August 5, 2023 • 48 mins
Delve into the remarkable journey of U.S. Marine from 3/1 Infantry Battalion. Cpl. Sharma unveils poignant and harrowing experiences - from the profound impact of encountering his first enemy kia on the battlefield to enduring weeks without a single shower. Raw and unfiltered, he bravely opens up about his personal struggle with PTSD, taking us through the depths of his emotional battles. As the black sheep of his family, he defied all expectations, fearlessly choosing to stand up and fight for his country against all odds. Brace yourself for an inspiring and truly motivating narrative that will leave you cheering, "Hooorah!"
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Hey, what's up guys?
This is your boy, NelsonMartinez.
Robledo.
Welcome to Combat Mike.
And today we got a Marine,finally a Marine Joe.
The fuck, man.
It's hard, bro.
We're all looking for crayonsall the time and I don't blame
you though.
That's why they're out of stockat the stores now, but let's
introduce our guest brother.
You want to introduce yourself?
(00:21):
Hey, what's going on, man?
Rahul Sharma, 3rd Battalion, 1stMarines, Cap, Platoon, Machine
Gunner.
Damn.
How y'all doing?
Good, good, brother.
Thank you, man.
Thank you for coming on.
It's an honor to have you onhere, man.
So without further ado, let'sjump into that Combat Mike story
if you want to share with us.
Yeah, man.
So we're posted up at a L.
(00:42):
P.
O.
P.
Along MSR Golden.
Just sitting there, minding ourown fucking business.
Little Toyota Corolla fuckingcomes up and down the road and
I'm like, Yo, what the fuck'sgoing on?
We had our seven ton are 80 onesclose to the road.
I was with Sawyer Staff SergeantHeart and Sergeant Mendez at the
time in the vehicle.
I was a gunner.
Sorry was the driver and we justbeen fucking around.
(01:06):
Like fuck.
Yeah, we're ready for a bite.
Ready for a bite.
And we're boots at this fuckingpoint.
Our first deployment.
We don't fucking know anybetter.
We're all excited to get shot atand shit.
And here comes this littlefucking Toyota, man.
Just fucking circling.
Had four dudes poke out withsome fucking AKs.
And start unloading on us.
And the 7 ton calls fucking atick.
Troops in contact.
(01:27):
So we peel from our position.
I'm up in the gun on the fucking240.
And we start fucking rocking androlling at these motherfuckers.
And there's a semi coming downthe fucking road.
And old Haji man, fuckin I guesshe slammed on his brakes and he
got out.
And Mark Bevins, he was our Mark19 gunner and one of the other
Humbies, told me he had a fuckingun.
(01:47):
So dude's trying to hideunderneath this truck.
And I've never seen amotherfucker be more meticulous
with an indirect fire fuckinweapon, man.
Precision.
Oh, Bevins! Starts lighting upas a big motherfucker.
You talking about a crown eatingmotherfucking talk slow like
this.
fucking came to a gun fight Thatdude was fucking on.
(02:08):
Boy, man.
So he starts lighting the frontof this fucking semi up and he
sees, oh, hodge man, fuckingduck.
Dive underneath the fuckingfront of the truck.
He's bouncing rounds and blowsthe shit out of this fucking
dude while the rest of the guysare fucking engaged in that
vehicle.
And that was, I think the firsttime I saw my dead body in
combat and it's something that Iwon't fucking ever forget.
(02:29):
Like dude's fucking shit wasjust split half open.
Like you got H, HEDP roundsfucking going in at you at a 40
mic.
Ain't gonna be fucking noneleft.
Hell no.
That's f crazy.
So where did that happen at?
It was in 2005 in in Haditha,man.
This was right outside ofHaditha, actual in between the
(02:52):
dam and Al Asad airbase.
But we were just on our little fLBOP post, list and observation
post.
Just watching the roads,watching for anybody digging
around, f around.
And yeah, I think that was thefirst one that we got into it.
And it's one that's always stuckout because once that happened
and we started to fuckingconsolidate, there's a little
(03:12):
compound that we rolled up onwhere the vehicle had driven
into and I guess there was aback door that they got out of,
we pull up to this fucking placeand the dude's got a couple of
fucking Mercedes parked up in agarage and shit.
It's yo, what's really fuckinggoing on?
Let's go investigate this shit.
Yeah, that's that's where I gotmy.
(03:33):
Yeah, he's got all the goodfuckin hashish and the fuckin
heroin hidin in the fuckin backof his fuckin co chasing jacket,
bitches.
We found a lot of hashish in ourfirst deployment.
Yeah, oh yeah.
Damn, that's crazy.
Shit, the first deployment wefound a shit ton of hashish, but
the second deployment when wewere on the 13th MEU, and we
went into, we were outside ofCop Golden, outside of Fallujah
(03:55):
and TQ I think the bestdiscovery we ever found was a
field full of fucking raggy.
Damn.
That's fucking hot tea forwatermelons.
Shit.
That was the shit, bro.
We were on fucking QRF and we'rejust doing our fucking thing.
And they call us and they'relike, Hey, we got his fucking
motherfuckers.
They're transporting this shit.
We don't know what the fuck itis.
We get up over there.
(04:16):
It's chucks full of fuckingwatermelon, bro Best and worst
fucking experience because i'mlike, oh fuck we're about to get
some shit And then we pulled upit's fucking watermelons best
fucking treat we had in fuckingcountry That's fucking crazy
fucking moon dust fuckingcamera, right?
Oh, yeah, dude.
That was I think that was theworst fucking camp I've ever
been a part of was fucking, butthe golden showers were amazing.
(04:38):
Oh, man.
Wow, nice.
Sounds interesting.
Oh, it didn't matter if you tooka shower.
As soon as you walked out ofthat bitch, you were dirty,
right?
Yeah, you're a fucking sugarcookie, man.
All that moon dust.
Like you got wet, you gotfucking sweaty.
You're fucking covered in dust.
It didn't matter nothing.
(04:58):
So fine.
Like it was so fine.
The dust was so fine.
It wasn't like.
You just hit it like that.
It was like a big old fuckingclub, like fucking big.
Yeah, I'm still wiping that shitout of my cracks.
Oh damn it.
It was quite the experience,man.
I think with Weapons Company meand Robledo we did a couple of
things together.
(05:19):
For the most part, I think wewere in different sections.
The entire yeah.
I was gonna ask man talkingabout being dirty, as soon as
you get out.
So what was the longest periodof time you guys went without a
shower out there?
Ooh, fuck.
I'd probably say it was like for21 days, I think.
21 days?
I think it was 30.
Yeah.
(05:39):
21 days.
It was three weeks, man.
When we were doing that pushinto into Haditha and they
wouldn't like, we had the hotshowers, but we couldn't fucking
use them.
No, and then we would get thereand it would be like, Hey,
there's no water.
Wait till next time, dude.
All the fucking cooks were niceand clean though, motherfuckers
making their powdered eggs,bullshit.
(05:59):
I want to say it was about thesame fucking time for us, man.
There was a period of time whereyou're just pushing into new
territory.
There isn't any time to fuckingpull out and go back.
There's no rest, no nothing.
You just keep going and going.
I remember that time we gotback, dude, because we were
living in tents back at the FOB,right?
When everybody, I was like oneof the first ones to make it to
(06:20):
the fucking showers, dude.
When I come back into the tent,holy shit, man.
It smelled like I just fuckingsnorted a fucking booty hole,
bro.
That shit reeked.
Hey, you know what?
That's when the trend fuckingstarted, eating ass right there.
Yeah, there you go.
I was like, so that's what ittastes like.
(06:41):
I was surprised a lot ofmotherfuckers didn't have pink
eye just walking into a goddamntent.
Yeah.
It's mob level four, fuckingjust walking in there.
We needed right, bro.
Yeah, it was a crazy time, man,but it was probably the fucking
best time of my life.
I can say that for sure.
(07:01):
Yeah.
So growing up.
I was fucking born in India.
Everybody looks at me and startstalking Spanish.
I'm like, I know nothing.
I'm not from this place.
I don't know what, bro.
That's awesome.
You want a slurpee?
I got you, mother bitch.
A slurpee?
So what made you decide to jointhe military, man?
(07:23):
And why the Marines?
It was a couple of things, man.
9 11 happened when I was ajunior in high school, and I'm
sitting in my fucking economicsclass, and my teacher at the
time, I fucking won't forget it,Mr.
Broussard, put it on the TV.
He's hey, I don't want toshelter you from the world, but
here's what's going on.
(07:44):
There's a lot of bad people.
One of my really good friends,Kevin Miller he'd been talking
to a marine recruiter and he'shey dawg, I'm fucking joining
up.
I was like, okay, fuck it Let'sgo and for me being east indian
you know dealing with racism isone of those things like they
don't talk about indians or likeeven with latinos They don't
talk about us having to dealwith fucking racist shit Like I
(08:07):
got my ass jumped my parentsrestaurant at the time got
fucking vandalized And I waslike, you know what?
Fuck that shit, bro.
I'm gonna go show thesemotherfuckers.
What's up?
And the real reason that Ijoined the Marine Corps was to
really piss my dad off.
Him and I never, we never gotalong, man.
My older brothers, I'm theyoungest of three.
My older brothers went tofucking college and doing this,
(08:27):
that, or the other.
And I was always the fuckingblack sheep.
So being a fucking immigrant.
If you don't act like everybodyelse you're in the Indian
culture, you're whitewashed So Iwas the fucking black sheep that
was whitewashed I was a punk kidfucking skateboarding fucking
nails painted in a littlefucking band, whatever.
Yeah, so I was like, you knowwhat?
Fuck you dad.
(08:47):
I'm gonna go join the fuckingMarines So the crazy thing is I
actually went to boot camp in2002 Broke my wrist, got
medically separated, went back ayear later, just because I was
like, you know what, I fuckingdecided to do this, and I'm not
gonna fucking stop, so I wentback in like a fucking idiot,
(09:09):
and here we are.
Now, I really respect thatcommitment, man, pushing through
and getting it done, bro, thatmeans a lot.
That's why you're a Marine,right?
Fuck it.
Cause I don't know any better.
So I gotta ask this what is,what flavor of crayon is your
preference?
Oh man, the key lime.
(09:30):
It goes great with pie.
It goes great with a nicefucking whiskey.
Like it's almost a sea foamgreen.
So you could do like seafood,but it also equates to dessert.
Delicious.
There you go.
Delicious.
Awesome.
No, that's what's up man.
So how many deployments did youguys do?
I did two with with 3 1 the oneto Haditha and then the 13th Mew
(09:53):
and a lot of crazy shit inbetween when we were back, man.
I think one of the stories meand Robledo touched on when we
met up at Justin's fight here acouple weeks ago was a gas lamp
incident.
I was just a violentmotherfucker, always.
I've always had this fuckinglevel of aggression.
I don't know, it's cause,like...
I had this chip on my shoulderto fucking prove something.
Being Indian, and being in thefucking Marine Corps, like my
(10:16):
balls were fucking busted blue,right?
So growing up, being Indian, inthe Central Valley of
California, with a name likefucking Raul, if you didn't
speak Spanish, you were gettingyour fucking ass beat, because
all the other Latinos were like,Oh, this fucking motherfucker
thinks he's better than us.
I always had it's always been afucking fight, man.
I'm going to digress a littlebit growing up in India, fucking
just dirt poor poverty, didn'tknow shit.
(10:39):
I didn't even know I had a daduntil I was six years old.
I got a fucking flight out toCalifornia.
So then I'm living with.
my dad and my two brothers forabout seven years without my
mom.
And I think just a lot offucking anger because I'm a
young kid in a new country.
I don't speak the language.
I don't know the customs andcourtesies.
So it's just a lot of anger justpent up from there and just
(10:59):
built.
And then the Marine Corps wasreally my fucking released.
Like I can go fightmotherfuckers.
I can go be a fucking badass,whatever.
And so touching back on thatstory and in the gas lamp, we're
out fucking drinking, justhaving a good time.
And all I see is some dudefucking mouthing off one of my
boys and Governal gets up in themix.
He's like fucking jucking,diving on this fucking dude and
(11:21):
I just step in and homie throwslike 20 fucking punches, misses
every one of them.
