Gaikokujin - the Story II: Making of a Soldier (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9784908556036)

Basic training is a game of inches. How far can you bend the Army's rules before the system finally snaps back?

In Book II, we follow Takuan on his high-stakes journey into the military machine. Still black-and-blue from a near-death episode with his father, his 'get over' mentality-forged by the tutorials of neighborhood pushers-is put to the test by his new, government-issued father: a U.S. Army Drill Sergeant.

From the raw shock of Basic Training to the toxic, racist crosshairs of the 82nd Airborne, Takuan finds the hustler ideology of the streets meets its match in rigid doctrine. Stripped of military glamor, this institutional noir follows a man caught between the requirements of the uniform and the depression of a life left behind. Takuan must decide if he can truly become a soldier-or if he is destined to remain a 'Gaikokujin, ' forever on the outside of the system he took an oath to serve.