Where AM I?!

I feel like that Johnny Cash song, "I've been everywhere, man". Okay, so here's a little window to my world of late: On Monday 02 February 2009, I woke up in Afghanistan. On Tuesday 03 February, I went to sleep in Dubai. On Thursday 05 February, I went to sleep in Baghdad at Camp Liberty. On Saturday 07 February, I woke up on an charted SkyLink Arabia jet plane sitting on a runway and had no idea where I was. A few minutes later I learned, thanks to the flight crew, I was at Joint Base Ballad (formerly "Anaconda" - infamous for the multiplex movie theater and olympic sized swimming pool ... neither of which I was able to sample). On Monday ... well, you get the picture. I've been everywhere, man!

Everywhere, that is, except my ultimate destination which is Camp Taji. I should be flying there now instead of sitting here chatting with you but there is a sand storm here in Baghdad (i'm about 90% sure I'm in Baghdad :-) so the helicopters are not flying.

Haven't even had time for a cinnabon!

And Ever Shall Be: Fallen Comrades

Bagram Airfield is the main hub for air travel in and out of Afghanistan. If something is arriving to Afghanistan by air, it's most likely arriving to Bagram Airfield. If something is departing Afghanistan by air, it's most likely departing from Bagram Airfield.

The remains of military members killed in action depart Afghanistan by air.

Every departure - every, single departure - is marked by a Fallen Comrades Ceremony. When the plane is readied, regardless of the hour, all personnel are called to line the 2 mile stretch of road the Humvee bearing the bodies travels from Entry Point to Flight Line. I will forever remember every trip I made to watch a passing convoy bearing the caskets of the fallen, draped with flags and, quite often, flanked by their comrades in service.

It's an impressive sight: uniformed service members lining both sides of the road as far as the eye can see in both directions, waiting at parade rest until the Humvees, traveling at almost walking-pace, draw near and, as a collection, they snap to attention. There is no sound but the rustling of uniforms moving from rest to attention and back to rest ... like a wave of tribute rippling up the road. I feel so inadequate standing there beside them - unqualified to share in the salute that means more than any word ever spoken.

So I witness the occassion in silence and when the stinging in my eyes becomes too much to bear I look up at the mountains - the eternal, silent witnesses to the passing of those for whom Afghanistan ever shall be.

As It Was In The Beginning, Is Now ...

I landed in Afghanistan on 01 March 2008. As I prepare to depart Afghanistan on 01 February 2009, I cannot help but look around and notice how different it all looks ... and I see the most noticeable changes are those that have taken place on the inside.

The picture that launched the Blah, Blah, Blog was taken on the evening of my first day on Bagram Airfield, across from my "new home" B-Hut 313. The picture accompanying this entry was taken this morning across from my "old home" B-Hut 313. There have been so many pictures in between. And, of course, a great deal more "living" that occurred between the pictures.

This isn't my last Afghanistan entry (I hope). I have one final tribute that must be made before I go... to those for whom Afghanistan ever shall be.

For now, I must pack. Of course I haven't packed - how long have you known me? Even now we both know I'm fibbing about packing. I will procrastinate until Thursday, freak out all day Friday to avoid facing the reality that I am leaving then jump on the plane Saturday morning at zero-dark-thirty and not even realize I've left until I'm half way to Dubai. What can I say? It's my way ... and, if nothing else, I always somehow manage to do things my way.

The Invisible Women

In Afghanistan it is called a chadri. In other areas it is called a burqa (a/k/a burkha, burka or burqua). Officially, it is "an enveloping outer garment worn by women in some Islamic traditions for the purpose of cloaking the entire body."

Originally, the chadri was created by one of Afghanistan's rulers to prevent anyone from seeing his wives' faces (no, the plural is not lost on me but that is another discussion). The chadri became a symbol of an upper class citizen BUT as times changed the Afghanistan government decided they were not in keeping with their modern views and banned them. YAY for modern times.

But the winds of change blew once more and "modern times" gave way to Taliban Times.

