Mess

In some civilian societies this military usage has been extended to the eating arrangements of other disciplined services such as fire fighting and police forces.

modern French mets), drawn from the Latin verb mittere, meaning "to send" and "to put" (cf.

Messing in the Canadian Forces generally follows the British model (see United Kingdom below), from which most traditions have descended.

[citation needed] Canadian Forces personnel are normally welcome in any mess of their appropriate rank group, regardless of element; thus a regimental sergeant-major of an infantry battalion is welcome in a chiefs' and petty officers' mess (inter-service rivalries notwithstanding).

Personnel of a different rank (except as noted below) must ask for permission to enter; that may be granted by the president of the mess committee, his designate, or the senior member present.

One exception is on warships, where the president of the junior ranks mess is appointed by the commanding officer.

The committee members are generally the same as those of their British counterparts, with the addition of special representatives for such things as sports, housing, morale, etc.

society) - also called UK (NCO Comradeship/Unteroffizierkameradschaft) - Non-commissioned Officers' Mess: this is the area where NCOs can dine or spend their evenings.

Gentlemanly conduct is mandatory: for instance upon entering the main hall, officers are expected to stand at attention and perform a small bow.

As with the UHG, Kasinos have permanent personnel, as a general rule enlisted men, called Ordonnanzen, a military term for waiter or barman.

Also, every special meal brought by a crewmember, say celebrating a birthday or a rank promotion, is called Mess.

Members of the Officers’ and SNCO mess are also required to pay a subscription fee for supplies and upkeep.

In the far-flung forts of the American Old West, officers would organize their food service in two ways: The mess now is called a dining facility or DFAC.

In 2011, the Army rolled out a program known as "Soldier Athlete" which promotes healthier foods including low-fat milk, whole grains, and veggie wraps.

[6] Further impacting the club system ashore for the Navy is the fact that most naval units deploy for extended periods (e.g., six to ten months) on a regular basis with, especially for shipboard personnel, requiring for senior enlisted personnel and commissioned officers to maintain concurrent membership in a ship's CPO Mess or officers' wardroom, respectively.

Enlisted personnel normally receive all meals at what appears to be no cost, but in fact subsidize their meals through forfeiture of their Basic Allowance for Subsistence (BAS), also called "commuted rations," although chief petty officers may also have a mess "buy in" or monthly mess bill equivalent to the BAS.

For those ships with embarked Marine Corps personnel, staff noncommissioned officers in the grades of E-7, E-8 and E-9 will also be part of the CPO Mess.

Commissioned officers retain their BAS, a flat-rate allowance much smaller than the graduated by rank amount paid out to enlisted personnel; however, they must pay for all of their meals while afloat out of pocket.

Those for officers were able to utilize their initials as colorful acronyms, among the more well-known of which in the 1960s and 1970s were Zaragosa and Zweibrücken (ZOOM), Danang (DOOM), Ramstein (ROOM), and Korat Air Bases or Kirtland Air Force Base (KABOOM), Randolph AFB (Auger Inn) and Nellis AFB (Robin's Nest), with the nicknames usually ascribed to those facilities' casual bars versus the entire club.

Most NCO and Officers Clubs contain a sit-down restaurant in addition to social lounges, meeting/dining rooms, and bars.

Mess halls in the USAF, where unmarried junior enlisted residing in the dormitories are expected to eat, are officially referred to as "dining facilities," but are colloquially called "chow halls," although dining facility workers traditionally take offense at the term.

In the United States Marine Corps, enlisted dining facilities ashore are commonly referred to as 'galleys' or 'chow halls.'

When embarked aboard naval vessels, enlisted Marines and NCOs in the rank of staff sergeant (E-6) and below use the same mess decks as sailors in the grade of petty officer first class (E-6) and below, while staff NCOs in the rank of gunnery sergeant (E-7) and above take meals in the chief petty officers (CPO) mess.