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Stopovers in Atlanta, GA (USA).... SUCK !
If you dig US Army uniforms or indeed the soldiers in them, this is your spot.
I couldn't wait to leave. Not because I have anything against this clearly brave and valiant group of humans but because so many, now either on the other side of basic training or having completed at least 1 tour of duty, seemed to be sitting alone and mentally psyching themselves up for something. I can't think what exactly now, I wonder what kind of troubles could have been on their minds...? I forget, but for the moment let's go with the thought of possibly never again seeing the faces of their loved ones. Or for those that don't really have that problem, maybe it's something to do with getting blown up. Or perhaps worse, getting only partly blown up. They looked scared and under slept. Most of them also looked young enough to have been my offspring.
I couldn't help but think of those brightly dressed civilian corps Army volunteers, or 'the enlistment reapers' I like to call them; lurking around in poor and somewhat uneducated pockets of America, loitering in shopping malls and K-Mart car parks, screening the kids of America for new victims of their well rehearsed pitch about the career 'benefits' of joining the US Army.
Some of these benefits include incredible opportunities to 'travel' (which is true, if you don't mind having to dodge a few bazookas or occasionally wave off your mates going home in a bag) and the benefit of 'studying' at college someday, without ever putting the burden of tuition fees on your family.
I even know someone who is currently using the US Army for just that, he's graduating soon - he's actually using the system (not vise-versa) successfully. But he always was the outdoor adrenaline activity type and he could even read as well as write before he enlisted.
My point is, there is something sinister, in my view, when the recruitment pitch falls on the ill educated or on kids on the poverty-line when it includes emotive phrases such as 'burden on your family' when such a burden was never on the cards for them anyway. And when 'education' is spoken of as a 'bonus' rather than a 'civil right', I shudder at the twisted nature and only sense of logic these kids will ever know. For many who sign up, it's actually a good deal for them (I say this without any sense of sarcasm). Kids born in the heartland of the 'free world' could actually survive longer in Afghanistan than on their own street.
If America could ever afford to give away free graduate and post graduate education, would she ever do it? What would happen to the number of recruits for the US military forces I wonder? Looking at and sometimes talking to these fresh new soldiers-in-waiting in Atlanta, GA airport, the majority of them in their desert colours, the only phrase that kept springing to mind, rightly or wrongly, was... cannon fodder.
Is it Michael Moore's fault I see things this way? What is the source and wisdom behind such perceptions? The reputable school of modern TV? Our treasured rolling news channels? Or the impartiality of the medium of Film? Actually, this one is the fault of one Roger Waters (Pink Floyd). In particular, the album, "The Wall".
What I wouldn't have given to hijack the airport Tannoy system to broadcast on a loop, all versions of the song "Another Brick in the Wall".
When I was the age of these courageous young soldiers and indeed even younger, I'd sit by myself in airport lounges too, also on my way to see the world but my 'study' back then cost about £8.99 or $12 per lecture (I mean 'album') and access to a Walkman... I'm talking about the original School of Blues / Rock / Folk music. Paradoxically, this music may well be America's finest ever export.
Onto my last plane. I wanted a window seat, starboard side as I was about to fly over the Gulf of Mexico in broad daylight where the worst oil-spill in the history of the petroleum industry occured last month, and was still occuring. BP - which by the way is mostly US owned following mergers with Standard Oil of Ohio, Standard Oil of Californiaa and Standard Oil of Indiana - this is not your finest hour.
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Suggested blog soundtrack:
- The Wall by Pink Floyd (all tracks, but particularly "Another Brick in the Wall")
- The Lyre Of Orpheus by Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds (track "O Children")
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