I just rock back, bow, pop himonce, fucking hit him so hard he
does a 180 face plants and hislittle fuck, his boyfriend,
whatever the fuck he was withhim, he's all trying to take
pictures of me and Governal.
I look back, Governor all runsup, kicks that dude that I just
(11:42):
knocked out right in the fuckingface, drives his fucking phone,
smashes it.
We're all fucking dressed up inour American Eagle fucking
button down skinny jeans andfucking shoes.
And the fucking, the bike copscome and they're like, hey cops.
Me and this fucking dude, wefucking sprint, rip off our
shirts, go like three blocks up,three blocks over, and come back
(12:03):
all out of breath.
In fucking white t shirts.
You're like, hey, what's goingon?
You guys okay?
What's all the cops over here?
What's going on?
So yeah, we got into a lot ofshit like and there's another
time down there that fuckingstrip club right outside of MCR
D Make sure you Watch what yousay, because he's open to the a,
(12:25):
it was a strip club there.
So me, Justin Governell, JustinSawyer there, right?
And Sawyer's just gone.
This boy can drink like a fish,but when he's drunk, like he,
you'll see every bit of it.
And me and Governell are lookingfor him.
We see him.
He's coming back.
He's all distraught.
He's hey dawg, what's up?
He's these two fucking boots,they told me they were
lieutenants and they tried totake my money and this and that.
(12:48):
I'm like, where they at?
Where they at?
So me and Governor, I'll justlose our shit, like you're not
fucking with our boy.
We get to fuck with our boy, notyou.
So we go outside, and he pointsat these two dudes talking to
some chick in a little fuckingfour doors without even thinking
any question.
I just look at Sora, I'm like,that's them?
He's yeah, and Governor's let'sget it, dawg.
(13:12):
Dude, I run up, I crack thefucking homie right in the back
of the head, and I'm like,what's up, bitch?
You're a fucking lieutenant.
What's up?
I'm a fucking private.
Governor just starts kickingthis other dude in the leg.
So he falls in like they're infucking tears.
Like we're boots.
We're in the fleet at this time,but these fuckers are still at
SOI.
Not gonna happen, bro.
(13:33):
We knocked these dudes out andwe look at Sawyer's like, how
much money did they take fromyou?
He's 20 bucks.
They're like, all right, go tothis guy's wallet, pull out a
20, leave them there and getSawyer's money back.
So they actually took money fromhim.
What's that?
So they actually took money fromyour boy?
Yeah, they took a 20 from him.
So I was like, you're not goingto take any money from my
(13:53):
brother.
Fuck that.
That's fucking crazy, man.
That's my job.
He's going to buy me beer.
They got what they deserve.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
Typical Marine Corps Knight.
3 1 especially.
Transitioning through all thisas far as PTSD, have you seeked
help?
How are you mentally?
You good?
Did it cut off again?
There we go.
(14:14):
Yeah.
We got you loud and clear.
All right.
Cool.
We can't see the camera though.
Oh, come on, man.
What's going on here?
I could.
There you go.
There we go.
There it is.
For an Indian, I should bebetter at technology.
I can talk all day.
Yeah I did deal with it and itgot pretty bad at one point.
(14:35):
I was drinking myself to deathdamn near, and then I had my
first kid, and it still didn'tgo away I was in Sacramento at
the time I went to the VA forhelp, and the most that they
could offer me was Lunesta,Ambien, up my dosage which
really fucking made it worse,man it got to the point where,
My baby girl was probably aboutfour months and I put a fucking
(14:59):
gun in my mouth because I justcouldn't deal with it.
That's crazy.
I couldn't deal with it.
The only thing that fuckingpulled me through to this day I
say she's my saving grace was mybaby girl.
I heard her crying and I fuckingsnapped out of this funk that I
was in and it's what the fuck amI doing, man yeah, I'm a fucking
dad now, like I can't fuckinggive up.
(15:19):
I didn't give up the first timeI fucking broke my shit in boot
camp.
Why am I letting this get to me?
And I realized a lot of thesefucking sleeping pills, this
medicine and shit that theyprescribe, it doesn't help, man.
It doesn't.
All it does is it puts a fuckingminor band aid if it even works
for you.
For me, it didn't work.
Yeah, it numbs you toeverything.
There's, I love fucking music.
(15:41):
There's a great fucking song.
I don't agree with a lot of theshit that this dude says, but
there's a song by Macklemorecalled Drug Dealer.
And in it, one of the fuckingverses is my drug dealer was a
doctor and he got the plug fromBig Pharma.
He tried to kill me for adollar.
And like that shit fuckingresonated so much with me, man.
Cause it's like, why don't wetry the fucking holistic
(16:04):
approach?
Like Marijuana, fuckin is agreat fuckin tool that, that
helps to fuckin calm the minddown.
There's sativa, there's indica,there's different fuckin
strains.
And it's proven.
Harvard's doin fuckin studies onit.
Harvard, Stanford, they've donestudies on fuckin mushrooms, on
psychedelics.
And even fuckin DMT for dealinwith fuckin PTSD.
(16:26):
It's just, there's such a stigmaaround it that they'd rather
promote big pharma than thesefuckin independent people.
Like obviously marijuana islegal in fucking California,
Colorado, fucking ArizonaOklahoma and plenty of other
states.
Yeah.
So I think it's now time to pushto get this legalized, man.
Instead of these fucking pillsthat have all this shit in
(16:47):
there, turn to a more naturalapproach.
Yeah.
And I think it's coming.
I think that whole marijuanathing, I think it's growing and
there's more studies that aregoing to come out.
A lot of vets that, that I knowand talk to, they use marijuana,
and it helps, so I think it'sdefinitely coming to the VA,
man, I hope it does.
In the state of Texas, there isa care law that you can utilize
(17:10):
it for PTSD.
I've got, there's a link on thestudy that they have and the
regulations.
If you want Jose, I'll send itover to you.
I can't call you.
It's Robledo.
Fuck it.
I'm sorry.
That was a mistake.
There you go.
My bad.
What did I tell you?
What did I stopped all thefucking...
The pills and shit.
Like I found out that to shut mymind down, I got to wear my body
(17:34):
out.
And that's when I picked uprugby.
So I started playing rugby outin California and I did that for
four years.
Like after two or three fuckingsessions, I couldn't think
anymore.
I was just fucking tired.
So I translated that.
And that's when I started havingthat realization, as it gets,
you have to face it.
You can't run away from yourfears.
(17:54):
You can't run away from yourtroubles.
You have to acknowledge that youwent through some shit that
other people haven't.
You have to acknowledge that youweren't alone there.
And you really have to fuckingreach out and talk to your
brothers.
There's a handful of guys that Italk to on a regular basis.
I, obviously I keep in touchwith you now.
Cause I got your number,Robledo.
I talk to Green.
I talk to Governal.
(18:15):
I talk to Eric Farrell.
Ronnie Nolfe, Matt Haviland, andthere's a whole group of guys
that just randomly fucking texthim, Hey, what's up, what's
going on?
And I've been blessed here in inLiberty Hill, Texas the jujitsu
gym I train at is about 90%fucking veterans and Leos.
So I've got maybe five or sixfucking Marines that are here.
(18:36):
I didn't serve with them, butthey're still Marines.
We've got a shit ton of armyguys.
We got a couple of Navy boys andeven a fucking puddle pirate
that trains in there and, it'sjust that camaraderie, man, I
think that's what you miss themost.
It's not the organization, it'sthe fucking people that made
that place and that's what youfucking miss.
And I've told my wife plenty oftimes I've told some of the
(18:59):
other Marines around here that Ifucking talked to the shit going
on in Ukraine.
If it fuckin pops off, I woulddo it again in a fuckin
heartbeat if I had the samefuckin guys that I was with in
Iraq.
Heartbeat.
No fuckin questions asked.
Fuck yeah.
And that's what it is, man.
It's you start off hatin oneanother cause you're fuckin
different and you don't knowanything about the other guy.
(19:19):
My, my best fuckin friend,Justin Sawyer.
I hated that fucking bitch withthe fucking, we were in fucking
boot camp together.
This dude picks a fucking fightin the fucking squad way, squad
bay after fucking shower timewith this other fucking kid who
was a fucking pogue.
Yeah.
Did you guys get dressed?
No.
(19:39):
I had a towel on and fuckingshower shoes.
It gets better.
So Sawyer's this guy's a fuckingPogue man, he's picking on me.
I was like, all right, bitch,handle your business.
You're a fucking wrestler fromfucking Michigan.
What's up?
Damn.
And this dude said somethingthat that I thought he was
talking to me, but he wastalking to Sawyer.
So I'm standing there shaving myface.
I got shaving cream all over myface.
(20:01):
In my fucking shower shoes,towel around my fucking balls,
and this dude just saidsomething, bro.
I lost my shit.
I just turn around and startfucking jacking this dude.
Towel flies off, drillinstructor runs in.
AHHH! I got my fucking danglinghanging out, I'm fucking
punching this dude.
What the fuck?
I was like, I didn't even knowwhat to say.
(20:22):
I went to fucking pray rest.
It's just my fucking dickhanging out He's put a fucking
towel on Never got in troublebefore or nothing.
So I was like, all right, cool.
It's over when I graduated whenwe graduated Yeah, Joe Spector,
fucking Staff Sergeant Smithcame up to me, he goes, if I
ever have to look at yourfucking cock again,
(20:43):
motherfucker, I'm going to cutit off.
You're a fucking Marine now.
My bad.
And now you're best friends withthis guy.
Man, I love this kid.
I fucking do anything forSawyer, man.
And he's the guy that, that wegot into a fight for at that
strip club that I was tellingyou about and that's the funny
thing about the Marine Corps islike you are any branch of the
(21:05):
military, really you come fromdifferent backgrounds, you come
from different fuckinglifestyles.
Like I've known a couple of guysbootcamp.
And I've known people that havecome from poverty that had
nothing much like myself, but wedon't know anything about one
another and we get put into thissituation where you're either
gonna end up liking one another,you might save in their fucking
(21:27):
life, but at the end of the day,that motherfucker is going to
become your brother, you mayhate him.
But you fucking love them at thesame time and that's one of the
realizations that I've had overthe years is All these fucking
memories like I look back andnow everybody's got a
smartphone.
Everybody's got a fucking cameraI wish we'd taken more fucking
pictures together, man, just torelive everything.
Yeah I gotta sit in a situationthere's actually an episode that
(21:51):
we're gonna release One of mybuddies that we became really
good friends.
And same shit, man.
We hate each other.
We're about to, we squared upone day, we're about to throw it
down and now fuck, man we'reboys, so yeah, I know exactly
what you're talking about.
Any, did any thoughts aboutreenlisting or if not, what did
you do right after the military,man?
(22:11):
I did have thoughts ofreenlisting men like at the
time, Captain Haney, he came tome.
He's Hey you're good enoughMarine.
I think you should reenlist.
And this was that transitionwhere Iraq was ending and they
didn't know what else was goingto happen.
This is before even Afghanistan.
Came a thing and they went topeacetime Marine Corps man, and
they're doing fucking you got togo to this force You got to do
(22:33):
footlocker fucking thisinspection that inspection
fucking height and weightrequirements Even the first
class BFT like I got a fucking Igot a negative counseling For
being slightly above my fuckingweight and it was just like
you're gonna knock me for thisshit But forget everything else
that I've done.
Nah, I think it's time for me tobow out man.
(22:55):
You know what?
I'll do my time and get the fuckout right after I got out
Actually worked for a biosciencecompany.
I was doing ag research allthroughout, California had no
training in it But if you showme some A couple of times after
that, I'll fly solo.
So I worked for them for about ayear and a half going up and
down the California coast,central valley.
(23:18):
I flew out to Israel, flew outto Chile, just doing plant
growth regulators.
So basically we were given greatsteroids so the farmers could
have an earlier harvest, earlieryield.
And found out my fiance at thetime was pregnant.
So we got married, ended upgoing into a sales.
(23:38):
Obviously I can talk shit allfucking day long, so I can tell
you whatever ended up going intosales for HVAC, man, and I did
that for about four, four and ahalf years.
