So okay, so your first base is supposed to be a special base, right? Because it's the first assignment that you have. It's the first base that you're at, and it's a it's a big occasion. So in tech school, I found out what my base was, and I actually found out with my friend as well. And then we both looked together and I got Missouri, Whiteman Air Force Base, Missouri, and he got a Kansas I forget what the base is called. McConnell. Is it not McCord that's in Washington, but McConnell I think it's called but yeah, he gets that. I get Whiteman and we just kind of look at each other like oh man, we got crude, because a lot of other people were getting like England and Korea and all these different bases. So I go on my my way to Missouri, I graduate in January of 2012. And I'm going to Missouri and I'm thinking, Okay, I don't know what to expect, I don't know what's gonna go on. But here we go, we go in. And I arrived in Missouri, and it's, you know, get settled into the dorms, all that different stuff, meet everybody. And it's, it's pretty intense there, it was pretty intense. I was briefing, the commander within like a month of getting there. So it was just straight into the, you know, straight to the fire, if you will. And I think I did a good job. Basically, while I was there, I met some very smart people, some very cool people. And, but it was a lot expected of you. And I knew that going straight into intelligence, you know, you know, straight away, they're learning that it's going to be intense. And we actually had this one, Major, I'm not going to mention his name, because you know, who knows, he might listen to this, but I'm pretty sure he'll be able to gather that it's him if he did, or anybody else who was there, but he was very, he was a guy who basically didn't really care about morale. He was just like, do it this way, do it a certain way. And get it done, basically. And he was, he was not liked by a lot of people. I think he knew that. And he would talk to us often and just kind of, we'd go through things talk about things. But this guy was, I mean, he's got to be one of the worst people I've ever met in my life, to be honest, but he definitely made Missouri not so great. And another thing that made it not so great was the winters in the in the Midwest, for anyone who's lived their winter in the Midwest is not fun. So I got introduced to freezing rain for the first time, I had no idea what freezing rain was. But I got introduced to that in Missouri. And that was not a good time. I mean, just a lot of snow in general, I think we got 10 inch inches was the most I got, while I was there was 10 inches of snow. And that came up to my knees. That was definitely a different experience there. But Missouri was it was it was a good time, as I've I'll say, throughout I mean, you'll you'll notice this is a theme throughout is it was a good time in a sense of meeting people and, and being social and whatnot. But then it was a bad time as far as the work went in the people that I worked with and whatnot. So there was great people that I worked with in Missouri, but there was also very bad people. And the best time I had while I was in Missouri was doing the honor guard Honor Guard was incredible, where you know, you, you dress up all nice, you do all the different kinds of facing movements and whatnot. And you present the flag to, you know, someone who's had their family member who was in the military pass away and all that different stuff, you

Unknown Speaker 17:56
do funerals, you present colors, you do like different events. And that was a good time. Because literally you come in to practice I do a month on and then a month off. So a month doing that. And then another month, I'd go back to doing intelligence. And so it was a month, one month off scheme. And it was basically you know, you practice some days, and then you'd do a detail. So you'd go wherever it was to do your detail. And you know, whether it's a funeral, or whatever it is, and you do that, and you'd basically be done for the day. So if you had one that was close by it was always a good thing, because you'd have basically the entire day to yourself, but sometimes you'd have to go somewhere that was like three hours away or like some places you'd have to stay the night there and then come back the next day. And it was it was a lot sometimes it was a really great experience on a god was meeting the people that I did and doing what I did. While I was in Missouri, I got a chance to deploy. And I did six months in Qatar that was from I believe, December 2015 until July of 2016. So it was I mean, it was basically six months because I went at the end of December, just after Christmas unfortunately I think it was two days after Christmas was when