William Gonzalez

Professor Malcolm Campbell

UWRT 1103
January 30, 2016
A New Kind of Ammo
I hear the woodpecker, he raps on the tree with rhythmic precision. Rat, tat, tat, tat, tat,
tat. I dont want to open my eyes, its too early. The sun teases the ground with its warmth. Often
those last 30 seconds of our two hours of sleep are the best, laying there is our way of having a
tiny bit of control of our day. Rat, tat, tat, tat, tat, tat. I think to myself how this Red-cockaded
woodpecker seems to take up residence in every military installation in the Army, how we
always see the signs to keep out of certain parts of the woods due to endangered bird. Smart
bird. Rat, tat, tat, tat, tat, tat! He seems agitated today, I think to myself in my early morning
daze. My ears catch a low rumble, the ground trembles. My eyes shoot open, and it only takes
me a few seconds to realize Im not in the woods back in New York, and that isnt a woodpecker.
I jump out of bed and move quickly to my uniform and gear neatly set in the corner of
my ply wood room. I throw on my clothes in the same order I always do; tan T-shirt, pants,
socks, then boots, at the minimum. Thats enough to get the job done, if my time to get dressed
gets cut short. Boot half on, I hobble to the tarp that we used for a door and push it to one side.
My partner, Shad, big guy, six foot three and about 220lb, is standing there clicking in the last
pieces of his body armor. He and his family are from up state Michigan, so he has that funny,
almost Canadian, accent. To his annoyance I would mockingly end all of his sentences for him
with an Eh. It just seemed right. He was still in his grey and black Physical Training (PT)

uniform, and threw his gear on over top of it. He looks up at me and says with a big ole grin,
Rise and shine sunshine! I thought you were going to sleep through all the fun! Without a
reply, I smile, drop the tarp, and hastily move back to my gear and throw it on over my head.
Eleven months earlier, I was sitting in a classroom that I thought had to have been in use
since WWII. The rotted wood on the window sill, cracked floor tiles, and musty aroma
convinced me of that. The teacher was a very polite bearded middle-eastern man in his midthirties, who spoke with a British accent. Must be where he learned English, I thought. He
wore the typical garb of men from his native country, a white gown or man dress as we would
call it, coupled with that little Jewish looking hat on his head. I was the lucky winner of the hey
you detail and was selected to attend this class to learn Dari, one of the many dialects of the
Arab speaking world. We were set to deploy in a couple months and Dari and Pashtu were the
two dialects that we would be surrounded by. In retrospect it was definitely a great opportunity,
but it was a long four month class, and it would take me all the way through to the holidays.
The part that bothered me most was that my platoon, my brothers, would be getting some
essential field training those months leading up to our deployment. They would be out playing in
the bushes, shooting guns, and blowing stuff up, and I would be stuck here, trying not to bounce
my head off the desk. The thought of it made a wave of depression flow over me. I was a good
sport about it for the first couple days, I even took some pretty extensive notes. Salam! the
teacher would greet us every morning. Walikom ba Salam, I would repeat back to him reading
off my paper, unenthusiastically.
It was hard, I wasnt used to this type of challenge anymore. I hadnt been in a classroom
since I left college a few years ago to enlist. I didnt it, I thought that chapter in my life was
closed, at least for a good long while, but there I was studying a foreign alphabet that looked

nothing more than chicken scratch to me. AlefBayPay, he would slowly pronounce
each letter for the class as I struggled to copy the unusual hieroglyphics that I saw on the board.
It didnt help that Afghans read and write from right to left, so I essentially had to flip my brain
upside down to make sense of it.
After the fourth day of class I got a call from my squad leader that I wouldnt be
attending anymore. I was bumped from the class by a lieutenant who had priority over me.
Awww man, just when it started to get good. The sarcasm dripped from my words. After all,
who needs to learn that language, I wasnt an interpreter, and Im good at charades.
My Remington made XM 2010 sniper weapon system tucked under my arm, I sprint
behind Shad towards the ensuing chaos. If we can get up into a tower we can be the most
effective with our long rifles. We run past the mixed concrete and wood building the engineers
had put up for us to live in. Once we cleared the buildings we could see in every direction of the
roughly football field sized Combat Outpost (COP).
There are six towers, spaced evenly around the perimeter, each manned by Afghan
National Army (ANA) soldiers as part of our collaboration with their army. We have three gates
big enough to fit a tank through on our east, south, and west walls. I hear what sounds like whips
cracking over my head as we move into position towards a western tower. People are scattering
everyone like a freshly stomped ant pile.
As we run past the west gate I see an ANA soldier, frightened, hiding huddled behind
some sandbags. A cold chill runs down my spine as I realize the gate is for some reason wide
open. I yell to him, Close the gate! Close the gate! frantically motioning towards it with my
free hand. He stares at me, confused. How could he not know what Im trying to communicate to

him? Not having enough time to run over there, and knowing how important my role is to be in
that tower I turn and continue to run. If only I knew the word for gate, or even just to close.
I reach the tower and start panting up the unusually narrow stairs. My gear pulls down
heavily on my shoulders. I reach the top, it was a small eight by eight foot box, made out of
mostly concrete and reinforced with sandbags. A single window facing out of the outpost. Two
ANA soldiers stand there, looking out towards the conflict over top their .50 caliber machine
gun. Its a massive weapon system and I desperately need them to move it so we can set up. We
yell for them to move, and make sweeping motions left and right with our hands. Nothing. We do
our best pantomime of pushing something away, then desperately point at the window.
Something finally clicks and they immediately start moving all their hoard out of the way; coffee
mugs, bananas, oranges, knock off coke products, plates, silverware, cans of dip, cigarettes,
water bottles, unboxed ammo, hats, and sandals. After what took entirely too long Shad looks at
me in frustration and says, Are you fucking kidding me? The machine gun is still sitting right
in front of us, still in the way. Luckily for us, a few moments later one of our interpreters runs up
the stairs and yells to the ANA soldiers in his broken English, O.K. guys, the big boys are here,
time to move! They exchange a few sentences in Dari and the soldiers start to quickly break
down their .50 cal. If only I knew the word for gun. That, coupled with my sweeping hand
motions would have done the job, I think to myself.
Rat, tat, tat, tat. I open my eyes to the sound of that woodpecker. I push past my tarp and
open the corrugated tin sheet door to our ply wood box. The early dawn sun peeks over the
eastern mountain range as Ali, the same interpreter who helped us in that tower a week earlier,
stands there with his infectious smile. His dark skin contrasted by his unusually white teeth,
Good morning my friend! he says with his usual cheerfulness. Are you ready to start class?