Will's gone another rotation to base camp. He sent me a few of his favorite pictures and pictures that I asked about. Will said it's so surreal to be standing in the middle of nowhere and all of a sudden hear the Islam prayer song playing over some loud speakers that the ANA acquired. They all get out their prayer blankets, which they treat very well and keep clean, and do their prayers 5 time s a day. He said there are about 50 families with about 10 people per family near the FOB, so when toys come available - it's a free for all, and Afghani's are not very keen on sharing. Our kids sure enjoyed sending toys over though. I wonder if their moms get tired of their junk laying around as much as I get tired of my kids' junk laying around! Pick up that worm or it's going in the garbage!!
These cute little boys just happened to be around when Will unloaded his pockets of all the toys our kids sent him to give out to the Afghan kids. Will said that this little 'magic' worm - as shown, which Emma picked out at Funfinity - went right from his hand into this little boys pocket! I hope they could figure out how to make it work - I sure couldn't!
This little boy is holding a 'wrist rocket' Will says they're very popular and are all over the place. I would be very afraid to be on the receiving end of that wrist rocket. I'm sure those little boys are very good at using them.
This picture is looking down the canyon from behind the wall surrounding their tent. One question I had was...what walls?
This is Will and the brigade XO (he still doesn't know his name) and his interpreter Harly, whom Will likes very much. This brigade XO doesn't have many friends because he's a bossy, loud mouth. Will has impressed everyone by using his "Ferris Beuller" skills, and has broken his code. The XO comes to camp just to see Will now. When he comes to their camp he always yells, in his Afghan accent, Beeeesingggger! Come here! Sit, Sit, Sit. Welcome! and anything else in English he can remember.
To answer my question...what walls? Will said these are called HESCO's. They come in 7 ft, 4 ft, and 2 ft high baskets and they hire Afghani locals to fill them and they use them as walls for the FOB. That's a lot of back-breaking-filling! You can see in the picture above this one the 4 ft walls, and they put the 7 ft walls all around the FOB. They needed to hire the locals to fill them up because they couldn't get the big equipment in there because of the big pine trees - so....here's a shovel!
This is a closer shot of what the baskets of torture look like (at least to the Afghanis) and the rope contraption thing hanging in the trees is Will's workout machine. I have no idea how it works, but apparently he's bringing home a six-pack and some guns and...okay I'll stop!
This man is Ashub Udin. He's the brigade intel sergeant. What he's pointing at is called a sand table. The table is like a sand box and Will said this man has spent countless hours perfecting this 3-D map of sorts. Even down to the buildings in the villages and the trees...he colored sand green with green spray paint! Will said the detail is incredible. I commented that there are probably computers that can do that and Will answered - "not around here!" So tell the cats to stay away from this sand box!!
Will had some sidewalk chalk and wrote our initials on the road. After he wrote the W + J, a little boy tried to copy the letters...how romantic...our initials in chalk....on a road....in Afghanistan!! 
To beat Will in romance...in October last year, I power-washed our initials into our foundation wall when I was trying to clean the 50+ years of dirt/moss off our house!! Doesn't get more romantic than that I'm sure!!
This little boy is writing his name, which most children don't know how to do. They write from right to left. I wonder if a right-handed person there feels like a left-handed person would feel here because they write from right to left....just trying to use my brain!
1 comment:
I love reading your Will updates! It's so interesting to read about where he is at and what he is doing. We think of him and all that he is doing for our country and think of you at home and wonder how you are doing too! Thanks for the updates!
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