I left so that kind of sucked. I was I was dating this girl who eventually became my girlfriend as well at one point so yeah, so Qatar was actually it was six months and it was the worst six months of my life to be honest. It was the easily the worst time of my Air Force career. I mean I don't I don't necessarily want to say easily because was already was pretty bad. And I'll also talk about England later as well. That was pretty bad. But things about Qatar was you do a deployment and you're you're alone basically. So you have to get used to an environment where you're completely shipped off to something completely new which I know Oh, you know, you're probably thinking yeah should be used to by now, you know, went from England to a different country and all that different stuff. But Qatar was different because deployments, you just kind of ship your entire life off for six months, and you have to, you know, prepare things back home for, you know, you being gone. And you have to, you know, once you get towards the end of your deployment, you have to prepare to come back and things and things like that. So it was a it was a very difficult transition. And it was my first deployment, I actually had a second deployment which I'll, which I'll get into later, as well. But this first one was difficult as well, because of the people that I worked with. So I was one of the first people in my group. So, you know, working in, in intelligence, I work in an office and I was working with about, I say, maybe five or six people. And I came in when the previous crew was still there, the previous crew of five or six people. And obviously, they're keen to get out, but they were still in pretty foul moods, to be honest. One of the, one of the things she was a master sergeant, she was she was pretty bad. She was, she was pretty nasty person. So but the guy that I was transitioning, I was, you know, taking his place and whatnot. He's actually a guy that I worked with in Missouri. So it was nice to see him again. He was very good as far as like getting me prepared for everything. And then as they transition out, my crew comes in, I'll meet meet my crew, they seem like a good group of people. And I'm thinking, Okay, this is going to be chilled out. This is going to be a good time. But as time went on, and kind of got used to those different people, they turned out to be some of some of the worst people I've met, particularly my supervisor he was.

Unknown Speaker 21:45
He's without question, the worst supervisor I've ever had. And it's funny, because when I left after, like, after six months, you're fed up, when it's your time to leave, and you're finally out processing and all that stuff. It's like, Yeah, finally, I'm going. And it's funny, because when I left, I mean, it's the happiest, literally, that I kid you not the happiest I've ever been in my entire life was leaving that place. And I just didn't even say he, he took me to pick something up, or he was going to take me to pick something up. But I, I took either somebody took me in a vehicle, or I took a vehicle myself, and I just kind of left without him. And I remember passing him in the vehicle. And he just kind of shrugged at me. He was like, you know, what the heck, why didn't you wait for me to drive you and I just kind of, I just kind of shrugged my shoulders and just kept driving and, you know, got on the plane soon after that and left. So it was a good way to kind of leave it off with this guy, because he just wasn't, he just wasn't a great person. And he just wasn't a good supervisor. And he really didn't, he didn't treat me great, he took his bitterness out on me, which I can't stand in people when they project their bad feelings onto you. And that's what that's a lot of what that was with the airmen that I worked with, and stuff like that. And I just felt very alone when I was out there. And, you know, I to kind of get my mind past it, I would go to the gym and, and I would I actually started volunteering at the chapel there on on the base as well. And just kind of sorting through things. And you would get like a lot of free things, free books there. So I'd take books home, I'd read them and stuff like that. And I developed what's called mantras. I started learning about mantras and that and I'd, you know, say my mantras every day and I pray every day and stuff like that, because you just get very, you get very spiritual when you're out there because you're alone. And you have to kind of develop different skills. So Qatar was it was a it was a bad time, it was hot as well. Oh my goodness, 120 120 degrees full humidity so bad at night, it would be 90 degrees, like for humidity and it was actually worse than 120 During the day it was like really, really bad.

