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- Story Listed as: True Life For Adults
- Theme: Survival / Success
- Subject: Life Experience
- Published: 05/29/2024
More Surprises, Alaskan Style
Born 1947, M, from Oceanside, United StatesMore Surprises, Alaskan Style
These are more experiences than actual surprises, which was why I usually described the site this way to people.
In the winter, you fought off the cold, the insanity, and your roommate (only joking). In the summer, you fought off the mosquitoes, the insanity, and your roommate.
Yeah, I know, mosquitoes you ask? But don’t forget, Alaska was once under a glacier. When that glacier melted, it left behind potholes of water everywhere. You look at Alaska from the air; it looks as pitted as the surface of a sponge. Lakes and ponds of water dot the state like confetti after a New Year’s party. With Alaska being one giant,state-wide breeding ground for mosquitoes, it’s no wonder there were so many of them.
They were persistent little suckers. I’d often watch one poke around the sleeve of my shirt until he found a hole in the material, then he’d tried to zap me. But at least, most of the time, we had repellent to keep them away. But then, halfway through the summer, the mosquitoes disappeared, and the gnats took over, and there was no way to get rid of them. The repellent didn’t work. So, we all existed in this continuous cloud of gnats.
One day, I was sitting in our office, which was this tiny wooden cubicle on the side of a hanger. My boss and the other guy I worked with had already gone for the day. We didn’t have an airplane to work (unload or load cargo; I was an Air Freight Specialist), but one of us had to hang around the office in case we got a phone call from the main air base in Anchorage. I got picked.
Because we had a lot of holes in the seams where drafts or bugs could come through, before long, I found myself sitting in the middle of a cloud of gnats. They were flying all around me, going in my hair, in my ears, up my nose, down my collar, up my pants legs, up my sleeves. Sitting there, I felt like an infested dog. But that was the summer. Now, I bet I know what your next question is going to be. How cold was it up there in the winter?
Our average temperature was a minus 35. That was the average. The coldest day I saw was 62 below zero. We had to work an airplane that day. We spent two hours on the flight line, loading and unloading cargo. Of course, we had all that arctic gear they give you. But at one point, I had to take a truck to get sandwiches for the crew of the airplane. When I looked at myself in the truck’s mirror, I had frost on my eyebrows, as well as on my eyelashes, not to mention what looked like icicles growing out of my nose.
Now you think, how could anyone live in that kind of cold? But you do get used to it. In fact, we got so used to it, that in the spring, when the temperature got up to minus 10, we were hot. We even opened up our parkas.
You’re also probably wondering whether or not we had six months of darkness. Well, not quite. You see, we were stationed right in the middle of the state, In the winter, the sun would come up above the horizon about ten in the morning, skim along the horizon, then drop back down about three-thirty or four in the afternoon.
In the summer, it would be just the opposite. The sun would drop below the horizon around ten at night, skim along just below the horizon, then pop back up around three in the morning. It would be light the whole time. So, twelve O’clock midnight, you’d find yourself walking around in broad daylight. Part of your body would say it was time to go to bed. The other part would say, no way; it’s broad daylight! Of Course, this having to deal with too much light in the summer was nothing compared to the sense of isolation we all felt.
Remember, I said we were stationed right in the middle of the state. There were no roads going anywhere, except one that went a short distance to a nearby radar site, and no towns to go to, except the tiny Indian village on the other side of the runway.
Accentually, we were cut off from civilization. You could only get to our site by air or by boat on the river during the summer. We were all stuck there for an entire year. One whole year in isolation! It’s no wonder we all drank so much, which led to a funny incident.
Do you know what it’s like to have a couple of hundred whisky-swigging, beer guzzling GI’s anxiously awaiting the plane carrying their main source of nourishment? It’s like being at one of those used book sales your local library puts on.
You get hundreds of ravenous literary hounds crowding around the area where the books to be sold are on display. Their faces radiate their impatience to get their paws on as many of these practically free volumes as they can snatch up. Well, it was something like this with us, but on a much smaller liquid scale.
As the plane carrying the beer and whiskey landed, several guys stood on the side of the flight line with that same I-must-have-it-or-else expression on their faces. I thought the moment we turned our backs, they were going to steal this stuff right off the pallets. We actually had to call in the air police to come with M16 rifles and guard the pallets. But booze wasn’t the only thing we ran short of.
In the summer, we’d get a large portion of our yearly supplies on barges which came up the Yukon River. Supplements would come by planes other times. Among the items we got on the barges was our yearly supply of meat. Included were a lot of chicken, turkey and steaks, and always one item of lesser quality. During the year I was there, it was veal. I guess back then, at least in the military, veal didn’t cost as much as chicken or turkey.
So, when it came time for creating the menus in the chow hall, chicken and turkey and steak were some of the first items on the list to be served. Which also meant, as the winter progressed, they would be the first items to run low. When that happened, the cooks found incredibly creative ways to supplement the meals with ... you guessed it, veal!
You’d look at the menu and it would say something like: veal a la chicken, or veal a la turkey, or veal a la scrambled eggs. When things really got scarce, you’d even see veal a la veal.
I got so tired of eating veal, I vowed never to eat it again, and haven’t had it but twice in all the years following.
But wouldn’t you know it. On the way home from the airport, after my parents had picked me up (this was after I had left the site), I asked my mother, “By the way, what were you planning on making for dinner?”
She replied, “Guess what? I just bought six pounds of veal. I’m going to make veal parmesan.”
I told her, “You serve that to me, I’ll throw it at you.”
She got all shook up. “Why? What’s the matter?” she asked.
Then I explained to her about the shortages, and about how sick and tired I was of eating veal. She said she understood and would make something else. But this having to deal with eating only one thing all the time was just one of the frustrations of being at the site.
