Mike Comes for a Visit

Pardon the delay in getting out this post but I was spending the last eight days with my son, Mike. Mike, as many of you know, is a Marine, and this is the last time he will be able to visit us for at least eight months because is he being deployed on the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit (24th MEU) at the end of this month.

By way of explanation, an MEU is the smallest Marine air-ground task force in the United States Fleet Marine Force. Each MEU is an expeditionary quick reaction force. It is normally composed of a reinforced Marine infantry battalion (designated as a Battalion Landing Team) plus some other elements. Troop strength is about 2,200, and it is deployed from amphibious assault ships. So he will be spending much of the next eight months crammed into a Navy ship with a bunch of Marines or, as Mike describes them, creatures.

His ultimate destination is the Persian Gulf. On the way there the MEU will stop at other places. One of them is the country of Djibouti. Djibouti is pronounced Jeh-booty. I had never heard of the place, and when Mike first told us that he was going to Je-booty my initial reaction was “Jeh my ass.” My second reaction was that maybe it was in South Florida around Miami.

Once he convinced me that Djibouti is a real place, I did a little research. What a shit hole. Djibouti is a small country on the east coast of Africa between Ethiopia, Sudan and Eritrea and across the Gulf of Aden in the Red Sea from Yemen. Not exactly prime real estate in my book and probably in the estimation of any rational human being on the planet. It may not be the asshole of the world but it is certainly on the left butt cheek and within striking distance.

According to the CIA World Factbook, Djibouti is a poor, predominantly urban country, characterized by high rates of illiteracy, unemployment, and childhood malnutrition. The official unemployment rate is nearly 50 percent. Just for good measure, Djibouti is a transit, source, and destination country for men, women, and children subjected to forced labor and sex trafficking

The total area of Djibouti is about 9,000 square miles which makes it slightly larger the Vermont. Its population is just under 850,000, and 94 percent of them are Muslims. About 40% of population is under age 15, and only 15% is over age 40. In fact, less than 4 percent of the population is over 64. One reason for that may be the “nearly universal practice of female genital cutting” which is “a major contributor to obstetrical complications and its high rates of maternal and infant mortality.” (CIA World Factbook.) It truly is no country for old men (or women). I presume that Djibouti doesn’t have a problem with Medicare—no one lives that long.

Djibouti has one TV station and two radio stations. Mean daily maximum temperatures range from 90 to 106 °F. Less than one percent of the land is forested; the rest looks like an atomic bomb test site in the Nevada desert. The slogan of the National Tourism Office of Djibouti is “Djibeauty.” Really? Hearing that, it wouldn’t surprise me if the country’s national anthem was written by K.C. and the Sunshine Band.

To the ancient Egyptians, Djibouti was known as the Land of Punt as in punt if you ever have the opportunity to go there. The photograph at the top of this post shows Queen Ati of Punt as depicted in a wall carving on some obscure pharaoh’s tomb. I guess arm fat and thunder thighs were quite the vogue in Punt.

So, you might ask, why in the hell are 2,200 Marines going to Djibouti? It might have something to do with Camp Lemonnier, a United States Naval Expeditionary Base, located at Djibouti's international airport. It is home to the Combined Joint Task Force - Horn of Africa of the U.S. Africa Command and is the only permanent US military base in Africa. In addition, France’s largest military foreign presence, a demi-brigade of the French Foreign Legion, is based there, and it is also the site Japan’s only foreign military base. To top it all off, China is building its first overseas base ever in the country. From an international military perspective Djibouti is a happening place. I guess the real estate prices were reasonable.

Mike doesn’t think his particular unit (a light armored recon company) will actually disembark in Djibouti which makes me a happy camper though I was looking forward to getting a t-shirt from the place. I can think of a lot of clever things you could put on a t-shirt from Djibouti ranging from “Shake Djibouti” to “My son visited Djibouti and all I got was this lousy t-shirt.”

It’s just as well that he will not disembark in Djibouti. Meredith and I have been considering visiting him if he gets any leave time overseas but we were thinking of places like Spain, Italy or Greece. You know, places that don’t feature genital mutilation, sex trafficking and malnutrition. Much as I want to see Mike there is no way I am setting foot in Djibouti.

Anyway, it was great to spend eight days with Mike before his deployment. I imagine he will have some good stories when he comes back.