Marines, and Brits, and Helicopters, Oh My!

So, what do Marines, Brits and Helicopters have in common you ask.... Charlie of course!! I got to talk to Charlie for about 40 minutes last night! I was so tired I almost didn't answer my phone didn't recognize the 10 digit 805 area code phone number calling me. I though to myself "self, its 11:00pm, i'm not in college anymore so I doing get drunk friends calling for rides, whoever this is probably has the wrong number and is drunk and just wouldn't understand, self, don't answer" but, my half asleep self answered anyways! And thank goodness I did b/c it was Charlie calling!! after a little confusion with the "hello?" "Hi" "Who's this?" convo, I finally realized it was him and I woke right up!

I guess I wasn't expecting his calls, I wait for them, but I never expect them and I never try to anticipate when they might come, b/c then I get disappointed when I think he's going to call one night and it doesn't work out. Turns out he'd been back for a couple days but comm was down, "river city," so last night was the first chance he had to call.

He's doing well, he sounded really upbeat and happy. He sounded most excited about the helicopter mission, and the fact that he was apart of the largest British helicopter operation in British history! And add to that, not a shot was fired! Yay!

Probably not the same kind he was in... but who knows! 

Charlie mentioned that they went into a lot of villages and pissed off a lot of farmers. It safer to walk through the farm fields to get from place to place than to walk down the roads, so the farmers get pretty upset. One farmer got so upset that these guys were walking through his farm that he took the guys down the road and showed them where he thought the IEDs were! But the point of going into the villages was not to piss people off, but gather information. It was mixed emotions on whether they were wanted in the villages or not, but he said he felt like they did a lot of good, and got some good information, and the majority of the people there welcomed them. So all in all it sounded like this past week was pretty exciting for him. I was just happy to hear that everyone that went out with him made it back safe and sound! Even this monster...

That's Char's MWD Robbie, isn't he sweet looking!