In Afghanistan, the Taliban force women to wear chadris / burqas in public because, according to Taliban spokespersons, "the face of a woman is a source of corruption" for men not related to them. In addition to forcing women to wear burqas, the Taliban required all ground and first floor residential windows be painted over or screened to prevent women being visible from the street.

Photographing or filming women was banned as was displaying pictures of females in newspapers, books, shops or even the home. Modification of any place the name of which include the word "woman" or "women" was mandatory - e.g. "Women's Garden" was renamed "Spring Garden". Women were forbidden to appear on the balconies of their apartments or houses. Women were banned from being on radio, television or being present at public gatherings.

After women disappeared from public the Taliban decreed women were not allowed to work. Women were not allowed to be educated after the age of eight and prior to the age of eight they were only permitted to study the Qu'ran. Girls who wanted an education were forced to attend underground schools such as the famous Golden Needle Sewing School (google it - fascinating stuff) where they and their teachers risked execution if caught. Execution.

The only time women are publicly showcased is when they are publicly flogged or publicly executed (usually via public stonings. read prior blog for gory details of breaking teeth, etc.) for violating the Taliban rules.

The only evidence of women in much of Afghanistan is the striking, arresting site of a chadri walking up a mountain road or hangin on the wall to dry. Like magic. They all just disappeared.

Suggested Reading: A Thousand Splendid Suns (the story of a few invisible women in Afghanistan who saw each other)

Website: http://www.rawa.org/ for stories of Afghanistan girls who set themselves on fire in an effort to make somebody witness the frustration and lonliness of being invisible and forgotten by the world.

I'm Gonna Make it After Aaaallll

I'm not gonna lie to you - I've been sick. Not just "sick" but Super Sick with special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onion on a sesame seed bun SICK. I was so sick my boss won't even take a picture of me to post because he says, "I ain't takin' a picture of you lookin' like that. Yore mama'd be on the first flight over here with you lookin' all puny and pathetic like ya do. I ain't facin' yore mama."

Smart man. Especially since I'd be gone by the time she got here. But I digress.

The point is I am feeling better and learned a great deal about oral restorative salts in the progress.

I leave for Iraq in 10 days so this is sort of the final countdown (I surrender my blog to this Eurasia moment. Sing it with me now, "we're leaving together. but still it's farewell. and maybe we'll come back. blah blah who can tell? blah blah blah blah light years to go. we're leaving ground. will things ever be blah blah agaaaaaaiiin? it's the final countdown. d-d-duhn-duhn. d-d-du-du-duhn).

Okay, I'm back. I know what you are thinking but the answer is, "NO. It was NOT a mental illness from which I suffered." But I can't swear that my brain didn't fry a little. :-)

Departure Date: 01 February.
Destination: Camp Taji, Iraq

The Ten Thousand Words

There's a photographer, named David Lang, who photographs the faces and places of Afghanistan and Pakistan - but I love his work because when I look at his faces and places I really see the souls of this region. I've never met him. I first learned of his work when he traveled to Pakistan in 2002 (I think it was 2002) to photograph the aftermath of the earthquake. He has returned numerous times since then and it is obvious from his photos that he is completely in love with this place (and my Mom thinks SHE has it bad) and that his heart will never belong to anyone as completely as it does "the 'Stans".

I learned from him that Afghanistan plans to send a women's boxing team to the Olympics and they are training even as I write. You can meet the girls - as young as 12 years old - and their coach at http://www.davidlang.com/main.php (Index / Afghan Womens Boxing).

The most effective pictures I've seen of a suicide bombing are ones he took of a bombing that happened in Kabul, Afghanistan at http://www.davidlang.com/main.php (Index / Kabul Suicid Bombing). While you are there, you have to visit the "Kabul Street Photographers" link to see life as it is lived between bombings.

Even though I am here, in Afghanistan, surrounded by the faces of locals, I return to his site to stare into the faces in his Afghanistan portraits (http://www.davidlang.com/main.php (Index / Afghanistan Portraits). I see in his faces every Afghan who I have ever asked, "Are you from Afghanistan or Pakistan?" who has either stood a little straighter or gentled at my ignorance and responded, "Af-whan-i-stan".

