Photo By Master Sgt. Lynette Hoke | Sgt. John Backes of the 851st Vertical Engineer Company and native of St. Cloud,...... read more read more
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RACINOVCI, Croatia - The old saying, “it’s a small world,” really resonated for one Minnesota Army National Guard Soldier during a recent humanitarian civic assistance trip to Croatia.
“I was hanging out at the local café here and I met a man name Boris who just happens to have a son living in St. Cloud and just graduated high school,” said Sgt. John Backes, a native of St. Cloud, Minn. “He is considering joining the Guard to get experience and help pay for things…It’s an extremely small world, the fact you can be in tiny village halfway across the world and meet someone who has connections to my hometown.”
Backes and 30 other members from the 851st Vertical Engineer Company spent three weeks working side-by-side with the Croatian Army, Mechanized Armored Brigade to renovate and rebuild a roof on the community center in Racinovci, Croatia.
“At the beginning it looked like such a big picture, but now that it’s wrapping up it wasn’t that bad,” said Backes, a carpentry/masonry specialist. “We learned so much in regards to the way they do construction, the notching and the tiles and the measurement system. Now I have first-hand experience with it and can have that under my belt.”
The project included many aspects where the Soldiers had to be quickly adapt and be resilient to the last-minute changes that occurred. Many of the Minnesota Guardsmen were unfamiliar with the metric measurement system and many of the other construction techniques used, but the friendship and teamwork they found with their Croatian allies made the transition much easier.
“The Croatian military members are a lot like us in many ways that they are hard workers, family comes first and they are so proud of what they do,” said Backes. “They like working with us too and that everyone wants to be here makes the entire thing that more enjoyable. For them being that way motivates me to want to work even harder and stay up even later to get the job done for them and be able to know them afterwards.”
Despite rainy weather and many other bumps along the road to finish the project, the group completed the requirements almost a day early.
“I am grateful to be a part of a mission like this,” said Backes. “Some of the people still have next to nothing, they are still trying to rebuild their life. It’s an honor to be a part of something that they have had and will have for many more generations to come.”
| Date Taken: | 07.03.2015 |
| Date Posted: | 07.07.2015 12:20 |
| Story ID: | 169252 |
| Location: | RACINOVCI, HR |
| Hometown: | SARTELL, MN, US |
| Hometown: | ST. CLOUD, MN, US |
| Web Views: | 46 |
| Downloads: | 1 |
This work, Soldier Stories - Sgt. John Backes, by MSgt Lynette Hoke, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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