An Inconvenient Truth

The potential isolation of being here has hit us forcefully. A sad reason has forced Jody to need to return to the US immediately. We found out Wednesday night. But there were absolutely no seats available on any flights for Thursday, so the earliest solution was a Friday flight that would get her into the US by Saturday mid-day. Turns out, Friday wouldn't work either, but not because of any problem with the flights.
As we were walking toward the parking lot to wait for the ride to the airport, we heard several popping noises that were pretty clearly gunshots, maybe 6 or 8. And we passed one person on the phone saying, "They say they're going to set the vehicle on fire." We went out the gate and waited at the gazebo, and for the next several minutes, we heard several sporadic bursts of gunfire. Then a security team mobilized and ran out the compound. We saw several armored vehicles with gun mounts head north toward Massoud Circle, the obligatory point one must pass en route to the airport. A few minutes later the helicopters circled overhead on their way toward the airport road, which had been locked down by Afghan security forces. A few more gunshots, nearly two hours waiting, and then we finally learn that the road can't be secured, so there will be no movement to the airport today. The same applies to people who just landed and want to enter the city; they are stranded at the airport indefinitely.

The story has just now begun to hit the media:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38485760/ns/world_news-south_and_central_asia/
The gist is, a traffic accident involving US cars, with reportedly at least four Afghans killed. Crowds gather around the accident scene, surround the vehicles, set two on fire, chant "Death to America,"etc. And so far, Jody still does not have a flight back to the US. Tomorrow, we try again.

Famous Debates

There are certain debates whose final resolution may never be known. Free will versus predestination. Plato versus Descartes. Capitalism versus socialism. Less filling versus tastes great. Yankees versus everyone who isn't the Yankees, though anyone on the first side of the debate is a jerk, no room for disagreement whatsoever.
To this august list we add one more, but with the certainty that its outcome will be known next July: did we, or did we not, send too much toilet paper in the consumables shipment?
We currently have 127 rolls on hand, as it were, with approximately 51 weeks to go, so to speak.
I was a proponent of sending lots of toilet paper; Jody has come to believe this was unnecessary.
Time, and the frequency of Delhi belly, will tell. The rough estimate was 2.5 rolls per week. We will be out of the country some part of this year, or traveling in country, so in fact we have more than this; we are probably looking at a stockpile of 3 - 3.3/week. That may be excessive. All I know is, I would rather that I be wrong than her, because if we run out, things are going to get very ugly very quickly.
Speaking of stockpiles, next I will write about an ongoing argument on compound over the ethical dimensions of hoarding alcoholic beverages given that the shipments are unpredictable and unreliable.

Bad Things, Updated

It's already in the news so it's now permissible to mention. Two American sailors stationed in southern Kabul were attacked by insurgents. According to an Afghan policeman quoted in the international press, they were driving a vehicle at night but turned the wrong way. That's not good in these parts. The insurgents learned of their whereabouts and a firefight ensued. One American was killed. The burned vehicle was found later, at quite a distance. The Taliban say they've got the other American.
I watch developments in the field, at provincial reconstruction teams and district support teams. Much of the work is carried out by contractors, partner NGOs and similar organizations, and while their presence is more subtle, they are much more vulnerable than official Americans stationed at combat outposts or PRTs. In the past week we've seen 9 wounded in 5 separate attacks - mostly IEDs, but also mortar and small arms fire.
Update: News now has publicly what we've known for a bit - the second sailor was taken prisoner but then killed by the Taliban. Word is that a spotter saw the two in their vehicle obviously lost; the spotter alerted an armed group which positioned for the eventual attack.

Notes from Training, 3: Roll Over

Humvees are top heavy. Armored humvees are very top heavy. Roads aren't always level here, and off-roads even less commonly so. If an IED happens to go off, the road can become less level in a hurry. So once the incline passes 20 degrees or so, Humvees roll over. This is not a good thing if you are inside it at the time. So we get a drill with a Humvee simulator to practice what to do if it rolls over. Turns out, the main thing you do when a Humvee rolls over is, you roll upside down. If your seatbelt holds and you manage to get a hand or an elbow up in time to cushion the movement -while not getting it caught in the gun turret mount, which is going to turn, and if your fingers are there, they are going to migrate to the other side of the vehicle - your head doesn't smack into the ceiling, and you aren't pelted by loose objects flying around, then it's not that bad; you just hang upside down. (Unless the Humvee has entered a river, in which case you're upside down and your head is submerged.) If you can re-orient yourself and have freedom of movement, you can unbuckle the belt, gradually slide to the ceiling that is now the floor, open the door upside-down and get out. So that's what the Humvee rollover simulator simulates.
See the chairs behind it? They make you sit there for a few minutes after you're done to make sure you're not too dizzy. And that's about all there is to say about that.