And my wife got a job offer outhere in Texas.
So it's fuck it.
I don't have anything lined up,but I'll find something.
Let's go.
I want to support you.
I want to be there for you.
At this time we've had.
(23:59):
We had two girls, so we movedout to Texas.
She was doing interior design ata company I was working at
cheaper than dirt because theyhad a storefront in Central
Texas in Round Rock.
And so once working there justsaw a dude walk in a couple of
times, had a Marine vet hat on,got the opportunity to talk to
him, just gave him, greatcustomer service, was attentive,
(24:20):
wasn't trying to sell him anytype of bullshit, answered all
his questions.
He handed me a card right aroundNew Year's.
He's hey man, you ever get tiredof this shit?
Here, give me a call.
Didn't even look at the card,put it in my pocket.
I was like, bro, they paid me toplay with guns.
I'm solid, I'm good.
So I get back home, my wife'sdoing my laundry.
She's hey, what's this?
Who's this vice president thatyou talked to?
I was like, oh fuck, I don'tknow.
(24:41):
It's a guy named Jeff.
He came in.
I guess he was the vicepresident of a multi million
dollar fucking company that diddisaster recovery.
Damn, dude, that's nice.
After New Year's, took him up onhis offer.
I called him, went in for aninterview.
He goes, you're hired.
What do you want to get paid?
I'm like, I was making 15 overhere.
If I can get 20, I'll come workfor you.
He was like, okay, you got it.
(25:01):
Fuck.
Yeah.
And then I was with them forabout six years, man.
Traveled all over the fuckingcountry.
I went to Canada, Puerto Rico.
We had some jobs right up inEurope, but that kind of fell
through.
So every major hurricane thathappened since 2015 tornado.
Fire, whatever.
We were there.
We were doing all the disastercleanup.
(25:22):
We were doing, we were dealingwith the bird flu, Ebola, all
that shit.
So again, no training in it.
Just on the job, fucking tellingme what to do.
And I started out as asupervisor.
By the time I left, I was aproject manager after Hurricane
Harvey.
I was running Ingleside ISD, andthat was about, say, 75 million
project that I did by myself.
(25:43):
From there, I went to PuertoRico, and from there, I went to
Florida.
Florida had two productionfacilities that were like 100
million, so it just kept goingup and up.
Money was amazing, travelinghere, there, everywhere, but I
wasn't around my kids.
About three years ago, I made adecision.
My youngest daughter was four atthe time and she says, Daddy, I
(26:05):
miss you.
When are you going to come homeand stay home?
And I just fucking hit hard,man.
I've been poor.
I've been rich or well off.
And what the fuck am I doingthis for?
I'm doing it for my kids, butI'm not making memories.
I'm just making money.
Exactly.
Money I can make at any fuckingtime.
Memories I can't.
It just goes back to that timewhere I wish I had a fucking
(26:26):
camera.
You know what I mean?
Big pictures of the shit we did,the time we spent.
And that just clicked in myhead, man.
Like, all of it it just cametogether like a puzzle piece.
Okay, fuck it.
I'm gonna be a stay at home dad.
I got the disability checkcoming in from the VA.
Got it up to 100%.
I started going to college.
And I'm a fat kid.
I like to eat.
(26:46):
Started toying around with somefucking recipes.
And about two years ago, man, Istarted my own company.
It's called Bombs Away.
Barbecue.
I do barbecues barbecue sauces,salsas, and caterings.
And it's just something I dobecause I'm passionate about it
and something that I get my kidsinvolved in.
So it's just, it's something Ican leave behind for them that's
(27:06):
not just money.
And that's where I find my happyplace now.
So that's what I'm doing.
Dude, that's badass, man.
So how did you narrow it down tobarbecue, man?
Me and Indian, we have a lot offlavors and I'm in Texas.
So you've got the Texas smoke Itook.
It's called Tex Jab.
So a Texan with a punjab.
You take all these flavors andyou combine it with that smoke.
(27:28):
Robledo tried that pulled pork Ibrought down there.
And just take the garlic, thecardamom, the cumins the
tumerics and just rub it in,man, and just use the Texas
smoke and that heat and thatsolid barbecue and just put it
all together.
Shit sounds pretty, pretty good.
All wants to do is put his meatin everyone's mouth.
(27:48):
Hey, that's my goal in life.
You're next.
You're next.
I was already there.
He's next.
I'm, he's, it definitely sounds,and I know Roberto, you said you
got some events coming up.
Down there in the valley, bro.
Let me know.
I love to just bring the smokerdown there and beat a bunch of
people and put your name outthere and whatever we got to do.
(28:10):
Yeah, no, for sure, man.
Yeah, so we joined, I started apainting company.
It's already been two yearswhere we select a veteran every
year and we paint their house.
So this year we're about torelease.
Sorry, I couldn't help, but lookat that cup, man you still eat
in and out over water burger.
This is just a drink, sir.
(28:31):
There's no hamburgers in myhand.
My kids don't know any better.
My kids don't know any better.
So they like the burgers.
I like the drink.
All right.
All right.
We're clear.
All right.
Go back to this.
So yeah.
So yeah, dude.
We released the flyer about.
March, April, and then we starttaking nominations till October
(28:51):
and then about the last week midor mid October, we select the
veteran and everything's basedon necessity.
You know what I mean?
So people have to write a littleshort email talking about the
vet.
And then we make a selectionbased on the house and yeah,
man, so last year we had a bunchof volunteers.
We had a actual barbecue companyactually come out and to the
(29:13):
people.
So man, come out and help uswith that.
That'd be amazing, man.
Absolutely, brother.
Yeah, you tell me time andplace, man.
I'll do lunch slash dinner oneday for everybody that's there.
Hell, I'll get my hands dirtywhile the meat smoking.
I love doing demo, man.
That's for disaster recovery.
That's what I did, man.
Down in Louisiana where italways floods.
We did we did section eighthousing.
(29:34):
We did a bunch of housing blocksand I was gutting out 2000
square foot houses a day.
So that's crazy.
I can't put shit together, butif you want me to break it
apart, you call the brains.
I can push it together.
I got that part.
So the where we went to is aveteran business outreach
(29:55):
center.
I don't know if you ever heardof the branch over there, Austin
or something, but I don't liketo go to Austin.
No, no one does, but I'm sayinglike cause now how homeless
people are there, whatever,going crazy and shit.
That's where we got help too.
Okay, your business plan andeverything to get our shit going
(30:16):
to get everything going So thisbetter Veterans Business
Outreach Center VBOC is aprogram based off of the small
business association So they'rea program dedicated to veterans
and helping them start abusiness and helping you create
a business plan And actuallygoing through a long process if
need be.
So in case you ever wanted toexpand your business, That's a
(30:39):
source there, man.
One of my buddies that I went toschool here at the university
he's actually the one in chargehere.
And I think they're in charge ofCause right now, Paul, out of
Texas, bro.
Something like that, because hewas over there in Houston.
Yeah they travel and givePresentations about VBuck and
stuff, man.
Have you ever been thinkingabout expanding or setting up
shop somewhere, or...
Yeah, that's definitely comingdown the pipe, man.
(31:01):
So my, I've already got mybusiness plan.
I've got enough funds from thesale of our house.
We're trying to close on a pieceof property right now where it's
going to be self sustainablefarming.
Like we're doing rain catchingsystems.
We're going to have a coupleheads of cattle.
Obviously we got wild game outthere.
So I include that in my mealprep menu.
Cause I do about it.
(31:22):
60 to 70 meals a week for a lotof the guys at my gym and just
local customers I have here.
So I'm growing the businessslowly cause I don't want to
overextend myself.
So now that I'm three monthsaway from getting my bachelor's
in project management use my GIbill for that.
That's when I'm going to take itto the next step.
So this land closes, we'vealready got enough capital set
(31:43):
up beside to where I'm going toget a food truck and be more
mobile.
That's the plan like a brick andmortar during this time just
doesn't make sense because Idon't know what the 19th 20th
fucking variation of Kobe it'sgoing to be and they're going to
shut that shit down and, all thefucking overhead.
This way.
I'm outdoors man and it's just,it's more natural it's more
(32:05):
organic like you, you pull upand it's like a chuck wagon in
the old fucking days.
I got the smoker going.
I got the plates ready to go.
You fucking come in, eat, getthe fuck out of my life.
That's what I want.
Put my meat in your mouth andgo.
There you go.
Come back tomorrow.
Take it and go fuck off.
(32:25):
Oh man.
Yeah man, that's that's what Igot going on in my neck of the
woods.
So if y'all are ever up here,hell, come on by.
I'll make sure you eat good.
And drink plenty of whiskey too.
No, bro.
No, no whiskey.
No whiskey.
Jose Robledo is hurting rightnow, dude.
I can tell.
He's sleeping over there.
(32:46):
Yeah.
I drank till what, 5.
30?
Something like that.
I tried to go to sleep early.
Technically, I did.
5.
30 is good.
It's early enough.
In the morning, right?
I don't want to say nothing badin front of your buddies, bro,
but I put them to sleep theother day, bro.
I was fucking tired.
He was already tired.
(33:07):
The sun was in his eyes.
He had a little paint in thereand he just got sleepy bear.
Yes sir.
The funny thing is, we weredrinking at this place.
I guess it's a bar.
Ojos Locos.
You've probably heard of it ornot.
So somehow I was fucked up.
We didn't get kicked out.
I fell asleep on the table andthey just kept bringing us beer
(33:30):
and we just kept drinking.
I don't know how the hell we didnot get kicked out of the room.
Hey, there's nothing wrong withthat.
As long as you're taking a napin your house.
I was doing it like this.
I was like this.
The funny thing is that.
I was looking through somepictures a month later and now I
just happen to scroll like whatthe fuck like joseph's sleep and
then Oh shit.
It was at that bar.
We didn't even remember thatshit, but definitely good
(33:51):
fucking time Those are the bestman.
Look.
Hey, i'll trade you sleep.
I'll trade sleep cycles withanybody right now, bro I've got
six kids like I don't get nofucking sleep My pull out game
sucks nice Yeah, my pull outgames like the u.
s military in iraq.
Oh, we're gonna do it.
I promise Oh, never mind.
(34:11):
How do you feel after thisconversation?
I know you had a story, feltlike you dropped the pack.
Like you just expressed yourselfbasically.
Like for me, when I saw youguys, I was I had an anxiety
after I came back home.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm like, fuck, like it was sobadass.
with you guys again, like what?
15 years.
And I was like 15 years, man.
(34:33):
Yeah.
And nothing's changed, bro.
Like the human being I knew thenit's still the fucking great
human being now honestly, aftersharing this, I don't feel any
different because I've come toterms and I'm, I feel more
comfortable talking about it.
It's the guys that.
Play that fuckin machismo Fuckit, I'm a veteran fool, I'm not
gonna talk about shit cause I'ma hard No, you're not,
motherfucker.
(34:54):
It's okay to be fuckinvulnerable.
It's okay.
Nobody's here to fuckin judgeyou.
We're here for you.
I wanna hear what you've fuckinbeen through.
Cause at the end of the day,We're all going to fuckin this
place, right?
We have this fuckin goal.
Wha Whatever your goal is, mygoal is, It's something better
than we are today.
Tomorrow you want to be a betterversion of your fucking self,
but to get there you got to behonest with yourself And to be
(35:16):
honest with the people aroundyou don't fucking keep the shit
in Don't let the fucking demonstay in your fucking back, bro
let it out talk about it becausethe more you keep it in the
worse this fucking gets Andthat's the one thing that i've
discovered That's why I can'tshut the fuck up ever like my
wife kicks me out of the house.
It's like just shut up go Getout of here.
(35:38):
And that's my personal fuckingthing like everybody's got their
own fucking path in life manLike, we all want to be rich.
We want to be successful.
We want to be this we want to bethat's great That's your fucking
goal.
That's what you're aiming for Itdoesn't mean that we got to walk
the same path, right?
You got this windy fucking upand downhill that you had to
come through This motherfuckerover here swam through a fucking
river to get to where the fuckhe had to be But it's all trial
(35:59):
and fucking tribulation It's wehave to recognize that It's okay
to fucking talk.