Afghanistan and Pakistan are so separate and so inseparable at once that I cannot look around Afghanistan without wondering what would have happened were things different in Pakistan. I love the pictures of the 2008 Pakistan election. They are the record of a future that cannot be realized ... but which will always remain possible in those photos. (http://www.davidlang.com/main.php (Index / Pakistan Election 2008).

The tens of thousands of words I cannot find to tell you about Afghanistan can be found in David Lang's work. A man who talks more than me? Who'dda thunk?!

My Favorite Things: The Unsung Heroes

I wanted to post a "before" and "after" picture of the interior of the porta potty pre- and post-cleaning, but after the reaction I got to my bedroom, I'm afraid the porta potty would be too great a shock to the senses (I should have posted those bedroom pics ages ago and capitalized on your sympathy - I think I could have tripled my already impressive "care package" statistics! I had no idea how awful my room was until my mother informed me she now wishes she could travel back in time to the first time she ever told me to follow my heart and ground me to my room, instead. She wants me to tell those of you with young, impressionable children of your own to insist they watch more television and not let them play outside so often lest they suffer "her" same fate (that of having a daughter who refuses to give you grandchildren, teases you with dreams of stability by getting a law degree then pulls the rug out from under you by running off to Afghanistan to live in a 6'x6' plywood room with walls that don't reach the ceiling and a ban on behavior that would ever get you grandchildren)). Ha!).

This picture of the exterior of the porta potties and the "cleaning truck" will have to suffice. Yes, those are hoses on the side of the truck. Yessss, those hoses attach to the porta potty. Yesss, those hoses make a "withdraw" which goes into that gray holding tank on the back of the truck. But none of that interests me (although I am grateful they make the withdraws). My favorite part is when they remove all the toilet paper and power wash the interior leaving it spic-n-span for the lucky first user - which I make certain is me.

The unsung heroes of Bagram Airfield - the portapotty cleaners. There are about a thousand porta potties (or more) base-wide and these guys clean them come hell or high water. Air-kiss, Air-hug to them, one and all. Bless their cotton socks.

A Few of My Favorite Things: Is This a Sign?

Be back in 30 - 45 minutes starting now. No, NOW. No. Wait... now.

See why I love it?!

Don't be surprised if this sign disappears from Afghanistan around the same time I do and shows up in Iraq ... around the same time I do. Ha Ha.

A Few of my Favorite Things: Room Service

The first time I laid eyes on the 6' x 6' plywood room I would (and have) call "home" for all of my 305 days (and counting) in Afghanistan, all I could think of was a Groucho Marx quote: "Hello, Room Service? Could you send up a larger room?"

But as is prone to happen when a girl travels the world alone, the space around me became a character in the story of my Afghanistan experience and my room has played an essential role in this tale (don't worry / get your hopes up - thanks to General Order No. 1 (which I have affectionately dubbed, "Get None One") prohibiting sex or even opposite-sex visitors in one’s room, my walls have seen nothing but G-rated stories for the telling).

The walls defined the gallery space upon which I displayed the collection of paintings I "commissioned" from a local Afghan artist named, Mujeeb as well as the “shrine to home” – my hodgepodge collection of family pictures and cards sent from home which I thumb tacked to the wall at the foot of my bed.

My bed, clothed in Technicolor bedding and a pink electric blanket (thanks to Mom, Dad and friends who sent home-washed sheets!) became my sanctuary from the cold, the tired, the dust and the inevitable loneliness that sometimes creeps into alone time. The bed doubled as my "display table" upon which I would open care packages and scatter my treasures for viewing and inventory! I snuggled under those covers and read letters from home about what I was missing on Dancing with the Stars (I had no idea – go Brook! Go Lance! That football player guy was a total pity-keep. He stank!), prayed for God/dess to sneak a few extra hours into the night so I could sleep(and that I spend them sleeping rather than hunkered in a bunker despite all those tasty snacks) and watched bootlegged copies of "in theaters now" movies on my old-school portable DVD player (3-and-a-half inch screen, thank you very much. The screen was to-scale with the room).

