“They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?”

September 28th 2005, 1250B

In that case, does anyone have a suggestion for me as to how to deal with a “lame” ambulance? Shooting isn’t really an option, or at least not with anything I can readily get my hands on, because the damn thing is armoured to withstand up to .50 cal rounds. I could always set it alight, but I don’t think that would be quite satisfactory enough – I’m thinking more along the lines of big fucking explosions right now.
It’s funny how the little things can get right up your nose & take you from zero to apoplectic in .05 seconds flat. Then again, maybe a busted ass ambulance is perhaps not such a small thing, ‘cause if I need to CASEVAC someone in a hurry there’s going to be shit. I’ve got a reasonable idea as to what’s wrong with it, but I’m not going to put any money on it – I think it’s either air in the fuel system, or clogged filters or something, but my knowledge of engines isn’t much more advanced than knowing where to put the fuel. The rest of it I leave to the little internal combustion fairies, with the understanding that I won’t interfere with them if they leave me alone.

It’s when the little bastards go on strike, such as now, that there are problems. Or maybe one of the fairies got careless, and fell into something which has jammed up the works. Anyway, the end result is that the bloody ambulance coughs, farts, splutters, and doesn’t bloody go. Well, not more than 10kph at least. And then only for a few hundred meters, whereupon it stops and proceeds to *severely* cough, fart, & splutter. I tried to bleed the diesel pump, working on the assumption that I could at least try to do that, because there was sweet fuck all else I could do at the side of the road. Did it help? In a word, NO. I don’t even know if what I was attempting to bleed was in fact the bloody diesel pump. It certainly looked like it, or at least the most like the diesel pump that I could see, but we’ve already established that I’m hardly an expert where mechanical shit is concerned.
At least we made it back to the base with the bloody thing. It took us over an hour to do 10k’s, but we made it, so I should be grateful for that I guess. I’ve sat 18 hours next to the road waiting for a mechanic before, and a repeat of that would not have done my happy thoughts & cheerful disposition any good. The tiffies are supposed to be coming out to the base today anyway, so hopefully I’ll have a functional ambulance again soon, but seeing as they were also supposed to be here yesterday but didn’t pitch I’m not going to be holding my breath. You remember how I’ve said previously that shit only happens when it’s supposed to by accident in this organisation? Well, that’s especially true when it comes to getting hold of a recovery vehicle or mechanic.

Anyway, other than fucked up vehicles, it’s been a pleasant enough day. It was pretty much more of the same as yesterday, providing an escort to civvy UN personnel, but it was to a different area as yesterday which kept things fresh & interesting. This really is a beautiful area, & I quite enjoy driving around it. It actually reminds me a fair bit of parts of northern Natal, especially the area between Eshowe & Empangeni. I also managed to get a few more decent photos, but the ones I really wanted to come out well didn’t unfortunately. There was a small kestrel or falcon flying around that I tried to get a few shots of, but the 200mm lens I’ve got just didn’t have the reach. If I crop far enough into the image that the bird is a reasonable size, the quality just goes to shit. Bugger.
Actually, I think this is an example of my firearms training having an impact on my photography. There are large areas of overlap when it comes to the skill sets involved – both involve you pointing an aperture at a target and maintaining a stable platform while you do it after all – but there are a few differences in application. One of them is in the area of focus, but not in the strictly photographic sense. Rather I mean that what you concentrate on is different when you look down the sights of a weapon compared to through a cameras viewfinder. With photography you need to consider the entire frame and how the different elements go towards creating an effective & pleasing composition, and not just your main subject. But when you’re firing a weapon at something, you pretty much need to focus exclusively on your target and ignore everything else that might distract you. Simply put, a bullet actually needs to hit its target to be effective, whereas with photography you have a lot of latitude as to where in the frame your subject actually appears. Anyway, to get to the point of this, it seems that I find it hard to break my “professional habits” when I’m using a camera, & I tend to focus pretty much exclusively on my main subject. It’s only when I think to remind myself that I’m holding a camera and not an assault rifle that I stop to consider composition, or that the falcon I’m trying to take a picture of is a rather small object smack in the centre of a fairly large frame. Now, if I was trying to shoot the damn bird I’d stand a fair chance of hitting it, but it makes for a very crappy photo :P My weapons training & operational experience also probably go a long way towards explaining my predilection for long zoom lenses, as anything that makes my target bigger – i.e. easier to hit – whilst still keeping it at a safe distance is to be desired. I’ve “enjoyed” the experience of exchanging fire from ranges as short as 5m before, & while those experiences were certainly exciting at the time, they also made me realise that maybe the sniper who picks off targets from a kilometre away may just be onto something lol
And also that body armour is your friend, even if it is heavy, sweaty & uncomfortable.
Not that the realisation that I’m probably allowing one set of skills & habits to influence another is proving an effective argument against my still wanting to buy that nice 500mm lens :P I’m really hoping that the rumours I’ve heard about our allowances are true, because it’s getting to the point where I’m going to splash out on that longer lens regardless, & hang the expense. I know that I should be saving money to put away against maybe being out of a job, but maybe Getaway will be more likely to give me a job as a photographer if I can supply all my own equipment :P

That’s about it for the day though. I have a feeling the next few days are going to be quiet, given that my vehicle is out of commission, but I should be able to come up with something for this again before too long.

Cheers for now though ;)