It's okay to be vulnerable.
That people won't fucking judgeyou the more you talk about it.
It's like being a little fuckingkid off of a plane from India
and not knowing shit.
And having everybody make fun ofyou for the longest time.
(36:22):
that fucking just got under yourskin and you didn't know how to
fucking deal with it until youbecame a fucking marine and then
these guys that you're supposedto go to war with are fucking
busting your balls and one dayyou just fucking snap and you
use self deprecation and yourealize i'll take whatever this
is and i'll use it as a toolinstead of it being a fucking
weapon against me i'm going toturn it as a fucking tool so i'm
(36:44):
going to use the shit that i'vebeen through to mold the next
steps that i have to fuckingtake but i have to be
comfortable with where i've beenand to where i'm fucking going
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's awesome.
I'm happy to hear brother thatyou got that mentality.
Joey and I started this becausewe know some vets, man, and I've
(37:05):
met, I talked about it in aprevious episode that we're
going to release before yours.
When I go out and do estimates,man, there's still Vietnam vets
that haven't got out of thatstage.
You know what I mean?
They're still secluded.
They don't like going out.
They don't like talking topeople.
So it's 50 years now.
Yeah.
Think about it.
50 years.
So I'm glad, man that you'velearned to, to turn it on and
(37:29):
you know what you want to do inlife.
And my hat's off to you,brother, with that, and I hope
that other vets going throughshit right now, this is proof,
man, that it, that there is lifeat the end of the tunnel, man,
you just gotta focus onyourself, and if, if we could
fucking do it, you could fuckingdo it, because, shit, like Rahul
said, he had a fucking gun tohis mouth, bro, yeah.
(37:50):
And I've had a fucking rifle tomy fucking throat, too, you know
what I mean?
We've been there, but, you Whyfucking give up, man?
First, in my opinion, you gottalove yourself, bro, before you
do anything else.
You know what I mean?
Cause there's guys that don'thave family, they don't have
wife and kids.
But you just gotta love yourselfand do it for yourself.
Not because your mom's tellingyou or your brother's telling
(38:12):
you.
Do it for yourself.
That's the way I see it.
Yeah, apart from that familysetting, you've got a group of
fucking brothers you may nothave a wife, your parents may
have passed, you don't havekids, you've got brothers, man,
and just fucking reach out,don't be fucking afraid, we're
not gonna judge you, are wegonna bust your balls?
Abso fucking lutely, that's myway of telling you that I
fucking love you, and that's,it's that macho stigmata that,
(38:36):
that we had to fucking bear,it's that tough skin that we had
to fucking wear, you And forsome guys, it's easier to peel
that layer back, but a lot ofguys can't let go of it.
You mentioned the Vietnamveterans.
It's interesting cause I've gota guy that he was a fucking
warrant officer in the armyVietnam vet.
Lost his fucking toe.
I just happened to meet him herein town, and I'm fucking serving
(38:57):
my meals, and he come up, got afucking plate.
We got to talking.
And since that day I've checkedon this dude every fucking day.
He's had little projects.
I've gone over there and talkedto him.
Yeah.
And his wife, she said that...
I don't know what you did to myhusband, but he's more bearable
because he found somebody totalk to.
That's awesome.
And although there's that, thatfucking gap in between service
(39:20):
experience, what he wentthrough, what we went through,
it doesn't fucking matter.
At the end of the day we'restill that same warrior class.
That needs to just find somebodyto talk to, and if that's the
best avenue of approach forsomebody, whether you go talk to
a psychiatrist, a fuckingtherapist, or just call one of
your fucking brothers, be like,Hey, dawg, you remember that
fucking time we did this?
(39:41):
Yeah, you talk about it longenough, it doesn't become a
fucking sticking point in yourbrain.
It's something that you did, andnow you're fucking over it, and
you're past it.
Yeah, I agree.
Of course, we would all do itall over again, man.
But what is something...
That you miss the most from thefucking military.
Not having any responsibilities,just doing my fucking job.
(40:03):
Shit, I agree with that.
That's what we say all the time.
Sit in the turret.
Just stay alive.
Just stay alive.
Sit in the turret.
Do that.
Piss in a bottle.
And that's it.
Go back.
Clean my fucking weapon.
Yeah.
Yep.
That's true.
It was the most difficult andstressful situation of your
fucking life, but it was thesimplest fucking time.
(40:25):
Yeah.
Now I don't have to worry about.
I've got six kids.
All right.
Which one of you fuckers shityourself?
Who's got this lesson?
Who's got that lesson?
All right go clean your fuckingroom.
No mommy and daddy time.
Fuck.
Know what I mean?
So it was.
It was controlled chaos, man.
It was simplicity in the mostutter chaos fucking position you
(40:49):
could find yourself in.
But at the end of the day, likeRobledo said, do your fucking
job and that's it.
That's all we had to do.
Keep your weapon clean.
Shave your fucking face.
Keep your gear fucking not fromgetting blown up and destroyed
or anything and fucking keep iton you And when you got Joel
watch your brother six, man,that's all you had to do And at
(41:10):
the time you hated it you fuckthis motherfucker doing this
shit doing that shit I'll dothat in a fucking heartbeat
right now compared to all theresponsibilities we have here
now it's stupid simpleheartbeat.
Take me back.
Fuck it.
I guess only we understand thatBeing in there, right?
You told us to other people.
They're like, oh, that's reallyhard.
(41:30):
I'm like, no, I'm not saying,I'm not saying you don't want,
they don't understand one.
If they would get to experienceit, they would be like.
Yes.
It's, it is easiest.
Yeah, absolutely.
The other the other hardestthing that, that I've
discovered, I like to cuss alot, but to talk to me all time.
He's like trying to talk topeople like I was, I just had to
(41:54):
go to California,'cause myfather-in-law passed away.
So I took a day, we went down toFresno, Hey, Life happens, man.
I had to go talk to my mombecause my dad passed away two
years ago from cancer.
So I'm just talking to my momI'm, I get caught up in the
moment.
I'm like, hey mom, where thefuck is this shit?
Like, when are we fucking doingit?
She's like, why do you talk likethis?
Why is this foul mouth comingout?
(42:15):
I'm like, mom, that's just who Iam.
I'm, I'm a dumb jarhead.
That's how we talk.
That's my vernacular.
It's catching yourself.
Like when I'm at professionalsettings now, like when I go out
and I do caterings, I can't belike, Hey, motherfucker, you
want some of this meat?
Nah, fuck you.
Didn't you remember the hotpizza?
Motherfucker.
Pizza motherfucker! He died,man.
(42:36):
I know he died.
I cried, I'm not a geek.
I'm sitting there looking onFacebook, my wife's like, Why
are you crying?
I'm like, I'm not fuckingcrying.
What are you looking at?
I'm like, my pizza delivery guydied from horno.
Oh, shit.
He would walk around base everyday.
At 12 or like 1150 be walkingaround hot pizza motherfucker.
No, it's not pizza.
Just all day he never reallyworked at Little Caesars He I
(43:00):
know he sure I know what all thefucking pizzas it would do it
son of a bitch Cuz they werefive bucks He would sell it to
us for ten.
No shit.
See but he had the cap And alittle unicorn shirt, and some
khaki pants.
Khaki pants were what sold me,I'm like, he's got khaki pants,
he's official.
(43:20):
He had fucking, yeah he made alot of dough bro.
His trunk was full of pizzas,his back seat, everything was
just full of pizzas.
You said Fresno man, I used tolive in Fresno.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
I went to Hoover.
Hi, buddy.
Oh, for real?
Yeah, dude.
I went to Roosevelt.
Oh, Roosevelt.
(43:42):
Yeah I was at the child carecenter over there.
The one that was like one of twofucking schools when I
graduated.
One of two schools that had afucking daycare.
Like y'all need to stop fuckingover there in Roosevelt, dude.
That is true, man.
There's a lot of chicks, man.
I only went there for myfreshman year and then I came
back to Texas.
But I've been in Fresno, shit,since I was 3 to 12.
(44:04):
So yeah, man.
Yeah, I grew up in front ofFresno Stateman, those blue
apartment complexes right there.
No shit.
Yeah.
I grew up there.
And then when we, when I got tohigh school, we my dad got a
house over by the high schooland we had a Indian restaurant
over on Sean Marks Bram Bull.
Okay.
Damn, that's crazy.
Over by Eddo.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So imagine we were kids, we wereprobably fucking crossing paths
(44:26):
without even knowing.
That shit's crazy.
Probably more than likely.
Yeah.
We probably played footballtogether.
What year did you graduate?
I was only there my freshmanyear in Roosevelt.
Oh, okay.
Yeah, but I graduated in 2004.
Oh, okay.
Yeah, we probably no.
Yeah, unless you played footballyour freshman year.
What year did you graduate?
2002.
2002, okay.
(44:47):
Yeah.
Probably not, but.
Nah, that's cool man.
Yeah, I was actually in Fresnolast summer, I'm sorry.
I know, right?
That's the thing.
I love visiting, but I can'tmove.
I just can't.
I can't do it.
No.
No.
No, definitely not.
Yeah, especially the summers.
No.
No.
Dude, there's 10 cities already,all over the fucking expressway
now, dude.
(45:08):
Yeah.
No, now fucking, man, you can'tgo down 99.
Without hittin a fuckin methhead or two.
You just can't.
It's fuckin bad out there.
Yeah, it's crazy, bro.
Cause shit I used to work rightthere in the ranchos.
Just past Fresno, in the MaderaRanchos.
When I was younger, before myparents had the restaurant.
I'd go out there during thefuckin summer.
(45:28):
I'd be pickin grapes.
There you go.
Nice, dude.
No wonder everybody thought Iwas Mexican.
There you go.
The fuckin name sounds likeRaul.
He's brown.
It's just look at the eyebrows,like what are those things?
This mother bitch hascaterpillars, crazy.
(45:49):
Badass bro, so we're gettingalready here to the closing time
brother.
I don't know if there's anythingyou want to conclude.
Something you want to say to theother brothers out there
struggling man with PTSD anddepression.
Hey, man.
Just remember at the end of theday, when everything's fucking
closing in on you, man, when youget claustrophobic and you look
around, you don't see anything.
All you gotta do is pick up thatfucking phone.
(46:10):
Call one of your brothers.
If he doesn't have the next one,somebody's gonna fucking want to
hear what you got to say.
I'd rather listen to your voice.
Then you get a fucking text thatyou're not here anymore.
Yep.
So depression, it'll get thebest of you.
It's like a, it's like a fuckedup dream that you can't wake up
from.
But at the end of the day,you're not alone in this, man.
(46:31):
Nobody's fucking alone.
If you wore that fucking uniformand you were in fucking country.
You got a group of fuckingbrothers that love you, you just
don't realize it because yougotta, like you said Nelson, you
gotta learn to love yourselfagain before you see that other
people love you.
So you're never alone in thisfucking life, man.
You got a brother always.
That's right, man.
And one thing I want to say, andthis comes to my head, whenever
(46:53):
I feel like fucking, sometimesyou just feel depressed.
There's days where you justfucking go through those fucking
days, and I just tell myself.
You know what?
I was a badass motherfucker.
You know what I mean?
You're fucking right.
I, that, and I tell that to someof my friends like, Dude, You
were a badass motherfucker.
Remember that shit, man.
Walking the streets in Iraq,nobody could fucking touch you.
Have that fucking mentalityright now.
(47:13):
You're a badass motherfucker.
Nobody could fucking touch you.
At 19 years old.
Yep, at 19 years old.
That's right.
That's right.
Take that shit, put thatmotherfucker right back on your
shoulder.
Don't let nobody knock it down.
Exactly.
But, humble yourself.
You're not a drill sergeant, sojust, keep it humble.
That's right.
Keep it going, brother.
Awesome, man.
Thank you, brother.
Hopefully we get the pleasure ofmeeting each other in person and
(47:33):
trying to absolutely barbecue.
And hopefully, you mean his meatin your mouth.
Yeah, I'm glad you said it.
He's blushing.
I didn't think brown peoplecould blush.
I do want to try your meat.
Okay.
I have to try your meat.
All right.
So hopefully this it'll happenthis year.
