Stepping away from jobs as secret service agents, airline pilots and landscapers more than 350 reserve Marines, sailors, airmen and soldiers arrived in Senegal, Africa June 16 to conduct military exercises and come face-to-face with the people of Senegal through various humanitarian assistance projects during exercise Shared Accord 07.

Dubbed Task Force 225 the exercise participants included Marines from Garden City, based 2nd Battalion, 25th Marine Regiment; sailors assigned to 4th Medical Battalion: airmen from the 445th Aerospace Medical Squadron; and soldiers from the 404th Civil Affairs Battalion.

For the Marines this provided an opportunity not only to brush up on their combat skills and get familiar with the Senegalese military and how they function, but to also practice for a scheduled deployment to Iraq.

"We (2nd Battalion, 25th Marines) are scheduled to deploy to Iraq in spring 2008," Lt. Col. Geoff Rollins, commanding officer, 2nd Battalion, 25th Marine Regiment and the task force commander, noted. "This is good training for the battalion staff. It is as if we were deploying to Iraq, plus we get to work with the other services as a joint staff. This is extremely rare for reservists to have this opportunity."

While the battalion's Marines primarily came from northeastern locations like New York City, Long Island, New Jersey and Albany, the other services are sourced from all across the United States.

"It is an exercise itself to move reserve Marines this far," Maj. Tom Armas, executive officer, Weapons Company, 2nd Bn, 25th Marines, said. "It is hard for many of us to believe that 24 hours ago we were at our civilian jobs, moved to Garden City and are now in Senegal. This is all our personnel and equipment."

For the junior members like Lance Cpl. Ryan M. Scheubel of Babylon and an Upper Room Christian School graduate, this is a whole new experience as he sees his first camel roaming among goats and donkeys. "This is my first time outside the United States," Scheubel, a mortar man from Weapons Company, said. "It is all right, but it is hot. I appreciate America more because of the way people live here."

The Linguere area is in a desert environment centrally located in northern Senegal. The towns and villages are comprised of thatched roof huts surrounded by woven stick fences. Shoeless children walk through the dirt, trash and manure-laden roads but still smile brightly and wave as the American service members drive by in vehicles.

The airmen conducting the limited medical, dental and optical care may see or have seen these children as patients during one of their many Medical Civic Action Programs held in Senegal. Seeing hundreds of adults and children per day, the airmen examined and addressed numerous medical conditions, removed bad teeth and provided hundreds of the 20,000 eyeglasses donated by the Lions Club of America.

For those providing and receiving care every little bit helps and both are mutually enthusiastic. "Ninety percent of the patients are overly enthusiastic about being seen and provided health care and medicine," Senior Master Sgt. Cliff Archer, 181st Medical Group out of Terra Haute, Indiana, said. "It makes us feel good inside. It lets you see what else is going on in the world and do something about it."

The soldiers of the 404th Civil Affairs Battalion based in Fort Dix, N.J., also focused on patients - patients of a different kind. Goats, donkeys, horses and cows were provided various anti-parasite treatments to help the numerous local and nomadic herders. In one day the team managed to treat more than 3,000 goats in addition to treating the other animals.

Soldiers from the same group also identified engineering projects that will help the people of the Linguere community. "We are still identifying projects," Capt. Paul Ferreira, civil affairs team leader, said. "Hopefully doing what we are doing today will prevent the Marines from having to come here in five to ten years from now. By changing hearts and minds now we can avoid conflict in the future."

The Shared Accord 07 exercise is a routine US European Command scheduled exercise coordinated by U.S. Marine Corps Forces Europe. It concluded June 30.