First Night Off Base

It's nearly been a week I've been "on island" but since I've been on Kadena I haven't been able to leave because while the airmen have very few rules the Marines have a lot. One of the rules is that all Marines must carry a red liberty card so they can go on and off base. They must also have buddies to go out into town.
Saturday night I went out to Gate Two Street. Obi Wan Kenobi from Star Wars sums it up pretty well, "You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious." This is where the homeless and prostitutes appear. and the paychecks disappear. So I decided to see what it was all about.

Lance Corporal Malta (blue shirt) went with his buddy Pfc. Serna from Marine Corps Air Station Futenma. Serna works as a air support operations operator. He didn't really say what he did exactly.
As soon as we jumped out of the taxi we saw a group dressed up. A ghostbuster, Superman and Batman. A little early for Halloween. But it did get my brain working for what I'll be for Halloween and how I'll make up it up for missing Halloween last year since I had boot camp.

The picture is dark but this is basically what you see on Gate Two Street. A lot of neon and people walking around.

First stop was Zen's Bar. I was taking it all in while Malta and Serta had their drinks. They were having fun While I was trying to think of how I would solve my lack of gum problem.














This is Malta (blue shirt) and Certa (red shirt) with the bartender. (barmaid?)

Malta definitely is a character.











Zen's Bar is pretty small. We went to another bar named "29 Palms" - it's Marine-themed. It's a karoke bar. The thing is, there's girls there that will try and get you to buy them drinks. Some guys just enjoy their company and don't mind. There were two older gentleman, my guess at least late 60s, who were singing, drinking and dancing with these young 20 Okinawan girls. Malta and Certa couldn't stop talking about it.

This sign was just freaky looking.













Yes, it is true. There are vending machines everywhere. Very odd sizes of drinks too. It's all metric. Yeah... metric... that measuring system the entire world uses for everything but us.

My drink of choice that night was good ol mountain dew... in an abnormally sized can.