Unknown Speaker 23:55
Okay, let's move to some good times and talk about Korea. So I leave Missouri finally, by the way, that was one of the happiest moments of my life as well talking about leaving Qatar. It was surreal as well though, because obviously I'd been in Missouri for five years. But I leave Missouri and I go to Korea obviously a completely different country and I'm thinking what can I expect here and you know, get settled down already meet some like decent people. But again, with Korea, you had to kind of be on a restricted sort of you couldn't drink the first two weeks I think it was but after that it was off to the races. I mean, Korea is very it's a very social place. Anyway, you go overseas in the in the Air Force from what I've learned is going to be a social place. So Korea was just crazy, because I think it's because we were very, I guess aware that maybe we could get attacked by North Korea. So I think everyone just wanted to have as much fun as possible. So that's pretty much what Korea was Korea was just about having fun. It was just such a good time. There was the to events, you know, the Superbowl happened while we were over there. And that was a that was a great time. I mean, the time difference, I believe it was on it like six o'clock in the morning. At least that was when people started maybe kickoff was was later than that. But that happened. And then I remember the Floyd Mayweather Conor McGregor fight happened as well. So that was a big occasion. But Korea was interesting, just because of the different culture, the different places you could go to. I traveled to Australia, and Thailand and Japan and Malaysia while I was over there. So it was just such a, it was such a good place. The job as well was just so rewarding the intelligence job because you felt like you were, you know, you're talking a lot about North Korea while you're there and kind of preparing people for what the threat is and whatnot. So it was just a very rewarding job over there, which was why Korea was such a good time. And I just met some of the best people. Honestly, off the top of my head that I mean, there's a couple of people I could be like, we're the worst people I've met. But I think that's just a theme with anywhere, there's going to be good people, there's going to be bad people, but Korea was just socially, it was just such a good time. And I I really enjoyed it. And the follow on from Korea, of course, was England. So when I left Korea, I'm not gonna lie, I was really happy because I thought I'm finally going to be around my, my family for the first time since since I've been in the Air Force. I mean, I thought, you know, I'd only gotten to go home about once a year. But now I'm thinking, Okay, what would it be like? And I always thought, what would it be like to live in England, but also be in that American life. So live on an Air Force Base, or at least close to one and just be constantly surrounded by Americans, but I'm actually home as well. So I get to England, and you know, Korea couldn't drive at all, you're not given a vehicle to get to England, obviously, you drive on the left side over there. So that was a complete shock to the system. I never learned to drive when I grew up in England. So that was interesting to finally drive on the on the roads consistently, at least not just be learning and stuff, obviously, I learned. But I didn't get my license while I was in England. So going to England, it was great. But England would have been potentially as bad as Qatar or Missouri if I wasn't surrounded by my family and friends. And I couldn't turn to them every time I had, you know, stress or issues and whatnot. Because England was terrible. Again, I just worked with some of the worst people I've ever worked with. And although I made some really great friends, and you know, possibly you'll be able to hear some of them here on the podcast. But it was just, it was a really awful time. Because some of the leadership there it was just, it was really bad. It was, like unforced or not needed stress. Basically, there was a lot of people there who would just throw stressful situations and throw stressful things on you for no reason. And, and people saw no way of doing it in a you know, a comfortable, good way, it was just always let's just do it in the worst possible way possible, and just make it difficult for everyone. So England was bad in that sense. And England ultimately proved my decision to or at least led to my decision to separate from active duty Air Force. And, you know, England also involved another deployment, which was to Jordan. And that was a good time and a bad time as well. But, you know, there's so much stuff I could go into with Jordan, but it was yeah, it was a good time. It was a bad time. You know, living in tents, again, having bad food, just like, just like Qatar basically was just wasn't, wasn't the best in that aspect. But it was a good time, I got to go to Petra while I was out there. So Jordan was Jordan was nice. It was definitely, obviously I'd never been to a place like that before. So that was great.

Unknown Speaker 28:48
So I separated and I moved back to Las Vegas, which, of course was because of the fact that I was born in Vegas. And a couple of other things with Las Vegas was I decided on UNLV because UNLV has a good at least I'd heard that they have a good veteran community, which I now know they do. And Vegas in general just has a good veteran community and Nellis is here. So I felt like that was a good base to separate and move to the reserves in because obviously with active duty, it was just too stressful. You know, to be so stressed over something that you don't even really care about that much. It's just not worth it. And the fact is I wanted more control over my life. So I decided to separate moved to Las Vegas, go to UNLV get into journalism and media studies and basically just control my life and go to where I want to go which is being in you know, the sports media realm, if you will, possibly radio, maybe podcasting as well. There's a couple of different aspects, you know, voiceover as well as a different couple of different things where I thought maybe I could get involved with this. Maybe I could do something with this. So my journey bringing me here is just simply like to focus on myself and, and to see where where I can go basically with this journalism journey and you know, I'm excited to see where it can go. Thank you for listening to the American military Brit podcast. Be sure to tune in to these weekly podcasts to check out different perspectives from different military personnel. We're gonna have some great guests coming in. So make sure to tune in to each episode every week.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai