Christmas Day - we sang a very wierd version of the 12 Days of Christmas (each day was a physical exercise, and we had to do the days reps on each verse - ie: "On the Six day of Christmas, my Drill Instructor gave to me - Six mountain climbers..." we all dropped "One Sir, Two Sir, Three Sir, Four Sir, Five Sir, Six Sir" - got back up "On the Fifth Day of Christmas my Drill Instructor gave to me five Leg Lifts" and then dropped "One Sir, Two Sir, Three Sir..." and it continued...
We were laughing, smiling as we were pushed with a Drill Instructor who seemed to not have a Christmas bone in his body - knowing that we were all sharing in something that we would never forget.
He later told us when we graduated - "you'll always remember our Christmas together Marine". I still do. My favorite Thanksgiving in the Marines was spent eating an Sake Basted Turkey with Rice stuffing in Iwakuni with Mamasan Hamamoto. (The resident MAG-11 ham/cheese sandwich and Soda shop lady) I miss her. Happy Thanksgiving Mamasan - whereever you are. You cheered many Marines.
I think she was the MAG-12 Mama-san, wasn't she?
MAG-12 was in Iwakuni and I remember many, many times there in the old barracks, Block 8. Did you ever live there?
Semper Fi,
Norb