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"There Isn't A Lot You Can Love . . ."

There isn't a lot that you can love being on a deployment due to the fact that you are away from your home and loved ones.

However, when you have celebrities such as Wayne Newton, Chely Wright, Neal McCoy and Kid Rock (just to name a few) that will travel 1,000s of miles and give their time and effort to put a smile on your face it helps your time out a lot. We recently had quite a few celebrities and various other people with different types of jobs and also a couple of people that lost a loved one on 9/11 travel all the way to Kuwait to do just that. They spent a week of their busy life traveling from Base Camp to Base Camp and even to Iraq to help out the troops. Words can't express what it did for me and over 10,000 other troops who waited for hours to meet and greet them. It truly boosted our moral to the highest it has been in months. We can never really thank them enough or even try to pay them back for the help they give us.
I myself was one of the more luckier ones. Myself along with numerous others were chosen to be escorts for the Celebes. We were given the job of escorting them around from place to place and making sure they knew what was going on and had plenty of water to drink. It was a very fun job I must admit. Best detail the Army can give a soldier. I was able to meet everyone, take plenty of pictures, and get autographs. I also had time to sit down with many of them and talk face to face and get to know them. They were all very down to earth and had no problem asking any question with had of them. I was truly a once and a life time experience and a great ""Back stage pass."" It was a time I will never forget and one that I can tell my kids and grandkids about in the future. I also listen to country music a lot so it was very nice to be able to ride around and sit down and talk to Neal McCoy, Chely Wright and Lee Ann Womack. They also did a fabulous concert on one of the Camps and it was really nice. They had a stage built for them with lights and everything else they needed. I truly think the concert was one of the best I have ever seen. Those stars got on stage and rocked the Camp. I really do appreciate all of them coming over here and giving their time and effort to help us out.

Thank You.
SPC Joseph K. Castle 139th Roc (CORPS)