Post-exercise admin

I reckon the vast majority of people would shudder at the thought of wearing the same underwear for days on end, washing out of a bowl of cold water and eating beans with every meal. Well, that's what going on a training exercise is usually like, but this one was different. Right across the Army's massive Salisbury Plain training area, the Royal Engineers had been busy recreating a series of Forward Operating Bases (FOBs) for us to use for our mission rehearsal training.
Now that meant food cooked by Army chefs, solar showers (a bag you hang up in the sun to heat the water) and cot beds, so we had a pretty comfortable time of things. We even had some simulated Afghan National Army soldiers to work with to practice how we're going to mentor them.
But what I wasn't quite prepared for was the sweaty, horrible experience of wearing Osprey body armour. It's bloody good stuff (in that it will hopefully keep me alive when I'm in Afghanistan), but it is basically two large, heavy plates strapped fore and aft. It's bulky, it weighs a lot and it makes you perspire freely. Or sweat like a dog, depending on how you look at it. That's why I'm about half the size I was when I began the exercise.
It's been an interesting two weeks, settling in to my new unit, the 1st Battalion the Rifles, meeting new people and getting used to how they do business. Of course, I've seen assorted members of Corunna Company cutting about the area, and at one point I even caught a fleeting glimpse of one of my North Devon Journal colleagues, Rupert Sims, interviewing a Royal Engineers captain.
Next week should be far less frenetic, as I'm going to be learning Pashtu, the language most commonly spoken in Helmand. Despite only having a week to pick up the basics, it's going to be useful to at least say hello to the locals and inquire after their health, their opinions on the weather and stuff about the pen of my grandfather's aunt (unless language training has come a long way since I left school). "Has anyone seen any Taliban?" may also be a useful phrase. It's pretty difficult really, because the usual foreign lingo picked up by us Brits is something along the lines of "beer and chips please", neither of which we are likely to be using in and around the towns and villages of Southern Afghanistan.
But after that, I've got three weeks' leave, so I'll be travelling around the country visiting relatives and friends, packing my kit and preparing for the off, sometime in mid-September. But complaining about flying RAF is something I'll save for another time.