Absolutely brother, it'd be mypleasure.
Just let me know when and where,I'll be there.
(47:56):
You got it bro, alrighty, sothis was Nelson Martinez with
Combat Mike.
Robledo out.
Peace out motherfuckers.
Bye bitches! Co o m pact Co o mpact Co o m pact
Hey, what's up guys?
This is your boy, NelsonMartinez.
Robledo.
Welcome to Combat Mike.
And today we got a Marine,finally a Marine Joe.
The fuck, man.
It's hard, bro.
We're all looking for crayonsall the time and I don't blame
you though.
That's why they're out of stockat the stores now, but let's
introduce our guest brother.
You want to introduce yourself?
(00:21):
Hey, what's going on, man?
Rahul Sharma, 3rd Battalion, 1stMarines, Cap, Platoon, Machine
Gunner.
Damn.
How y'all doing?
Good, good, brother.
Thank you, man.
Thank you for coming on.
It's an honor to have you onhere, man.
So without further ado, let'sjump into that Combat Mike story
if you want to share with us.
Yeah, man.
So we're posted up at a L.
(00:42):
P.
O.
P.
Along MSR Golden.
Just sitting there, minding ourown fucking business.
Little Toyota Corolla fuckingcomes up and down the road and
I'm like, Yo, what the fuck'sgoing on?
We had our seven ton are 80 onesclose to the road.
I was with Sawyer Staff SergeantHeart and Sergeant Mendez at the
time in the vehicle.
I was a gunner.
Sorry was the driver and we justbeen fucking around.
(01:06):
Like fuck.
Yeah, we're ready for a bite.
Ready for a bite.
And we're boots at this fuckingpoint.
Our first deployment.
We don't fucking know anybetter.
We're all excited to get shot atand shit.
And here comes this littlefucking Toyota, man.
Just fucking circling.
Had four dudes poke out withsome fucking AKs.
And start unloading on us.
And the 7 ton calls fucking atick.
Troops in contact.
(01:27):
So we peel from our position.
I'm up in the gun on the fucking240.
And we start fucking rocking androlling at these motherfuckers.
And there's a semi coming downthe fucking road.
And old Haji man, fuckin I guesshe slammed on his brakes and he
got out.
And Mark Bevins, he was our Mark19 gunner and one of the other
Humbies, told me he had a fuckingun.
(01:47):
So dude's trying to hideunderneath this truck.
And I've never seen amotherfucker be more meticulous
with an indirect fire fuckinweapon, man.
Precision.
Oh, Bevins! Starts lighting upas a big motherfucker.
You talking about a crown eatingmotherfucking talk slow like
this.
fucking came to a gun fight Thatdude was fucking on.
(02:08):
Boy, man.
So he starts lighting the frontof this fucking semi up and he
sees, oh, hodge man, fuckingduck.
Dive underneath the fuckingfront of the truck.
He's bouncing rounds and blowsthe shit out of this fucking
dude while the rest of the guysare fucking engaged in that
vehicle.
And that was, I think the firsttime I saw my dead body in
combat and it's something that Iwon't fucking ever forget.
(02:29):
Like dude's fucking shit wasjust split half open.
Like you got H, HEDP roundsfucking going in at you at a 40
mic.
Ain't gonna be fucking noneleft.
Hell no.
That's f crazy.
So where did that happen at?
It was in 2005 in in Haditha,man.
This was right outside ofHaditha, actual in between the
(02:52):
dam and Al Asad airbase.
But we were just on our little fLBOP post, list and observation
post.
Just watching the roads,watching for anybody digging
around, f around.
And yeah, I think that was thefirst one that we got into it.
And it's one that's always stuckout because once that happened
and we started to fuckingconsolidate, there's a little
(03:12):
compound that we rolled up onwhere the vehicle had driven
into and I guess there was aback door that they got out of,
we pull up to this fucking placeand the dude's got a couple of
fucking Mercedes parked up in agarage and shit.
It's yo, what's really fuckinggoing on?
Let's go investigate this shit.
Yeah, that's that's where I gotmy.
(03:33):
Yeah, he's got all the goodfuckin hashish and the fuckin
heroin hidin in the fuckin backof his fuckin co chasing jacket,
bitches.
We found a lot of hashish in ourfirst deployment.
Yeah, oh yeah.
Damn, that's crazy.
Shit, the first deployment wefound a shit ton of hashish, but
the second deployment when wewere on the 13th MEU, and we
went into, we were outside ofCop Golden, outside of Fallujah
(03:55):
and TQ I think the bestdiscovery we ever found was a
field full of fucking raggy.
Damn.
That's fucking hot tea forwatermelons.
Shit.
That was the shit, bro.
We were on fucking QRF and we'rejust doing our fucking thing.
And they call us and they'relike, Hey, we got his fucking
motherfuckers.
They're transporting this shit.
We don't know what the fuck itis.
We get up over there.
(04:16):
It's chucks full of fuckingwatermelon, bro Best and worst
fucking experience because i'mlike, oh fuck we're about to get
some shit And then we pulled upit's fucking watermelons best
fucking treat we had in fuckingcountry That's fucking crazy
fucking moon dust fuckingcamera, right?
Oh, yeah, dude.
That was I think that was theworst fucking camp I've ever
been a part of was fucking, butthe golden showers were amazing.
(04:38):
Oh, man.
Wow, nice.
Sounds interesting.
Oh, it didn't matter if you tooka shower.
As soon as you walked out ofthat bitch, you were dirty,
right?
Yeah, you're a fucking sugarcookie, man.
All that moon dust.
Like you got wet, you gotfucking sweaty.
You're fucking covered in dust.
It didn't matter nothing.
(04:58):
So fine.
Like it was so fine.
The dust was so fine.
It wasn't like.
You just hit it like that.
It was like a big old fuckingclub, like fucking big.
Yeah, I'm still wiping that shitout of my cracks.
Oh damn it.
It was quite the experience,man.
I think with Weapons Company meand Robledo we did a couple of
things together.
(05:19):
For the most part, I think wewere in different sections.
The entire yeah.
I was gonna ask man talkingabout being dirty, as soon as
you get out.
So what was the longest periodof time you guys went without a
shower out there?
Ooh, fuck.
I'd probably say it was like for21 days, I think.
21 days?
I think it was 30.
Yeah.
(05:39):
21 days.
It was three weeks, man.
When we were doing that pushinto into Haditha and they
wouldn't like, we had the hotshowers, but we couldn't fucking
use them.
No, and then we would get thereand it would be like, Hey,
there's no water.
Wait till next time, dude.
All the fucking cooks were niceand clean though, motherfuckers
making their powdered eggs,bullshit.
(05:59):
I want to say it was about thesame fucking time for us, man.
There was a period of time whereyou're just pushing into new
territory.
There isn't any time to fuckingpull out and go back.
There's no rest, no nothing.
You just keep going and going.
I remember that time we gotback, dude, because we were
living in tents back at the FOB,right?
When everybody, I was like oneof the first ones to make it to
(06:20):
the fucking showers, dude.
When I come back into the tent,holy shit, man.
It smelled like I just fuckingsnorted a fucking booty hole,
bro.
That shit reeked.
Hey, you know what?
That's when the trend fuckingstarted, eating ass right there.
Yeah, there you go.
I was like, so that's what ittastes like.
(06:41):
I was surprised a lot ofmotherfuckers didn't have pink
eye just walking into a goddamntent.
Yeah.
It's mob level four, fuckingjust walking in there.
We needed right, bro.
Yeah, it was a crazy time, man,but it was probably the fucking
best time of my life.
I can say that for sure.
(07:01):
Yeah.
So growing up.
I was fucking born in India.
Everybody looks at me and startstalking Spanish.
I'm like, I know nothing.
I'm not from this place.
I don't know what, bro.
That's awesome.
You want a slurpee?
I got you, mother bitch.
A slurpee?
So what made you decide to jointhe military, man?
(07:23):
And why the Marines?
It was a couple of things, man.
9 11 happened when I was ajunior in high school, and I'm
sitting in my fucking economicsclass, and my teacher at the
time, I fucking won't forget it,Mr.
Broussard, put it on the TV.
He's hey, I don't want toshelter you from the world, but
here's what's going on.
(07:44):
There's a lot of bad people.
One of my really good friends,Kevin Miller he'd been talking
to a marine recruiter and he'shey dawg, I'm fucking joining
up.
I was like, okay, fuck it Let'sgo and for me being east indian
you know dealing with racism isone of those things like they
don't talk about indians or likeeven with latinos They don't
talk about us having to dealwith fucking racist shit Like I
(08:07):
got my ass jumped my parentsrestaurant at the time got
fucking vandalized And I waslike, you know what?
Fuck that shit, bro.
I'm gonna go show thesemotherfuckers.
What's up?
And the real reason that Ijoined the Marine Corps was to
really piss my dad off.
Him and I never, we never gotalong, man.
My older brothers, I'm theyoungest of three.
My older brothers went tofucking college and doing this,
(08:27):
that, or the other.
And I was always the fuckingblack sheep.
So being a fucking immigrant.
If you don't act like everybodyelse you're in the Indian
culture, you're whitewashed So Iwas the fucking black sheep that
was whitewashed I was a punk kidfucking skateboarding fucking
nails painted in a littlefucking band, whatever.
Yeah, so I was like, you knowwhat?
Fuck you dad.
(08:47):
I'm gonna go join the fuckingMarines So the crazy thing is I
actually went to boot camp in2002 Broke my wrist, got
medically separated, went back ayear later, just because I was
like, you know what, I fuckingdecided to do this, and I'm not
gonna fucking stop, so I wentback in like a fucking idiot,
(09:09):
and here we are.
Now, I really respect thatcommitment, man, pushing through
and getting it done, bro, thatmeans a lot.
That's why you're a Marine,right?
Fuck it.
Cause I don't know any better.
So I gotta ask this what is,what flavor of crayon is your
preference?
Oh man, the key lime.
(09:30):
It goes great with pie.
It goes great with a nicefucking whiskey.
Like it's almost a sea foamgreen.
So you could do like seafood,but it also equates to dessert.
Delicious.
There you go.
Delicious.
Awesome.
No, that's what's up man.
So how many deployments did youguys do?
I did two with with 3 1 the oneto Haditha and then the 13th Mew
(09:53):
and a lot of crazy shit inbetween when we were back, man.
I think one of the stories meand Robledo touched on when we
met up at Justin's fight here acouple weeks ago was a gas lamp
incident.
I was just a violentmotherfucker, always.
I've always had this fuckinglevel of aggression.
I don't know, it's cause,like...
I had this chip on my shoulderto fucking prove something.
Being Indian, and being in thefucking Marine Corps, like my
(10:16):
balls were fucking busted blue,right?
So growing up, being Indian, inthe Central Valley of
California, with a name likefucking Raul, if you didn't
speak Spanish, you were gettingyour fucking ass beat, because
all the other Latinos were like,Oh, this fucking motherfucker
thinks he's better than us.
I always had it's always been afucking fight, man.
I'm going to digress a littlebit growing up in India, fucking
just dirt poor poverty, didn'tknow shit.
(10:39):
I didn't even know I had a daduntil I was six years old.
I got a fucking flight out toCalifornia.
So then I'm living with.
my dad and my two brothers forabout seven years without my
mom.
And I think just a lot offucking anger because I'm a
young kid in a new country.
I don't speak the language.
I don't know the customs andcourtesies.
So it's just a lot of anger justpent up from there and just
(10:59):
built.
And then the Marine Corps wasreally my fucking released.
Like I can go fightmotherfuckers.
I can go be a fucking badass,whatever.
And so touching back on thatstory and in the gas lamp, we're
out fucking drinking, justhaving a good time.
And all I see is some dudefucking mouthing off one of my
boys and Governal gets up in themix.
He's like fucking jucking,diving on this fucking dude and
(11:21):
I just step in and homie throwslike 20 fucking punches, misses
every one of them.
I just rock back, bow, pop himonce, fucking hit him so hard he
does a 180 face plants and hislittle fuck, his boyfriend,
whatever the fuck he was withhim, he's all trying to take
pictures of me and Governal.
