Amazing what becomes important when you're deployed. Stuff you take for granted at home suddenly become huge things of global concern, demanding interest and attention you'd normally not even consider.
Bathroom facilities here are like that.
The dorms we have are basically long trailers with 30 room (15 to a side) lined up in row upon row in the middle of the desert. If there were trees this place would be a metropolis in West Virginia or Mississippi, (sorry, couldn't resist!), but here it's just lousy housing. There's no indoor plumbing, so at the end of every two rows, they built shower buildings, also just big modified trailers. These facilities were here when I first came in 2004/2005 and are still here 6 years later. They were in lousy shape then, horrid shape now.
When we were here in 2008 the base had decided to make something more permanent for all of us "transient" folks, people deploying for less than six months... so instead of new dorms, they started building permanent shower buildings... (not a good omen for the possibility of new sleeping accomodations...) A year and a half later we showed up and theses permanent shower buildings were sitting there half built, boarded up, and deteriorating in the desert sun.
Apparently whatever local contractor got the lowest bid, took 75% of the money, built 25% of the structure and walked off the job. So the Air Force's brilliant idea was to take the remaining 25%, use our own Civil Engineering folks who supposedly can build things, and finish them off. Sounds good.
Some truths never change: cheap is cheap, and the good stuff isn't cheap.
The first new ones opened on the 2nd or 3rd of March. Incredibly they were worse than the showers/lattrene facilities we already had. The urinals and mirrors were all placed too high to use unless you are about six feet tall (the girls are taking the mirrors off the walls so they can see to do their hair), the toilets overflow constantly, the shower fixtures continually break off in your hands, and there is either no water pressure, no hot water, or usually, a combination of both. Tile floors are already cracked, the shower floors are uneven and the drains aren't sealed so you can see into the subflooring...which I'm sure won't rot or deteriorate. Every shower has a different manufacturer's cheapest fixtures, and most are mounted on a tin facing... that's not going to rust?
Finally, the stalls for the toilets are made out of plywood. In a hot and bath/shower facility. After three weeks no door closes and they all look like they are about to fall down. It's pathetic.
The local base paper had a big rave about the new shower facilities and how great they were. There were pictures of a ribbon cutting ceremony with Commander's comments on the fact that they were able to complete them under budget. Obviously the guy hasn't set foot in one to actually do anything other than peek in the door.
Yesterday I went down to take a begin anew the search for hot water and water pressure, attempting a shower in one of these new "beauties." Inside I found all the new urinals being replaced... Knowing these guys they'll raise them up higher!
No comments:
Post a Comment