Life as a Mad Max 

Lotte Mart

This is where i do my Grocery shopping... at least most of it. Also there is bennigans here and a cafe up top, and also a department store. this is right next to Seoul Station. and on the opposite side if you keep walking past seoul station and lotte mart, is the new Seoul Station. but here is Lotte Mart

Seoul Station

Here is a picture of Seoul Station. there is a lot that goes on here but for starters this is one of the only Stations that survived the Korean War. Unfortunately there are a lot of homeless people that hang out around here. Fortunately there are a lot of volunteers that come here to take care of them. they can get free haircuts, medical exams, and food and water. oh and soju.

Newcomers

every month we do a newcomers brief to let the new soldiers in our unit know our unit mission and about korea. here is a few pictures that show the in-brief. usually the Commander starts off but his schedule was busy with something else. CSM Houston started us off by introducing herself and then having all the Newbies stand up and tell a little bit about themselves.
then all of the other sections have someone to brief all areas of the command and staff sections. here is just a small collection of photos.starting with SPC Marchant.
here is SFC Samuels... the S1 NCOIC

here is warrant officer 1 Hicks

Re-Enlistment

Here i am reenlisting. this picture is proof of oath. even though everything was abbreviated, such as i will defend the US instead of united states and follow all rules under UCMJ instead of uniform code of military justice. I got to choose to have LTC Foster re-enlist me.
and the after hand-shake. he was whispering something to me but i couldn't understand what he was saying. it must have been funny because he started to laugh at his own joke. LOL.
here i am accepting my certificates of honorable discharge and enlistment.
they just got these new high speed folders in. they are velvet with the unit insignia and 1st signal brigade letters written on it. in a gold shiny color.
and here are the certificates...

SSG Adams

This is the Re-enlistment NCO... SSG Adams. She along with SPC Marchant are the ones that started to get me into running. She also is the one who suckered me into re-enlisting. J/K... i knew what i was doing. I think i made an excellent career move.

Battalion Commander

Here is my Battalion Commander... LTC Kevin D. Foster. I got lucky when i first met him by making a great first impression. I was the one who took him to go pick up his family from the airport when they arrived. we got to talk at a more personal level and i believe it made my tour with him much easier.

Battalion Command Sergeant Major

This lady is the devil. haha. She gave me such a hard time and in the end i found out that there was a flaw in paperwork on her end. So i won in the end. Otherwise i understand all the hard times she gave me... because what doesn't hurt you just makes you stronger. She is a pretty good CSM otherwise.

Company Commander

here is a picture of my company commander...CPT Bowers. he used to be the S1 a long time ago and used to drink with us and party and have fun. then he assumed command and had a hard time separating and leading soldiers. oh well. just goes to tell you that you never know whats going to happen so always conduct yourself accordingly. haha.

Farewell Ben

we went out for SPC Ben Scott's fairwell the other night. and had a blast. we went to Insadong, a korean traditional town where u can find all the korean traditional gifts, like masks and many other things. we went to a restraunt and found it was rediculously expensive. here it is. we stayed for about 3 minutes.
then we went to another restraunt... and this was the food served.
I was going to take a picture of the name of the restraunt but i had a little too much... and forgot.
everyone was acting kinda silly for instance... my roommate...
and here is ben and his roommate.
then we went to a traditional bar. we had dong dong Joo. a really potent alcohol. it comes in a bowl type thing and you pour it into a smaller bowl. I also had a couple shots of lemon soju, but not too many because marchant kept stealing mine... hahahaha.
Marchant got really drunk...yes our chaplain assistant... and was laughing soooo hard that he had a vien poppin out of his forehead. so he gave us a demonstration of how to get a vien out. after this he showed us how to snort wassabi up his nose. Ouch!!!
finally on the way home we passed a Bondaeggi stand. Bondaeggi is a silk worm larva that they eat as a snack. they say it is very delicious but i would never try it... until this night. here is a picture of it.... and a closer look... i only had one bug and that was all it took. Yuck!

runnin man

here is my new hobby. i have been running a lot of 5 and 10K's lately. this is a picture of the start/finish line. an official timer and everything. So far my best time for 5K is 22:57. and my best 10K is 47 min. i also ran a half marathon in which i had some "troubles" and had to stop for 8 min. to get a quick fix. haha. they told me i could take that time off my finish time but its just not the same. starting all over again is just too rough. i came in at 1 hour and 57 min. my goal was under 2 hours but i feel that i could have done so much better. anyway, running is a good stress reliever too.