I look back, Governor all runsup, kicks that dude that I just
(11:42):
knocked out right in the fuckingface, drives his fucking phone,
smashes it.
We're all fucking dressed up inour American Eagle fucking
button down skinny jeans andfucking shoes.
And the fucking, the bike copscome and they're like, hey cops.
Me and this fucking dude, wefucking sprint, rip off our
shirts, go like three blocks up,three blocks over, and come back
(12:03):
all out of breath.
In fucking white t shirts.
You're like, hey, what's goingon?
You guys okay?
What's all the cops over here?
What's going on?
So yeah, we got into a lot ofshit like and there's another
time down there that fuckingstrip club right outside of MCR
D Make sure you Watch what yousay, because he's open to the a,
(12:25):
it was a strip club there.
So me, Justin Governell, JustinSawyer there, right?
And Sawyer's just gone.
This boy can drink like a fish,but when he's drunk, like he,
you'll see every bit of it.
And me and Governell are lookingfor him.
We see him.
He's coming back.
He's all distraught.
He's hey dawg, what's up?
He's these two fucking boots,they told me they were
lieutenants and they tried totake my money and this and that.
(12:48):
I'm like, where they at?
Where they at?
So me and Governor, I'll justlose our shit, like you're not
fucking with our boy.
We get to fuck with our boy, notyou.
So we go outside, and he pointsat these two dudes talking to
some chick in a little fuckingfour doors without even thinking
any question.
I just look at Sora, I'm like,that's them?
He's yeah, and Governor's let'sget it, dawg.
(13:12):
Dude, I run up, I crack thefucking homie right in the back
of the head, and I'm like,what's up, bitch?
You're a fucking lieutenant.
What's up?
I'm a fucking private.
Governor just starts kickingthis other dude in the leg.
So he falls in like they're infucking tears.
Like we're boots.
We're in the fleet at this time,but these fuckers are still at
SOI.
Not gonna happen, bro.
(13:33):
We knocked these dudes out andwe look at Sawyer's like, how
much money did they take fromyou?
He's 20 bucks.
They're like, all right, go tothis guy's wallet, pull out a
20, leave them there and getSawyer's money back.
So they actually took money fromhim.
What's that?
So they actually took money fromyour boy?
Yeah, they took a 20 from him.
So I was like, you're not goingto take any money from my
(13:53):
brother.
Fuck that.
That's fucking crazy, man.
That's my job.
He's going to buy me beer.
They got what they deserve.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
Typical Marine Corps Knight.
3 1 especially.
Transitioning through all thisas far as PTSD, have you seeked
help?
How are you mentally?
You good?
Did it cut off again?
There we go.
(14:14):
Yeah.
We got you loud and clear.
All right.
Cool.
We can't see the camera though.
Oh, come on, man.
What's going on here?
I could.
There you go.
There we go.
There it is.
For an Indian, I should bebetter at technology.
I can talk all day.
Yeah I did deal with it and itgot pretty bad at one point.
(14:35):
I was drinking myself to deathdamn near, and then I had my
first kid, and it still didn'tgo away I was in Sacramento at
the time I went to the VA forhelp, and the most that they
could offer me was Lunesta,Ambien, up my dosage which
really fucking made it worse,man it got to the point where,
My baby girl was probably aboutfour months and I put a fucking
(14:59):
gun in my mouth because I justcouldn't deal with it.
That's crazy.
I couldn't deal with it.
The only thing that fuckingpulled me through to this day I
say she's my saving grace was mybaby girl.
I heard her crying and I fuckingsnapped out of this funk that I
was in and it's what the fuck amI doing, man yeah, I'm a fucking
dad now, like I can't fuckinggive up.
(15:19):
I didn't give up the first timeI fucking broke my shit in boot
camp.
Why am I letting this get to me?
And I realized a lot of thesefucking sleeping pills, this
medicine and shit that theyprescribe, it doesn't help, man.
It doesn't.
All it does is it puts a fuckingminor band aid if it even works
for you.
For me, it didn't work.
Yeah, it numbs you toeverything.
There's, I love fucking music.
(15:41):
There's a great fucking song.
I don't agree with a lot of theshit that this dude says, but
there's a song by Macklemorecalled Drug Dealer.
And in it, one of the fuckingverses is my drug dealer was a
doctor and he got the plug fromBig Pharma.
He tried to kill me for adollar.
And like that shit fuckingresonated so much with me, man.
Cause it's like, why don't wetry the fucking holistic
(16:04):
approach?
Like Marijuana, fuckin is agreat fuckin tool that, that
helps to fuckin calm the minddown.
There's sativa, there's indica,there's different fuckin
strains.
And it's proven.
Harvard's doin fuckin studies onit.
Harvard, Stanford, they've donestudies on fuckin mushrooms, on
psychedelics.
And even fuckin DMT for dealinwith fuckin PTSD.
(16:26):
It's just, there's such a stigmaaround it that they'd rather
promote big pharma than thesefuckin independent people.
Like obviously marijuana islegal in fucking California,
Colorado, fucking ArizonaOklahoma and plenty of other
states.
Yeah.
So I think it's now time to pushto get this legalized, man.
Instead of these fucking pillsthat have all this shit in
(16:47):
there, turn to a more naturalapproach.
Yeah.
And I think it's coming.
I think that whole marijuanathing, I think it's growing and
there's more studies that aregoing to come out.
A lot of vets that, that I knowand talk to, they use marijuana,
and it helps, so I think it'sdefinitely coming to the VA,
man, I hope it does.
In the state of Texas, there isa care law that you can utilize
(17:10):
it for PTSD.
I've got, there's a link on thestudy that they have and the
regulations.
If you want Jose, I'll send itover to you.
I can't call you.
It's Robledo.
Fuck it.
I'm sorry.
That was a mistake.
There you go.
My bad.
What did I tell you?
What did I stopped all thefucking...
The pills and shit.
Like I found out that to shut mymind down, I got to wear my body
(17:34):
out.
And that's when I picked uprugby.
So I started playing rugby outin California and I did that for
four years.
Like after two or three fuckingsessions, I couldn't think
anymore.
I was just fucking tired.
So I translated that.
And that's when I started havingthat realization, as it gets,
you have to face it.
You can't run away from yourfears.
(17:54):
You can't run away from yourtroubles.
You have to acknowledge that youwent through some shit that
other people haven't.
You have to acknowledge that youweren't alone there.
And you really have to fuckingreach out and talk to your
brothers.
There's a handful of guys that Italk to on a regular basis.
I, obviously I keep in touchwith you now.
Cause I got your number,Robledo.
I talk to Green.
I talk to Governal.
(18:15):
I talk to Eric Farrell.
Ronnie Nolfe, Matt Haviland, andthere's a whole group of guys
that just randomly fucking texthim, Hey, what's up, what's
going on?
And I've been blessed here in inLiberty Hill, Texas the jujitsu
gym I train at is about 90%fucking veterans and Leos.
So I've got maybe five or sixfucking Marines that are here.
(18:36):
I didn't serve with them, butthey're still Marines.
We've got a shit ton of armyguys.
We got a couple of Navy boys andeven a fucking puddle pirate
that trains in there and, it'sjust that camaraderie, man, I
think that's what you miss themost.
It's not the organization, it'sthe fucking people that made
that place and that's what youfucking miss.
And I've told my wife plenty oftimes I've told some of the
(18:59):
other Marines around here that Ifucking talked to the shit going
on in Ukraine.
If it fuckin pops off, I woulddo it again in a fuckin
heartbeat if I had the samefuckin guys that I was with in
Iraq.
Heartbeat.
No fuckin questions asked.
Fuck yeah.
And that's what it is, man.
It's you start off hatin oneanother cause you're fuckin
different and you don't knowanything about the other guy.
(19:19):
My, my best fuckin friend,Justin Sawyer.
I hated that fucking bitch withthe fucking, we were in fucking
boot camp together.
This dude picks a fucking fightin the fucking squad way, squad
bay after fucking shower timewith this other fucking kid who
was a fucking pogue.
Yeah.
Did you guys get dressed?
No.
(19:39):
I had a towel on and fuckingshower shoes.
It gets better.
So Sawyer's this guy's a fuckingPogue man, he's picking on me.
I was like, all right, bitch,handle your business.
You're a fucking wrestler fromfucking Michigan.
What's up?
Damn.
And this dude said somethingthat that I thought he was
talking to me, but he wastalking to Sawyer.
So I'm standing there shaving myface.
I got shaving cream all over myface.
(20:01):
In my fucking shower shoes,towel around my fucking balls,
and this dude just saidsomething, bro.
I lost my shit.
I just turn around and startfucking jacking this dude.
Towel flies off, drillinstructor runs in.
AHHH! I got my fucking danglinghanging out, I'm fucking
punching this dude.
What the fuck?
I was like, I didn't even knowwhat to say.
(20:22):
I went to fucking pray rest.
It's just my fucking dickhanging out He's put a fucking
towel on Never got in troublebefore or nothing.
So I was like, all right, cool.
It's over when I graduated whenwe graduated Yeah, Joe Spector,
fucking Staff Sergeant Smithcame up to me, he goes, if I
ever have to look at yourfucking cock again,
(20:43):
motherfucker, I'm going to cutit off.
You're a fucking Marine now.
My bad.
And now you're best friends withthis guy.
Man, I love this kid.
I fucking do anything forSawyer, man.
And he's the guy that, that wegot into a fight for at that
strip club that I was tellingyou about and that's the funny
thing about the Marine Corps islike you are any branch of the
(21:05):
military, really you come fromdifferent backgrounds, you come
from different fuckinglifestyles.
Like I've known a couple of guysbootcamp.
And I've known people that havecome from poverty that had
nothing much like myself, but wedon't know anything about one
another and we get put into thissituation where you're either
gonna end up liking one another,you might save in their fucking
(21:27):
life, but at the end of the day,that motherfucker is going to
become your brother, you mayhate him.
But you fucking love them at thesame time and that's one of the
realizations that I've had overthe years is All these fucking
memories like I look back andnow everybody's got a
smartphone.
Everybody's got a fucking cameraI wish we'd taken more fucking
pictures together, man, just torelive everything.
Yeah I gotta sit in a situationthere's actually an episode that
(21:51):
we're gonna release One of mybuddies that we became really
good friends.
And same shit, man.
We hate each other.
We're about to, we squared upone day, we're about to throw it
down and now fuck, man we'reboys, so yeah, I know exactly
what you're talking about.
Any, did any thoughts aboutreenlisting or if not, what did
you do right after the military,man?
(22:11):
I did have thoughts ofreenlisting men like at the
time, Captain Haney, he came tome.
He's Hey you're good enoughMarine.
I think you should reenlist.
And this was that transitionwhere Iraq was ending and they
didn't know what else was goingto happen.
This is before even Afghanistan.
Came a thing and they went topeacetime Marine Corps man, and
they're doing fucking you got togo to this force You got to do
(22:33):
footlocker fucking thisinspection that inspection
fucking height and weightrequirements Even the first
class BFT like I got a fucking Igot a negative counseling For
being slightly above my fuckingweight and it was just like
you're gonna knock me for thisshit But forget everything else
that I've done.
Nah, I think it's time for me tobow out man.
(22:55):
You know what?
I'll do my time and get the fuckout right after I got out
Actually worked for a biosciencecompany.
I was doing ag research allthroughout, California had no
training in it But if you showme some A couple of times after
that, I'll fly solo.
So I worked for them for about ayear and a half going up and
down the California coast,central valley.
(23:18):
I flew out to Israel, flew outto Chile, just doing plant
growth regulators.
So basically we were given greatsteroids so the farmers could
have an earlier harvest, earlieryield.
And found out my fiance at thetime was pregnant.
So we got married, ended upgoing into a sales.
(23:38):
Obviously I can talk shit allfucking day long, so I can tell
you whatever ended up going intosales for HVAC, man, and I did
that for about four, four and ahalf years.
And my wife got a job offer outhere in Texas.
So it's fuck it.
I don't have anything lined up,but I'll find something.
Let's go.
I want to support you.
I want to be there for you.
At this time we've had.
(23:59):
We had two girls, so we movedout to Texas.