I chewed a lotta hubba bubba and consumed a lotta dark chocolate (eating dark chocolate is not a violation of "Get None One" despite rumors that it is a substitute, of sorts) in that room. I questioned my sanity in that room. I reclaimed my soul in that room.

"Hello, Room Service? Cancel my order."

A Few of My Favorite Things: A Ten Part Series

Before I leave Afghanistan, I'd like to show you a few of the things that have made daily life here a little more bearable. To that end, I have prepared a song foreshadowing some of the "things to come" in upcoming blogs:

(Just like Mary Poppins sang it in The Sound of Music)

Girls in red Burkas
Sunday mail delivery
"Be back when I get back" sign
left when I'm leaving

Multi-roll t.p. holders made of wood
Helped to make my Afghanistan time gooooood.

Good morning snacks and my
good morning coffee
left on my desk by my
very good bossy

Shiny care packs that arrive every month
Sharing some snacks with my friends in "the bunks"

When the camels bite
When the heat stings
When I'm feeling sad
I simply remember the porta-john cleaning crew
and then I don't feeeel so bad

Work-outs in tent gyms
and muay thai kickboxing
expressing myself with
near-uncensored moxy

All of my outgoing mail sends for free (okay, not boxes, just letters - i'll still miss it!)
These are a few of my favorite things

When my clothes shrink
When there's no heat
When I'm feeling bluuuuue
I simply remember I don't have to cook
and then I feel gooood as new

A New Year, A New Career

I got a hot tip that they have hot water in Iraq. We've had no hot water here since 22 November 2008 (that's a date you remember, my friends) - the only reason I haven't left before now is because I thought a friend (okay, a brother!) of an ex-marine might hook me up with a hot water heater. I mean, everybody knows Marines can get things! But that's looking like a dead-end. So I'm accepting a job - still with DoD contracted to KBR - that will take me to Iraq where I will work as an Employee Relations Specialist (whatever that is).

My student loan officer will be pleased. My mortgage-holder is most certainly breathing a sigh of relief at this very moment. The fact that my parents will not be asked to "augment" my existence for yet another year has won me their endorsement ... okay, that and a promise that I'll be home for Christmas in '09.

I'm tentatively slated to leave Afghanistan on 01 February ... so don't stop sending those care packages just yet.

Happy New Year. I'm jealous of your hang-over.

Yes, Virginia, There IS a Santa Claus ... In Afghanistan

You know how they say, "it's the thought that counts"? They're totally right. How fabulous is this santa, sleigh and reindeer some of the locals (Afghans) who work on the base built in secret - with some help from the woodshop/carpentry staff (admittedly, it appears very little help)? Okay, so it looks like Santa may have crashed a little on his landing but I think he's flying 4 reindeer shy of a full fleet, so cut him some slack.

The guys who built this were SO PROUD of their gift to us - their homage to our Christmas, our "most important" holiday (per their perception). I practically beamed with pride for them. They practically beamed with pride under the praise and gratitude. Everyone was beaming. Everyone was priding. It was an all-out Christmas morning beaming-with-pride fest.

As Santa is wont to do, he breached religious, geographical and even environmental/climate barriers and united us. Santa for president in 0-twelve. Merry Christmas to all and to all ... good presents.

Jingle Trucks, Jingle Trucks, Jingle All The Way

Jingle trucks are painted with intricate patterns and bright colors and usually have thousands of charms hanging from the sides and bumpers that sound like chimes blowing in the wind.

Local superstition tells the jingling charms and the lavish colors ward off evil spirits during the dangerous journey through the mountain passes between Pakistan and Afghanistan. And the journey is, indeed, a dangerous one since jingle trucks are the transport vehicle of choice in Afghanistan - for both the US Military and the Taliban.

Why might the US Military employ the jingle trucks to transport supplies when they have their own elite line of armed-and-ready-to-transport vehicles? Because the jingle trucks are less conspicuous. There are thousands of them fulfilling thousands of innocuous non-war related transportation tasks which makes it easier for the hundreds performing military supply missions to traverse the country unnoticed. At least in theory. And, even in practice, the theory is fairly successful. The practice is certainly not without its detriments but, too, it is rife with benefits.

