Turn Your Head and Cough..

When I went off to boot camp I didn't really know what to expect. I figured it would be really difficult. I was wrong. Several things happened throughout my time there that truly surprised me. For example, our division had three different drill instructors: two male and one female. Sometimes during bedtime the female instructor, who was a southern black woman, would sing to all of us often leading to at least a few of the guys to start whimpering. If someone had told me that I would be sung to while at Navy boot camp I might have joined the Coast Guard instead (their food is better!). Another surprise/disappointment came when it was time for our division to get a beat down, which was just a bunch of exercises to get us to sweat a lot. These could have been administered for a punishment or just for a workout. Usually it was for a punishment. What surprised me was when during the first beat down the instructor pulled out this little white card from his pocket. On this card was the limitations of the individual exercises they could make us do in a row. For example, we could only be made to do 40 sit ups at one time. I found it hard to believe that the instructors had to follow these limitations. Our division often urged them to push us harder. We wanted to be challenged and to get into better shape.
Yet, with these examples of things that surprised me about boot camp there was always that one event we all dreaded from the very beginning of boot camp: the gas chamber! Let me explain my gas chamber experience. The whole division goes into this chamber with gas masks on. We line up in 4 rows shoulder to shoulder facing a very large viewing window where we see our instructors staring at us with anticipation. They know what is coming! We on the other hand, do not. There is a hot-plate in the chamber and someone puts some chemical on it and soon the room is full of a light smoke. The sailors in the front row closest to the window are in the best spot for this exercise. Once the room is smoke filled they are ordered to turn to the right and take off their masks. This was when the terror set in for me. Luckily for them they didn't have to watch people go through this experience. I on the other hand was in the back row, and watching this unfold in front of me was horrifying. They began to convulse and drip fluid out of every orifice on their heads. Their eyes watered to the point where they couldn't see and had to hold onto the person in front of them on their way out of the room. Their noses lost all forms of control and let out a flow of distgustingness that would make Slimer from the Ghostbusters movies envious. Last but not least was the mouth, and you can only imagine what came outta those things! Along the wall behind the big window was a stainless steel trough. It was nice and clean on the way in but the first row out turned it into a vomit depository.
So as all of this was happening I began to panic and panic hard. All of the pent up anticipation for this moment came rushing into my head. I started to sweat and breathe heavy, which I knew was going to make things even worse for me once my mask was off. And what didn't help was that the guy right in front of me, who happened to be a pretty tough guy, broke down like a little girl when his mask came off. I almost hyperventilated and passed out, but I didn't want to be 'that guy.' So there I was, in the back row, second to the end, and breathing like a guy going up Everest. I remember hearing, "Back row, turn to the right!" and nothing else. It began! Off went the mask, in came the smoke, and out went the mucus and tears. I remember standing there trying to control myself as the seconds ticked by. I began to do this little hot step from foot to foot waiting for the guy in front of me to start walking towards the door. I had a death grip on his uniform. Finally we began to move. I was coughing like crazy and oozing from everywhere and sweating profusely. Towards the door I began getting the feeling that I wasn't going to be able to retain my lunch. I made it to the trough and let loose. By the time I got outside the pain and uncomfortableness had subsided. I was smiling and happy that it was finally over. Everyone was. Some even said they wanted to do it again, crazies. I walked up to my buddies feeling proud to have made it through the terrifying gas chamber experience. That was until they pointed out that I had "lunch" all over the front of my uniform... awesome.