She was doing interior design ata company I was working at
cheaper than dirt because theyhad a storefront in Central
Texas in Round Rock.
And so once working there justsaw a dude walk in a couple of
times, had a Marine vet hat on,got the opportunity to talk to
him, just gave him, greatcustomer service, was attentive,
(24:20):
wasn't trying to sell him anytype of bullshit, answered all
his questions.
He handed me a card right aroundNew Year's.
He's hey man, you ever get tiredof this shit?
Here, give me a call.
Didn't even look at the card,put it in my pocket.
I was like, bro, they paid me toplay with guns.
I'm solid, I'm good.
So I get back home, my wife'sdoing my laundry.
She's hey, what's this?
Who's this vice president thatyou talked to?
I was like, oh fuck, I don'tknow.
(24:41):
It's a guy named Jeff.
He came in.
I guess he was the vicepresident of a multi million
dollar fucking company that diddisaster recovery.
Damn, dude, that's nice.
After New Year's, took him up onhis offer.
I called him, went in for aninterview.
He goes, you're hired.
What do you want to get paid?
I'm like, I was making 15 overhere.
If I can get 20, I'll come workfor you.
He was like, okay, you got it.
(25:01):
Fuck.
Yeah.
And then I was with them forabout six years, man.
Traveled all over the fuckingcountry.
I went to Canada, Puerto Rico.
We had some jobs right up inEurope, but that kind of fell
through.
So every major hurricane thathappened since 2015 tornado.
Fire, whatever.
We were there.
We were doing all the disastercleanup.
(25:22):
We were doing, we were dealingwith the bird flu, Ebola, all
that shit.
So again, no training in it.
Just on the job, fucking tellingme what to do.
And I started out as asupervisor.
By the time I left, I was aproject manager after Hurricane
Harvey.
I was running Ingleside ISD, andthat was about, say, 75 million
project that I did by myself.
(25:43):
From there, I went to PuertoRico, and from there, I went to
Florida.
Florida had two productionfacilities that were like 100
million, so it just kept goingup and up.
Money was amazing, travelinghere, there, everywhere, but I
wasn't around my kids.
About three years ago, I made adecision.
My youngest daughter was four atthe time and she says, Daddy, I
(26:05):
miss you.
When are you going to come homeand stay home?
And I just fucking hit hard,man.
I've been poor.
I've been rich or well off.
And what the fuck am I doingthis for?
I'm doing it for my kids, butI'm not making memories.
I'm just making money.
Exactly.
Money I can make at any fuckingtime.
Memories I can't.
It just goes back to that timewhere I wish I had a fucking
(26:26):
camera.
You know what I mean?
Big pictures of the shit we did,the time we spent.
And that just clicked in myhead, man.
Like, all of it it just cametogether like a puzzle piece.
Okay, fuck it.
I'm gonna be a stay at home dad.
I got the disability checkcoming in from the VA.
Got it up to 100%.
I started going to college.
And I'm a fat kid.
I like to eat.
(26:46):
Started toying around with somefucking recipes.
And about two years ago, man, Istarted my own company.
It's called Bombs Away.
Barbecue.
I do barbecues barbecue sauces,salsas, and caterings.
And it's just something I dobecause I'm passionate about it
and something that I get my kidsinvolved in.
So it's just, it's something Ican leave behind for them that's
(27:06):
not just money.
And that's where I find my happyplace now.
So that's what I'm doing.
Dude, that's badass, man.
So how did you narrow it down tobarbecue, man?
Me and Indian, we have a lot offlavors and I'm in Texas.
So you've got the Texas smoke Itook.
It's called Tex Jab.
So a Texan with a punjab.
You take all these flavors andyou combine it with that smoke.
(27:28):
Robledo tried that pulled pork Ibrought down there.
And just take the garlic, thecardamom, the cumins the
tumerics and just rub it in,man, and just use the Texas
smoke and that heat and thatsolid barbecue and just put it
all together.
Shit sounds pretty, pretty good.
All wants to do is put his meatin everyone's mouth.
(27:48):
Hey, that's my goal in life.
You're next.
You're next.
I was already there.
He's next.
I'm, he's, it definitely sounds,and I know Roberto, you said you
got some events coming up.
Down there in the valley, bro.
Let me know.
I love to just bring the smokerdown there and beat a bunch of
people and put your name outthere and whatever we got to do.
(28:10):
Yeah, no, for sure, man.
Yeah, so we joined, I started apainting company.
It's already been two yearswhere we select a veteran every
year and we paint their house.
So this year we're about torelease.
Sorry, I couldn't help, but lookat that cup, man you still eat
in and out over water burger.
This is just a drink, sir.
(28:31):
There's no hamburgers in myhand.
My kids don't know any better.
My kids don't know any better.
So they like the burgers.
I like the drink.
All right.
All right.
We're clear.
All right.
Go back to this.
So yeah.
So yeah, dude.
We released the flyer about.
March, April, and then we starttaking nominations till October
(28:51):
and then about the last week midor mid October, we select the
veteran and everything's basedon necessity.
You know what I mean?
So people have to write a littleshort email talking about the
vet.
And then we make a selectionbased on the house and yeah,
man, so last year we had a bunchof volunteers.
We had a actual barbecue companyactually come out and to the
(29:13):
people.
So man, come out and help uswith that.
That'd be amazing, man.
Absolutely, brother.
Yeah, you tell me time andplace, man.
I'll do lunch slash dinner oneday for everybody that's there.
Hell, I'll get my hands dirtywhile the meat smoking.
I love doing demo, man.
That's for disaster recovery.
That's what I did, man.
Down in Louisiana where italways floods.
We did we did section eighthousing.
(29:34):
We did a bunch of housing blocksand I was gutting out 2000
square foot houses a day.
So that's crazy.
I can't put shit together, butif you want me to break it
apart, you call the brains.
I can push it together.
I got that part.
So the where we went to is aveteran business outreach
(29:55):
center.
I don't know if you ever heardof the branch over there, Austin
or something, but I don't liketo go to Austin.
No, no one does, but I'm sayinglike cause now how homeless
people are there, whatever,going crazy and shit.
That's where we got help too.
Okay, your business plan andeverything to get our shit going
(30:16):
to get everything going So thisbetter Veterans Business
Outreach Center VBOC is aprogram based off of the small
business association So they'rea program dedicated to veterans
and helping them start abusiness and helping you create
a business plan And actuallygoing through a long process if
need be.
So in case you ever wanted toexpand your business, That's a
(30:39):
source there, man.
One of my buddies that I went toschool here at the university
he's actually the one in chargehere.
And I think they're in charge ofCause right now, Paul, out of
Texas, bro.
Something like that, because hewas over there in Houston.
Yeah they travel and givePresentations about VBuck and
stuff, man.
Have you ever been thinkingabout expanding or setting up
shop somewhere, or...
Yeah, that's definitely comingdown the pipe, man.
(31:01):
So my, I've already got mybusiness plan.
I've got enough funds from thesale of our house.
We're trying to close on a pieceof property right now where it's
going to be self sustainablefarming.
Like we're doing rain catchingsystems.
We're going to have a coupleheads of cattle.
Obviously we got wild game outthere.
So I include that in my mealprep menu.
Cause I do about it.
(31:22):
60 to 70 meals a week for a lotof the guys at my gym and just
local customers I have here.
So I'm growing the businessslowly cause I don't want to
overextend myself.
So now that I'm three monthsaway from getting my bachelor's
in project management use my GIbill for that.
That's when I'm going to take itto the next step.
So this land closes, we'vealready got enough capital set
(31:43):
up beside to where I'm going toget a food truck and be more
mobile.
That's the plan like a brick andmortar during this time just
doesn't make sense because Idon't know what the 19th 20th
fucking variation of Kobe it'sgoing to be and they're going to
shut that shit down and, all thefucking overhead.
This way.
I'm outdoors man and it's just,it's more natural it's more
(32:05):
organic like you, you pull upand it's like a chuck wagon in
the old fucking days.
I got the smoker going.
I got the plates ready to go.
You fucking come in, eat, getthe fuck out of my life.
That's what I want.
Put my meat in your mouth andgo.
There you go.
Come back tomorrow.
Take it and go fuck off.
(32:25):
Oh man.
Yeah man, that's that's what Igot going on in my neck of the
woods.
So if y'all are ever up here,hell, come on by.
I'll make sure you eat good.
And drink plenty of whiskey too.
No, bro.
No, no whiskey.
No whiskey.
Jose Robledo is hurting rightnow, dude.
I can tell.
He's sleeping over there.
(32:46):
Yeah.
I drank till what, 5.
30?
Something like that.
I tried to go to sleep early.
Technically, I did.
5.
30 is good.
It's early enough.
In the morning, right?
I don't want to say nothing badin front of your buddies, bro,
but I put them to sleep theother day, bro.
I was fucking tired.
He was already tired.
(33:07):
The sun was in his eyes.
He had a little paint in thereand he just got sleepy bear.
Yes sir.
The funny thing is, we weredrinking at this place.
I guess it's a bar.
Ojos Locos.
You've probably heard of it ornot.
So somehow I was fucked up.
We didn't get kicked out.
I fell asleep on the table andthey just kept bringing us beer
(33:30):
and we just kept drinking.
I don't know how the hell we didnot get kicked out of the room.
Hey, there's nothing wrong withthat.
As long as you're taking a napin your house.
I was doing it like this.
I was like this.
The funny thing is that.
I was looking through somepictures a month later and now I
just happen to scroll like whatthe fuck like joseph's sleep and
then Oh shit.
It was at that bar.
We didn't even remember thatshit, but definitely good
(33:51):
fucking time Those are the bestman.
Look.
Hey, i'll trade you sleep.
I'll trade sleep cycles withanybody right now, bro I've got
six kids like I don't get nofucking sleep My pull out game
sucks nice Yeah, my pull outgames like the u.
s military in iraq.
Oh, we're gonna do it.
I promise Oh, never mind.
(34:11):
How do you feel after thisconversation?
I know you had a story, feltlike you dropped the pack.
Like you just expressed yourselfbasically.
Like for me, when I saw youguys, I was I had an anxiety
after I came back home.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm like, fuck, like it was sobadass.
with you guys again, like what?
15 years.
And I was like 15 years, man.
(34:33):
Yeah.
And nothing's changed, bro.
Like the human being I knew thenit's still the fucking great
human being now honestly, aftersharing this, I don't feel any
different because I've come toterms and I'm, I feel more
comfortable talking about it.
It's the guys that.
Play that fuckin machismo Fuckit, I'm a veteran fool, I'm not
gonna talk about shit cause I'ma hard No, you're not,
motherfucker.
(34:54):
It's okay to be fuckinvulnerable.
It's okay.
Nobody's here to fuckin judgeyou.
We're here for you.
I wanna hear what you've fuckinbeen through.
Cause at the end of the day,We're all going to fuckin this
place, right?
We have this fuckin goal.
Wha Whatever your goal is, mygoal is, It's something better
than we are today.
Tomorrow you want to be a betterversion of your fucking self,
but to get there you got to behonest with yourself And to be
(35:16):
honest with the people aroundyou don't fucking keep the shit
in Don't let the fucking demonstay in your fucking back, bro
let it out talk about it becausethe more you keep it in the
worse this fucking gets Andthat's the one thing that i've
discovered That's why I can'tshut the fuck up ever like my
wife kicks me out of the house.
It's like just shut up go Getout of here.
(35:38):
And that's my personal fuckingthing like everybody's got their
own fucking path in life manLike, we all want to be rich.
We want to be successful.
We want to be this we want to bethat's great That's your fucking
goal.
That's what you're aiming for Itdoesn't mean that we got to walk
the same path, right?
You got this windy fucking upand downhill that you had to
come through This motherfuckerover here swam through a fucking
river to get to where the fuckhe had to be But it's all trial
(35:59):
and fucking tribulation It's wehave to recognize that It's okay
to fucking talk.
It's okay to be vulnerable.
That people won't fucking judgeyou the more you talk about it.
It's like being a little fuckingkid off of a plane from India
and not knowing shit.
And having everybody make fun ofyou for the longest time.
