MEPS, the Airport & Arriving at Ft. Benning

20 June 2011

Today started with a 4 am wake up call by the front desk. Man did it seems like I just closed my eyes. Breakfast was served in the hotel lobby at 4:30am and was actually really good. My roommate, Ethan, and I finished breakfast and got in line for the bus ride to Fort Gillem and MEPS.

We arrived at MEPS around 5:45am and started our "shippers processing." Basically, I had to stand in a room with about 50 guys in nothing but my underwear while we did a quick physical and height/weight check. I was 74" tall and weighed 188 pounds. I wanted to get down to 185, but with all of the great meals cooked for Jesica and I over the past week, I knew that would be nearly impossible. 

I finished the physical around 7:30am and from that point on it was "hurry up and wait" until noon. At noon we got to each a sandwich and chips and probably had my last soft drink for a while. We were then called into one last shippers briefing where final orders were distributed.

Of the 65 shippers from the Atlanta MEPS, only four of us were going to Ft. Benning. Because of my rank (specialist), I was put in charge of our group. That task consisted of carrying the packets/orders and getting us checked into the United Service Organization (USO) at the airport.  We arrived at the airport around 1:30pm and I got our group checked in with USO. I got to see about 200 soldiers waiting to deploy to Iraq/Afganistan on the USO floor. Many were either on their phones, laptops or just listening to their ipods. Some were fortunate enough to have their family with them while they waited. It seemed to be a bittersweet moment for many of them.

One of the guys in my shipping group, Brian Kim, knew some of the same people I knew. He use to work for the Athens-Clarke County Police Department and Sandy Springs PD. Brian is 31 and his military occupation specialty (MOS) is 18X or special forces. His basic training is 17 weeks which includes Basic Training, Infantry Training, and Airborne School. Really nice guy. He speaks Korean and is learning and third language as we speak.

The plan was to be on the bus by 5:30pm heading to Ft. Benning. The charter bus arrived at 7:00pm and we loaded up and pulled out heading to Benning around 7:30pm (approx 2 hrs late).  The ride was about 1 hr 45 min, putting us at the front door of the Reception Battalion around 9:15pm. Little did I know our night was just beginnning. Time does not permit me to describe every detail of the evening, but basically we were fed, briefed, issued physical training clothes, briefed some more and finally had lights out around 3:00am for a 4:00am wake up call. Hell of a first day!

Matthew