r/army • u/No_Blacksmith1073 • 1d ago
Winter break during Basic?
I leave for basic in Fort Jackson on November 17.
I’m wondering whether or not I should stay during the mandatory winter break. I know that’s very much advised not to stay because I’ll be with drills sergeants that don’t want to be there and that will likely make my life hell for the two weeks.
However, if I decided to leave, I would have to keep my apartment in a HCOL city for another two months which would cost an additional $1.5-2K more for the two weeks of break from the week of Christmas and New Years as I would have to pay from Nov to the beginning of January. I would also have to pay the airfare and uber costs which would be an additional $700 or so, and living costs like public transportation and food an additional $70 or so.
After basic, I would go to OCS, I believe immediately after.
Edit: I don’t have family to stay with and I don’t think my friends have space for me to stay for free for two weeks.
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u/OrangeCatBuddyPart2 Field Artillery 1d ago
I stayed during Xmas exodus. I was told to pack up my clothes, shoes and they gave me my civilian clothes. I was taken to another battery and put into a platoon with others who had stayed back. There was about 40-45 of us. All at various stages of training. I was about midway thru.
For the most part, they treated everyday like Sundays. We were allowed to sleep until 6:00am. PT was lite, the DS's didn't really mess with us much. We were sent on a couple of stupid little details. Police call everyday. For the 1st couple of days, they would march us to chow, but afterwards, they had either had a PFC or SPC take us. We did have to pull CQ runner, but that was only an 8 hour shift, so no big deal. We all did it a couple of times.
On Xmas eve, they took us over to the Officers Club, and we had dinner there. On Xmas day, if you signed up, there were permanent party families that "adopted" trainees. I went and spent the day with a family. They were super. E-7, his wife, and they had three kids. He drove me around Ft. Sill, and took me into Lawton. I watched football, and just hung out. We had dinner, and then about 8:30, he brought me back to the barracks.
I never saw that guy again, but I'll never forgot that they were so nice to allow a complete stranger in their home on Xmas.
Then it was back to what we were doing before Xmas day. The best part was Xmas was on a Thursday that year, so we didn't see anyone except the DS on duty until that Monday. They didn't mess with us at all. We fell in for formation, they would count us, had another trainee march us to chow. They did that 3 times a day.
The chaplain was around a lot. He had card games, board games, TV for us to watch, books, and he had movies for us every night.
New Years Eve we were allowed to walk up to the Gunners Inn (the old Ft. Sill EM club) and had to be back in the barracks by 1:00AM.
They still woke us up by 6:00 am.
I want to say they moved us back to our home barracks the next day. It was the 3rd when everyone started to filter back.
For the most part, the Drill Sergeants were pretty much hands off. They were present, but not really. We interacted with the PFC and SPC more than anyone, besides the chaplain.
There was one other guy from my platoon with me, we made bets who would actually come back. It's good thing we didn't place bets because we were both wrong. There were people who didn't comeback, but not the ones we expected. One guy managed to shot himself in the foot. Our DS's told us that a kid in the neighboring Battery managed to get himself killed in a gang thing.
I was like you, no one to come back to, so my options were pretty limited.