Paintball!

I've wanted to play paintball for years.  One of the Sunshine Committee (a group of teachers who organize local trips and other fun things to do) members helped organize a paintball expedition to the desert on October 19th.  I signed up.  Why not?  I've always wanted to play, so I might as well play here!

This is where we were headed:  (I 'borrowed' this photo and a few others throughout this post from other people who went along.)

There was nothing but desert all around us.  

 

And then we came upon this:

WELL.  When I signed up to go play paintball I didn't ask about WHERE we would be playing.  I'm thinking the nice, safe paintball courses you see in the movies, the ones with the large inflatable things to hide behind?  You know what I mean?  I realized that it wasn't going to be exactly like that.  This is Kuwait, after all.  Once we reached our destination the shocking things kept piling on.

THIS is who we were going to be playing with/against:

 We're talking ex-military, hardcore paintball dudes.  I don't even have a picture of all the camouflage I saw that day.  I did get a picture of this guy though:

And yes, dude is wearing a cape to play paintball.  Now, a reasonably rational person would say, "What's the big deal?  The course is safe!"  Friends, let me tell you, 'safe' is a relative term when playing paintball here.

Here's a shot of the room where we got our gear and listened to the rules:

 

And a few other area shots:

This would be me 'all suited up':

At this point, I'm still okay with everything.  I mean, it's paintball!  Who doesn't want to go play in the desert and shoot people with paint?

But then, my friends, then they took us on a tour of where we would be playing.....

Did you notice the bullet holes in the walls?  The rebar hanging from the ceiling?  These pictures are just a few of the gems of what awaited us inside the 'course.'  There were also sand dunes between the 3 (yes, 3) buildings that you had to climb without getting shot so that you could 'take' the last building.  Oh, and there were holes in the floors.  Basically, don't walk there.  Oh, and over there is really dark, I wouldn't go there.  Uh-huh....

After our walk-through, I looked like this:

And yes, that's definitely an, "Oh shit" expression.

I managed to survive the course.  My friend Lora wasn't quite so lucky.  Honey totally bit the dust on the course and ended up scraping / gouging both of her legs/knees and hands.  She had excellent medical care on site:

This one was the worst!  I drove us back to town and tried to get her to let me take her to the doctor.  She wouldn't hear of it.  The next day she did go and they removed yet more sand and glass from her hands and knees.  OUCH!  On the plus side, she got some serious street-cred with her students ;)

So, one nice little piece of information I may have not told you is exactly where in Kuwait we were....let's just say we were a half hour's drive from the Iraqi border.  Obviously, Lora and I did what any sane person would do when that close, we drove up to it.  See!  There's the border to Iraq.  Obviously, we didn't try to cross it.  I mean, really, she was in some serious pain!

When I got home I realized just how much of the desert I brought back with me:

And here are my 'war-wounds.'  I told Lora she totally wins this round.  Frankly, I'm okay with that!

This one lasted an entire month before it faded!

Forearm:

This one on my upper arm was pretty wicked.  My students could see it and were quite impressed.

And that, my friends, is paintball desert style :)