One thing that helped was being surrounded by friends and colleagues, some of who turned out to be real characters.
More Surprises, Alaskan Style(Tom Di Roma)
More Surprises, Alaskan Style
These are more experiences than actual surprises, which was why I usually described the site this way to people.
In the winter, you fought off the cold, the insanity, and your roommate (only joking). In the summer, you fought off the mosquitoes, the insanity, and your roommate.
Yeah, I know, mosquitoes you ask? But don’t forget, Alaska was once under a glacier. When that glacier melted, it left behind potholes of water everywhere. You look at Alaska from the air; it looks as pitted as the surface of a sponge. Lakes and ponds of water dot the state like confetti after a New Year’s party. With Alaska being one giant,state-wide breeding ground for mosquitoes, it’s no wonder there were so many of them.
They were persistent little suckers. I’d often watch one poke around the sleeve of my shirt until he found a hole in the material, then he’d tried to zap me. But at least, most of the time, we had repellent to keep them away. But then, halfway through the summer, the mosquitoes disappeared, and the gnats took over, and there was no way to get rid of them. The repellent didn’t work. So, we all existed in this continuous cloud of gnats.
One day, I was sitting in our office, which was this tiny wooden cubicle on the side of a hanger. My boss and the other guy I worked with had already gone for the day. We didn’t have an airplane to work (unload or load cargo; I was an Air Freight Specialist), but one of us had to hang around the office in case we got a phone call from the main air base in Anchorage. I got picked.
Because we had a lot of holes in the seams where drafts or bugs could come through, before long, I found myself sitting in the middle of a cloud of gnats. They were flying all around me, going in my hair, in my ears, up my nose, down my collar, up my pants legs, up my sleeves. Sitting there, I felt like an infested dog. But that was the summer. Now, I bet I know what your next question is going to be. How cold was it up there in the winter?
Our average temperature was a minus 35. That was the average. The coldest day I saw was 62 below zero. We had to work an airplane that day. We spent two hours on the flight line, loading and unloading cargo. Of course, we had all that arctic gear they give you. But at one point, I had to take a truck to get sandwiches for the crew of the airplane. When I looked at myself in the truck’s mirror, I had frost on my eyebrows, as well as on my eyelashes, not to mention what looked like icicles growing out of my nose.
Now you think, how could anyone live in that kind of cold? But you do get used to it. In fact, we got so used to it, that in the spring, when the temperature got up to minus 10, we were hot. We even opened up our parkas.
You’re also probably wondering whether or not we had six months of darkness. Well, not quite. You see, we were stationed right in the middle of the state, In the winter, the sun would come up above the horizon about ten in the morning, skim along the horizon, then drop back down about three-thirty or four in the afternoon.
In the summer, it would be just the opposite. The sun would drop below the horizon around ten at night, skim along just below the horizon, then pop back up around three in the morning. It would be light the whole time. So, twelve O’clock midnight, you’d find yourself walking around in broad daylight. Part of your body would say it was time to go to bed. The other part would say, no way; it’s broad daylight! Of Course, this having to deal with too much light in the summer was nothing compared to the sense of isolation we all felt.
Remember, I said we were stationed right in the middle of the state. There were no roads going anywhere, except one that went a short distance to a nearby radar site, and no towns to go to, except the tiny Indian village on the other side of the runway.
Accentually, we were cut off from civilization. You could only get to our site by air or by boat on the river during the summer. We were all stuck there for an entire year. One whole year in isolation! It’s no wonder we all drank so much, which led to a funny incident.
Do you know what it’s like to have a couple of hundred whisky-swigging, beer guzzling GI’s anxiously awaiting the plane carrying their main source of nourishment? It’s like being at one of those used book sales your local library puts on.
You get hundreds of ravenous literary hounds crowding around the area where the books to be sold are on display. Their faces radiate their impatience to get their paws on as many of these practically free volumes as they can snatch up. Well, it was something like this with us, but on a much smaller liquid scale.
As the plane carrying the beer and whiskey landed, several guys stood on the side of the flight line with that same I-must-have-it-or-else expression on their faces. I thought the moment we turned our backs, they were going to steal this stuff right off the pallets. We actually had to call in the air police to come with M16 rifles and guard the pallets. But booze wasn’t the only thing we ran short of.
In the summer, we’d get a large portion of our yearly supplies on barges which came up the Yukon River. Supplements would come by planes other times. Among the items we got on the barges was our yearly supply of meat. Included were a lot of chicken, turkey and steaks, and always one item of lesser quality. During the year I was there, it was veal. I guess back then, at least in the military, veal didn’t cost as much as chicken or turkey.
So, when it came time for creating the menus in the chow hall, chicken and turkey and steak were some of the first items on the list to be served. Which also meant, as the winter progressed, they would be the first items to run low. When that happened, the cooks found incredibly creative ways to supplement the meals with ... you guessed it, veal!
You’d look at the menu and it would say something like: veal a la chicken, or veal a la turkey, or veal a la scrambled eggs. When things really got scarce, you’d even see veal a la veal.
I got so tired of eating veal, I vowed never to eat it again, and haven’t had it but twice in all the years following.
But wouldn’t you know it. On the way home from the airport, after my parents had picked me up (this was after I had left the site), I asked my mother, “By the way, what were you planning on making for dinner?”
She replied, “Guess what? I just bought six pounds of veal. I’m going to make veal parmesan.”
I told her, “You serve that to me, I’ll throw it at you.”
She got all shook up. “Why? What’s the matter?” she asked.
Then I explained to her about the shortages, and about how sick and tired I was of eating veal. She said she understood and would make something else. But this having to deal with eating only one thing all the time was just one of the frustrations of being at the site.
One thing that helped was being surrounded by friends and colleagues, some of who turned out to be real characters.
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