Forever on My Conscience
May 27, 2004

In 22 years of life there have been many events that changed my life slightly, culminating in the person that I am today. These events have changed my life ever so slightly, save one.

It was a very uncomfortable night in Yangju, South Korea. The training had been fairly intense for the two weeks prior, but the last two days things had really been heating up. Of a company of soldiers, which consists of about twelve squads, less than two squads remained. Though it was "just training" vigilant soldiers walked the perimeter and stood guard at the gate. All of the soldiers knew that in training they were required to get four hours of sleep each night, especially the drivers. Unfortunately, we were just soldiers.

"Ours is not to question why. Ours is just to do or die." The thought amused me at the time, as I stood first guard shift at the gate with Pursely. Even though my buddy wasn't the most intelligent guy on the face of the planet, he was very amusing. As we stood there waiting for our shift to be up, we grabbed a Chem Light (glow stick) and decided to check whom we would be waking up for the next shift. I have since forgotten the name that was next on the list. What stands out most in my mind was the name of the sergeant that was listed next: Sergeant Hamburglar.

Now, I knew that there was no such person in our unit. Hamburglar? Where had I heard that name before? Pursely was beside himself, hurling obscenities at nothing in particular and everything at the same time.

"How are we supposed to get off shift when we don't know who this guy is?" Pursely questioned.

He stormed off to the mechanics' tent. Even though it was dark outside, I could still see his burly frame barreling into the tent. It was then that I remembered where I had heard the name before: Ronald McDonald. The Hamburglar. Hamburglar was a character from the old McDonalds' commercials! I chuckled to myself as I listened to Pursely yell inside the tent.

"Who the (expletive) is Sergeant Hamburglar?"

A wave of laughter exploded in the tent. Shortly after, Pursely came back to our post. I explained to him that whoever wrote the guard roster had put that name down as a joke, either to the people on guard or to the person who was to be wakened. After a little brainstorming, we figured that Sergeant Hamburglar must really be Sergeant Duran. Sergeant Duran looked very similar to the McDonalds' character and definitely ate his fair share of

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