What's good for the goose is good for the gander and the Taliban are not above smuggling their own rockets hidden in the innocuous materials. Therefore, it is not uncommon to see young soldiers and marines with M-16s on roadsides talking to the grizzled, bearded, unkempt drivers in their Afghan "pajamas" and their colorful trucks on old silk routes (for a true picture of the colorful jingle truck drivers -and other photos that bring Afghanistan to life - check out photographer David Lang's site at http://www.davidlang.com/. His photos are a treat for the senses).

Given the likelihood of the sight, it was with relative disinterest that I waited while troops searched a jingle truck ahead of my vehicle a few days ago. I barely registered the common scene of truck driver climbing down from his cab and being frisked as he turned out his pockets and offered his truck for inspection without objection. I zoned out to endure the delay (waiting is not one of my strong points) and had no idea how long I was gone or how far from the moment I'd traveled until I was pulled back to reality by the sound of Santa's sleigh.

Even my muddled brain quickly deduced that the source of Santa's sleigh bells was not Santa's sleigh at all, but the rhythm of the jingles on the idling truck - which, by the way, the driver had decorated with actual jingle bells tied to the bumpers with red, velvet ribbons.

But long before my brain performed aforementioned amazing deductive maneuvers, my unmuddled soul took me on an unlikely journey from the edge of an Afghanistan mountainside to the home of my childhood Christmases and returned me, in the space of a nanosecond ... grateful and renewed. Unlikely, unanticipated and unconsidered. So welcome.


And now, a Christmas song:

Dashing over the mountainside
In a 4-door up-armoured truck
We run into delay
And i think, "WTF?"

I drift into a nap
Hey, wait, I’m off the map
A second later I'm smiling like
A happy, Christmas sap :)

HEY!

jingle trucks, jingle trucks ...

*FYI: I am told the jingle trucks get their name from the jingling sound their charms make. Just so you know, there is competing name-origin story about a transport company called "Jinga" and the trucks originally being called "Jinga trucks" which morphed into "jingle trucks", blah, blah and blah. That story, however, offends my poetic sensibilities so I reject it on principal.

Let it Bluster, Let it Bluster, Let it Bluster

Announcer: And now, the BAF evening news with Cira Duffe sitting in for ... Katie Couric (why not? As long as I'm pretending, why not dream big? I know she's old-school but I like her so I'm her).

Camera 2 pans in on Cira sitting at her desk looking like she'd rather be on assignment in Thailand (whose tourist slogan, by the way, should be "Thai massage rules"): Good Morning. Katie is on assignment (in Thailand, I'm sure). In weather news, it's a blustery Friday on Bagram Airfield and promises to remain blustery through the weekend and well into February. Our mental health correspondent reports spirits remain high, despite the cold, rainy conditions and the frosty temps of the porta-potty seats, due in part to the amazing views afforded by the tumult of the winter zypher. In other words, folks, it's cold and snowing but there's a helluva view.

In fashion news, our correspondent cautions not to sport your "-25F thinsulated 2000g, lined, waterproof" Sorel Snow Boots in this weather lest you be made fun of by almost everybody else (a/k/a all the former special forces military tough people who refuse to transition from short sleeve to long sleeve shirts until the temperature drops below 40F) in your male-dominated corporate security department.

Happy Winds-day from blustery Bagram Airfield (if you are not presently imagining piglet blowing away sans scarf then you have been tooooo long without pooh).

It's Beginning to Look a lot Like Christmas

Snow? Check. Tree? Check (size doesn't matter). Pink "Santa" hat that says "Princess"? Check.

Sounds like we have everything we need for (an improvised) Christmas on Bagram Airfield!

What? Did you just say I'm missing some- You'll have to speak up, I can barely hear you. Ohhhhh, right, prezzzzents. What a great idea - I didn't even think of them (hey, pipe down - so what if I AM a present lobbyist?! You were warned in the very first blog... besides, I have been very good). Presents are a great idea. You're brilliant.

My boss only agreed to model the Santa hat on condition of anonymity and to show you the side where KBR will soon be embroidered in keeping with the spirit of the hat law (if not the letter).

Merry almost Christmas.