[B]By NOELLE WIEHE[\/B]
\n[I]Staff writer[\/I]<\/p>\n
[I]Editor\u2019s Note: This article was originally published in leadertrainingcourse.com. It is being published here with permission.[\/I]<\/p>\n
Most every cadet comes to the Leader\u2019s Training Course with a fear. A fear of heights, a fear of water or a fear of having no control.<\/p>\n
Matthew Cabrera\u2019s biggest fear is letting down his fellow cadets.<\/p>\n
If the first few days of the course are any indication, that fear will be short-lived.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhenever I needed help with something, this was the first guy who was there to help me,\u201d said Wendell Grouby Jr., Cabrera\u2019s battle buddy in Alpha Company.<\/p>\n
Cabrera, 22, endured a 17-hour flight Sunday from Guam\u2014the longest trip made by any Alpha Company cadet. He is the only cadet in his company from the island.<\/p>\n
Saipan, with a population of 70,000, is Cabrera\u2019s home island. It is in the Northern Mariana Islands, a string of 15 islands that are a three-hour flight from major Asian cities such as Tokyo and Hong Kong.<\/p>\n
One hurdle some cadets attending the course from outside the mainland U.S. encounter is a language barrier. But Cabrera conquered that issue long ago when he attended a private high school that forbade students from speaking any language other than English.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou would pretty much get punished,\u201d he said. \u201cThey\u2019d give you cleaning detail and all that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Last year, Cabrera moved to nearby Guam to attend the University of Guam, where he is majoring in marketing in hopes of going into public affairs after graduation.
\nIn 1994, the University of Guam\u2019s ROTC program was named the Triton Warrior Battalion to more appropriately convey the strength of these cadets and cadre. That program is the main reason Cabrera chose to attend.<\/p>\n
While Cabrera wishes there was a course like LTC closer to home, he is still optimistic about being a part of the training at Knox.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was looking at enlisting, and I wanted to give this thing a shot because I also wanted to finish my degree,\u201d he said. \u201cSo I kind of wanted to kill two birds with one stone.\u201d<\/p>\n
He was encouraged to attend LTC by cadets who attended in the past. His family influenced his decision as well.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy dad\u2019s brother, he\u2019s a captain in Hawaii,\u201d Cabrera said. \u201cHe\u2019s been giving me a heads up on what to expect in the program.\u201d<\/p>\n
He also has cousins who are enlisted soldiers, some of whom are stationed in Afghanistan. Most of Cabrera\u2019s family is home waiting for him to return to Saipan, including his 3-year-old daughter, Miana.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve caught her sometimes saluting her mother,\u201d he said, \u201cor I\u2019ll catch her saying \u2018Hooah\u2019 just out of nowhere.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cabrera is proud, yet surprised his little girl has picked up his habits by watching him. The admiration is obvious, but Cabrera can\u2019t ignore that his little girl will be without her father while he is away.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe is not liking the whole thing that I live on a different island,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Miana is home with her mother on Saipan. Cabrera is assured that their daughter won\u2019t have to share another parent with the Army, however. On Saipan, Miana\u2019s mother works part-time for the ROTC program at Northern Marianas College, but has no interest to serve in uniform.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe feels my pain, so to speak,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Of course, Cabrera faced more pressing issues than leaving his daughter and her mother behind. Fort Knox is 14 hours behind the time in Guam.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe drill sergeants do a good job of taking my mind off of the time difference and jet leg,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
There is no specific method for getting used to the time change so quickly, said Sgt. Daniel Sisto, an Alpha Company drill sergeant.<\/p>\n
\u201cTruthfully, until its lights out, we are just constantly doing training,\u201d he said. \u201cThey are basically moving at all times.\u201d<\/p>\n
The main advice he gives is for schools to help cadets adjust even before they arrive at LTC.<\/p>\n
\u201cTheir school needs to say, \u2018Hey, maybe don\u2019t sleep at all until that night you get there and then sleep a full night,\u201d Sisto said.<\/p>\n
Restlessness cannot be an issue at the course, Sisto said, because \u201cwhen they get here, everyone has to train the same.\u201d<\/p>\n
When Cabrera finishes the course, he will return to his university for another two years before he graduates.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m trying to get this whole thing done so we can get our lives jump-started,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Most every cadet comes to the Leader\u2019s Training Course with a fear. A fear of heights, a fear of water or a fear of having no control.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-152827","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/152827","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=152827"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/152827\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=152827"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=152827"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=152827"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}