Stories
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In Germany all those waiting for assignment were put in a big room with wooden floors where I laid in a corner, my back against a wall looking out a low, actually floor level round window, into a German commuter-train rail station, like out of an Alfred Hitchcock movie, watching the trains and passengers come and go. Spent the night in some barracks they provided. Finally late morning on the second day someone called my name and I jumped up. It was a young-guy with glasses, probably a draftee. We walked fast down the hall. In the army I learned that if you want to get anywhere you have to talk fast. So I walked along the side of him, talking in earnest. I says, "I was suppose to go Greece but they changed my orders. Now I really, really, don't want Germany. If there is anything you could do to get me into Greece; I would surely appreciate it". So he says, "I'll see what I can do", and I went back to my window. Later in the day he comes back, recognizes me this time and hands me my orders. He says, "Welcome to Greece. I had to change your assigned unit, but there you are." "Thank you, thank you, thank you," I says. That's all; no pay-offs; no compensation, and not expected. Just a nice guy helping another guy out that asked.
On the plane that evening to Greece, my seat companion was Holsue. He had been in the hospital in Germany and as it turned out was in the unit I was assigned. So I got the scoop. Turned out Holsue was always in the hospital for one thing and another, either in Germany, or Greece at the big American Air base just on the edge of Athens.
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