Venturing Out

Twice already planned trips outside Kabul have been scratched, at least for me. On my second day in the office I was going to go to Helmand Province, where things are, as they say, "kinetic." But that was postponed for security reasons. A trip to Kandahar a couple of days later happened, but without me, for less exciting reasons. I had to cover a series of meetings and never had a chance to leave the main building. But on the third night we did go into real Kabul to a restaurant. Chaotic traffic, check; chaotic amalgamation of shops, check, though it wasn't easy to see what each sold by the scant lighting, even with the nearly full moon; road blocks by Afghan security forces, check. None of this made much of an impression on me. What did were the potholes. I've seen sinkholes that were smaller. I thought a couple of my teeth had come loose by the time we had gone there and back.
The restaurant itself was fine, nothing extraordinary in terms of food; its walls were lined with oil paintings and carpets for sale. I didn't buy any.
We'll try our luck with more visits - Helmand is back on for early next week.
Helmand - I'm no Afghanistan expert, but I'm pretty sure that's the place where they make all the mayonnaise.

Notes from Training, 2: Helicopters

I enjoy helicopter rides, especially if they keep the doors open. I also enjoy the safety briefings, though I regret to say that these have grown slightly more professional over the past two decades. The only amusing words during the briefing for the Indiana flights were, "If you throw up in my chopper, you clean it up," prompting a couple of people to get airbags. But I remember my first such briefing, back in the day when men were men. Two rules especially stick with me:
- you should never tuck your legs under the seat, in case of what is now called a "hard landing," but 20 years ago was called an "unexpected early landing," e.g., crash. That's because the seat is a big shock absorber which will slam to the floor to cushion the impact. If your legs happen to be there, they will remain, even after you depart the helicopter.
- After the unexpected landing, "remain in the cabin until the rotors stop spinning." Everyone nods, understanding the obvious. "Unless the cabin is on fire." The nods transform to head shaking.
This time there are no unexpected landings, so we never get a chance to put this advice to the test.

Almost Never a Good Sign - Notes from Training, 1

The scenario is a visit to the marketplace. Only the sharpest eyed and eared could spot the clues that all was not well and that insurgents were about to attack:
- Every damn stall in the market was closed.
- If you asked the interpreter what the graffiti meant, he said, "Death to America." Even if that's not what the graffiti meant, still, it can't be a good idea walking around with an interpreter who has this opinion and isn't shy about telling you.
- Before we left post, the soldiers went over how they were going to practice responding to the attack by moving everyone up the alley and shoving them into the Humvees.
- (see above), a soldier's combat boots dangling from a wire above the street.
This is almost never a good sign.

Kabul Landscapes

A couple of views from our balcony on a gorgeous day, mid-80s, nice breeze, slowly gathering clouds.
The first photo, many of you will have observed, is not a landscape. It is of a very sleepy cat lounging near the pool.

Special Post for my Granddaughter

My granddaughter is named Zara. I was quite comfortable with the decision to name her after a Spanish clothing store, though my preference would have been for one like "El Reino de las Corbatas," in much the same way that I had suggested "El Museo de Jamon" for the nephew, who was eventually named Jaime instead. But stunningly, the parents proved stubborn on the subject. This younger generation. They truly are annoying.
No matter. The point is this: thanks to my eagle eye, now they know how to spell their daughter's name in Arabic.

A Bit More About Dubai

I saw an interesting sight in what was an excellent seafood restaurant in Dubai. All the public toilets we encountered - and no, I will not say how many that was - looked more or less like this.
Notice the hose. I wasn't sure what it was for, either, though I had my suspicions. But I have seen in my travels through the world lots of toilets of all different types, many of them simple unzip and fire any which way types, others requiring more gymnastic flexibility than one always feels like exercising when the inspiring moment comes. And yet I've never seen a hose.
So I thought it was worth opening up the stall and taking a photo.
Strange of me to do so, you think? The guy in there when I opened the stall door seemed to think that as well. But that's probably another story.

A Word of Clarification

An obligatory topic of conversation when first meeting someone here is previous postings. In this line of work, most people have a pretty good idea of how long a person stays in different posts. In our case, that post was Prague, which is very few people's idea of a difficult place to live. And so a typical follow-up comment is, "So you were there three years?", which is the typical tour. We have to clarify that in our case, it was only 21 months; we then have to explain why, which is, we curtailed from Prague in order to come to Afghanistan. We then have some 'splaining to do with the psychologist. My sessions are on Mondays and Thursdays.