(36:22):
that fucking just got under yourskin and you didn't know how to
fucking deal with it until youbecame a fucking marine and then
these guys that you're supposedto go to war with are fucking
busting your balls and one dayyou just fucking snap and you
use self deprecation and yourealize i'll take whatever this
is and i'll use it as a toolinstead of it being a fucking
weapon against me i'm going toturn it as a fucking tool so i'm
(36:44):
going to use the shit that i'vebeen through to mold the next
steps that i have to fuckingtake but i have to be
comfortable with where i've beenand to where i'm fucking going
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's awesome.
I'm happy to hear brother thatyou got that mentality.
Joey and I started this becausewe know some vets, man, and I've
(37:05):
met, I talked about it in aprevious episode that we're
going to release before yours.
When I go out and do estimates,man, there's still Vietnam vets
that haven't got out of thatstage.
You know what I mean?
They're still secluded.
They don't like going out.
They don't like talking topeople.
So it's 50 years now.
Yeah.
Think about it.
50 years.
So I'm glad, man that you'velearned to, to turn it on and
(37:29):
you know what you want to do inlife.
And my hat's off to you,brother, with that, and I hope
that other vets going throughshit right now, this is proof,
man, that it, that there is lifeat the end of the tunnel, man,
you just gotta focus onyourself, and if, if we could
fucking do it, you could fuckingdo it, because, shit, like Rahul
said, he had a fucking gun tohis mouth, bro, yeah.
(37:50):
And I've had a fucking rifle tomy fucking throat, too, you know
what I mean?
We've been there, but, you Whyfucking give up, man?
First, in my opinion, you gottalove yourself, bro, before you
do anything else.
You know what I mean?
Cause there's guys that don'thave family, they don't have
wife and kids.
But you just gotta love yourselfand do it for yourself.
Not because your mom's tellingyou or your brother's telling
(38:12):
you.
Do it for yourself.
That's the way I see it.
Yeah, apart from that familysetting, you've got a group of
fucking brothers you may nothave a wife, your parents may
have passed, you don't havekids, you've got brothers, man,
and just fucking reach out,don't be fucking afraid, we're
not gonna judge you, are wegonna bust your balls?
Abso fucking lutely, that's myway of telling you that I
fucking love you, and that's,it's that macho stigmata that,
(38:36):
that we had to fucking bear,it's that tough skin that we had
to fucking wear, you And forsome guys, it's easier to peel
that layer back, but a lot ofguys can't let go of it.
You mentioned the Vietnamveterans.
It's interesting cause I've gota guy that he was a fucking
warrant officer in the armyVietnam vet.
Lost his fucking toe.
I just happened to meet him herein town, and I'm fucking serving
(38:57):
my meals, and he come up, got afucking plate.
We got to talking.
And since that day I've checkedon this dude every fucking day.
He's had little projects.
I've gone over there and talkedto him.
Yeah.
And his wife, she said that...
I don't know what you did to myhusband, but he's more bearable
because he found somebody totalk to.
That's awesome.
And although there's that, thatfucking gap in between service
(39:20):
experience, what he wentthrough, what we went through,
it doesn't fucking matter.
At the end of the day we'restill that same warrior class.
That needs to just find somebodyto talk to, and if that's the
best avenue of approach forsomebody, whether you go talk to
a psychiatrist, a fuckingtherapist, or just call one of
your fucking brothers, be like,Hey, dawg, you remember that
fucking time we did this?
(39:41):
Yeah, you talk about it longenough, it doesn't become a
fucking sticking point in yourbrain.
It's something that you did, andnow you're fucking over it, and
you're past it.
Yeah, I agree.
Of course, we would all do itall over again, man.
But what is something...
That you miss the most from thefucking military.
Not having any responsibilities,just doing my fucking job.
(40:03):
Shit, I agree with that.
That's what we say all the time.
Sit in the turret.
Just stay alive.
Just stay alive.
Sit in the turret.
Do that.
Piss in a bottle.
And that's it.
Go back.
Clean my fucking weapon.
Yeah.
Yep.
That's true.
It was the most difficult andstressful situation of your
fucking life, but it was thesimplest fucking time.
(40:25):
Yeah.
Now I don't have to worry about.
I've got six kids.
All right.
Which one of you fuckers shityourself?
Who's got this lesson?
Who's got that lesson?
All right go clean your fuckingroom.
No mommy and daddy time.
Fuck.
Know what I mean?
So it was.
It was controlled chaos, man.
It was simplicity in the mostutter chaos fucking position you
(40:49):
could find yourself in.
But at the end of the day, likeRobledo said, do your fucking
job and that's it.
That's all we had to do.
Keep your weapon clean.
Shave your fucking face.
Keep your gear fucking not fromgetting blown up and destroyed
or anything and fucking keep iton you And when you got Joel
watch your brother six, man,that's all you had to do And at
(41:10):
the time you hated it you fuckthis motherfucker doing this
shit doing that shit I'll dothat in a fucking heartbeat
right now compared to all theresponsibilities we have here
now it's stupid simpleheartbeat.
Take me back.
Fuck it.
I guess only we understand thatBeing in there, right?
You told us to other people.
They're like, oh, that's reallyhard.
(41:30):
I'm like, no, I'm not saying,I'm not saying you don't want,
they don't understand one.
If they would get to experienceit, they would be like.
Yes.
It's, it is easiest.
Yeah, absolutely.
The other the other hardestthing that, that I've
discovered, I like to cuss alot, but to talk to me all time.
He's like trying to talk topeople like I was, I just had to
(41:54):
go to California,'cause myfather-in-law passed away.
So I took a day, we went down toFresno, Hey, Life happens, man.
I had to go talk to my mombecause my dad passed away two
years ago from cancer.
So I'm just talking to my momI'm, I get caught up in the
moment.
I'm like, hey mom, where thefuck is this shit?
Like, when are we fucking doingit?
She's like, why do you talk likethis?
Why is this foul mouth comingout?
(42:15):
I'm like, mom, that's just who Iam.
I'm, I'm a dumb jarhead.
That's how we talk.
That's my vernacular.
It's catching yourself.
Like when I'm at professionalsettings now, like when I go out
and I do caterings, I can't belike, Hey, motherfucker, you
want some of this meat?
Nah, fuck you.
Didn't you remember the hotpizza?
Motherfucker.
Pizza motherfucker! He died,man.
(42:36):
I know he died.
I cried, I'm not a geek.
I'm sitting there looking onFacebook, my wife's like, Why
are you crying?
I'm like, I'm not fuckingcrying.
What are you looking at?
I'm like, my pizza delivery guydied from horno.
Oh, shit.
He would walk around base everyday.
At 12 or like 1150 be walkingaround hot pizza motherfucker.
No, it's not pizza.
Just all day he never reallyworked at Little Caesars He I
(43:00):
know he sure I know what all thefucking pizzas it would do it
son of a bitch Cuz they werefive bucks He would sell it to
us for ten.
No shit.
See but he had the cap And alittle unicorn shirt, and some
khaki pants.
Khaki pants were what sold me,I'm like, he's got khaki pants,
he's official.
(43:20):
He had fucking, yeah he made alot of dough bro.
His trunk was full of pizzas,his back seat, everything was
just full of pizzas.
You said Fresno man, I used tolive in Fresno.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
I went to Hoover.
Hi, buddy.
Oh, for real?
Yeah, dude.
I went to Roosevelt.
Oh, Roosevelt.
(43:42):
Yeah I was at the child carecenter over there.
The one that was like one of twofucking schools when I
graduated.
One of two schools that had afucking daycare.
Like y'all need to stop fuckingover there in Roosevelt, dude.
That is true, man.
There's a lot of chicks, man.
I only went there for myfreshman year and then I came
back to Texas.
But I've been in Fresno, shit,since I was 3 to 12.
(44:04):
So yeah, man.
Yeah, I grew up in front ofFresno Stateman, those blue
apartment complexes right there.
No shit.
Yeah.
I grew up there.
And then when we, when I got tohigh school, we my dad got a
house over by the high schooland we had a Indian restaurant
over on Sean Marks Bram Bull.
Okay.
Damn, that's crazy.
Over by Eddo.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So imagine we were kids, we wereprobably fucking crossing paths
(44:26):
without even knowing.
That shit's crazy.
Probably more than likely.
Yeah.
We probably played footballtogether.
What year did you graduate?
I was only there my freshmanyear in Roosevelt.
Oh, okay.
Yeah, but I graduated in 2004.
Oh, okay.
Yeah, we probably no.
Yeah, unless you played footballyour freshman year.
What year did you graduate?
2002.
2002, okay.
(44:47):
Yeah.
Probably not, but.
Nah, that's cool man.
Yeah, I was actually in Fresnolast summer, I'm sorry.
I know, right?
That's the thing.
I love visiting, but I can'tmove.
I just can't.
I can't do it.
No.
No.
No, definitely not.
Yeah, especially the summers.
No.
No.
Dude, there's 10 cities already,all over the fucking expressway
now, dude.
(45:08):
Yeah.
No, now fucking, man, you can'tgo down 99.
Without hittin a fuckin methhead or two.
You just can't.
It's fuckin bad out there.
Yeah, it's crazy, bro.
Cause shit I used to work rightthere in the ranchos.
Just past Fresno, in the MaderaRanchos.
When I was younger, before myparents had the restaurant.
I'd go out there during thefuckin summer.
(45:28):
I'd be pickin grapes.
There you go.
Nice, dude.
No wonder everybody thought Iwas Mexican.
There you go.
The fuckin name sounds likeRaul.
He's brown.
It's just look at the eyebrows,like what are those things?
This mother bitch hascaterpillars, crazy.
(45:49):
Badass bro, so we're gettingalready here to the closing time
brother.
I don't know if there's anythingyou want to conclude.
Something you want to say to theother brothers out there
struggling man with PTSD anddepression.
Hey, man.
Just remember at the end of theday, when everything's fucking
closing in on you, man, when youget claustrophobic and you look
around, you don't see anything.
All you gotta do is pick up thatfucking phone.
(46:10):
Call one of your brothers.
If he doesn't have the next one,somebody's gonna fucking want to
hear what you got to say.
I'd rather listen to your voice.
Then you get a fucking text thatyou're not here anymore.
Yep.
So depression, it'll get thebest of you.
It's like a, it's like a fuckedup dream that you can't wake up
from.
But at the end of the day,you're not alone in this, man.
(46:31):
Nobody's fucking alone.
If you wore that fucking uniformand you were in fucking country.
You got a group of fuckingbrothers that love you, you just
don't realize it because yougotta, like you said Nelson, you
gotta learn to love yourselfagain before you see that other
people love you.
So you're never alone in thisfucking life, man.
You got a brother always.
That's right, man.
And one thing I want to say, andthis comes to my head, whenever
(46:53):
I feel like fucking, sometimesyou just feel depressed.
There's days where you justfucking go through those fucking
days, and I just tell myself.
You know what?
I was a badass motherfucker.
You know what I mean?
You're fucking right.
I, that, and I tell that to someof my friends like, Dude, You
were a badass motherfucker.
Remember that shit, man.
Walking the streets in Iraq,nobody could fucking touch you.
Have that fucking mentalityright now.
(47:13):
You're a badass motherfucker.
Nobody could fucking touch you.
At 19 years old.
Yep, at 19 years old.
That's right.
That's right.
Take that shit, put thatmotherfucker right back on your
shoulder.
Don't let nobody knock it down.
Exactly.
But, humble yourself.
You're not a drill sergeant, sojust, keep it humble.
That's right.
Keep it going, brother.
Awesome, man.
Thank you, brother.
Hopefully we get the pleasure ofmeeting each other in person and
(47:33):
trying to absolutely barbecue.
And hopefully, you mean his meatin your mouth.
Yeah, I'm glad you said it.
He's blushing.
I didn't think brown peoplecould blush.
I do want to try your meat.
Okay.
I have to try your meat.
All right.
So hopefully this it'll happenthis year.
Absolutely brother, it'd be mypleasure.
Just let me know when and where,I'll be there.
(47:56):
You got it bro, alrighty, sothis was Nelson Martinez with
Combat Mike.
Robledo out.
Peace out motherfuckers.
Bye bitches! Co o m pact Co o mpact Co o m pact
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On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!