Now in Kabul

We arrived yesterday afternoon. The landscape you fly over is endless barren folds of earth in every conceivable variant shade of gray: standard gray, brownish gray, blackish gray, tan gray, etc, with sharp upthrusting mountain ridges like what you'd get if you crumpled aluminum foil too many times, then took a close-up of it and posted it on Google Earth. You could see where the rivers would be running if it weren't the hottest point of summer, but now, they're dusty trickling lines weaving among the higher ground. You can see what have to be villages and farms, but since houses are built of the same baked dirt of the land, what you really see are lines, a bit lighter brown in hue, demarcating the buildings' and compounds' walls. Only close to Kabul did I start to see bluish-black lines that were rivers with water, and dark blackish clumps that were thickening vegetation.
Upon entering the airport, the first sign I saw was for "108 FM Kabul Rock," keeping Kabul rocking when the insurgency isn't enough. Most of the billboards in the airport were ads for mobile telephone companies, each one claiming the best coverage throughout the country. The signs that weren't for mobile phones were for advertising agencies, each proclaiming the most effective advertising campaigns available. And then comes the ride in from the airport. But this post is already too long.

Camels

We spent two days in Dubai, and we didn't see any live camels. But we did see signs for camel rides on the beach, which is close enough for government work to count. We also saw innumerable camel-themed merchandise: playing cards, snack items, stuffed animals, tin camel caravans, etc. We also bought for our granddaughter the book "Ali and the Camel," which is helpfully in both Arabic and English. Plot line is the distraught camel anguished by the thought that no one loves him is comforted by the boy Ali, who tells him all the reasons people appreciate the camel so. Said reasons include milk, fur, transport, "dung to heat our homes in the winter" (at which point, according to the book, the camel "smiles happily"), and ... camel meat. The camel is newly re-anguished and says, "So that's why I haven't seen my friends lately!" I'm not sure what lesson this book is teaching kids, but, since mine are grown, who cares.
The photo above is NOT of camels, but rather of shoppers in a Dubai mall. But it IS the mall where I bought the camel book.

Down Time

I have no Afghanistan-related news to report this week. We depart next week. This week we have spent the entire time with our three-week old granddaughter.

A Week Off

I have little to report, because this week we are on the last part of our home leave. We are spending time with our new granddaughter and our - well, "old," I guess, since she's not new - daughter. Both have funny facial expressions; one of them tends to poop her pants and spit up more often.

More from Crash and Bang

A word of advice from our driving instructor: if there is an enemy pointing a gun at you standing in the street ahead, "make him one with the road."

We excel at ramming cars both in forward and reverse, demonstrating that decades of parking lot mishaps provide valuable experience if applied appropriately. It is remarkable how little force is needed to dislodge a car if you hit it right. I will never not have the closest parking space in the mall again.

Shooting guns is fine and loud. I do reasonably well with the pistols except for the Glock, with which I can't hit anything except the hill behind the target or the cows beyond the hill. I am very good with the AK-47. I not only blow away the target's torso and head, not missing once - for good measure, the guy after me makes sure the target will not be reproducing without extensive reconstructive surgery.

Jody notes that the body armor is quite comfortable to wear- "like a life jacket, filled with lead."

Medic Class

Two days of what to do when someone gets shot or blown up. Besides the gross photos of things like sucking chest wounds and blown-off faces, there are numerous funny lines from the trainer:
"In case of evisceration, reassure the patient, and don't let him see his guts."
Speaking of evisceration: "If your intestine is working on its tan, that's a problem."
Pulse points: one is the femoral artery, ie, the upper inside of the thigh, but we are instructed to find that one for homework. "Just be sure to let your significant other know what you are doing in advance so they don't walk in and get the wrong idea. This could turn into some quality time for date night."
On estimating how widespread burn damage is, the general rule of thumb is, front and back of torso 18% each, limbs 9% each, head 9%, etc, and re the groin, "Sorry, gentlemen, but it's only 1%. Don't let anybody tell you different."
The class is shown a photo of a severe sunburn on a young woman in a bikini, with the bikini raised to emphasize the contrast between the burned and pale skin. The Socratic instructor asks, "Can you get this at your post?" An unidentified voice replies, "I hope so."
One person speaking of previous jobs refers to a stint as an "aquatics technician." After a couple of questions, this is revised to "pool boy."
We are informed that certain spinal injuries can cause involuntary erections, and that it is necessary to check for bleeding from the rectum as a sign of internal injuries. We are cautioned, though, that unlike broken bones or cavitous wounds, "we don't splint a priapetic incident or pack a rectum." Good to know.
When checking an injured person, if they can talk, find out crucial information. For example, ask what their last meal was, "if for no other reason than you might be seeing it again."