100116 – OPT Visit to Herat

I've been very busy lately, working on some projects and planning two trips. The first one was a 3-day trip to Herat. This post is a quick impression of that visit. The second one is a 12-day trip to the US! I'm so excited about that one, but more about that later. First, Herat...

One of the several projects I’m part of at IJC is the Future Operations RC-West Operational Planning Team (OPT). It’s interesting, but also confusing because we’re trying to plan EVERY aspect of the security, governance, and development of the region. What makes it even harder is the fact that our OPT is at IJC Headquarters and the operators and planners of RC-West are so far away. Like any large organization, especially spread across vast distances, orders and plans get lost in translation between the Headquarters and the front-line units. Add the fact that IJC HQ is mostly English speakers (US, UK, Australia, Canada) and RC-West is all Italian and Spanish and even more is lost in translation, literally. So our team decided to make frequent visits to RC-West to coordinate and work together, face-to-face.

So Fernando, a Spanish major at IJC, and I made a 3-day trip to Herat to meet the RC-West planning team, to get some answers to questions the IJC team had, and to see how we could help the RC-West team. That all sounded great from our IJC perspective, but when I got there the first question the Spanish colonel asked me was, “why are you here again?” I tried to explain that we were here to ask a few questions—to understand how far along they were in planning specific topics—and to see if we could help them in any way. Well, from their perspective, they’re exactly on course on all of their planning efforts and don’t our help. It didn’t help that just before we got there they heard of an IJC plan to send a 10-person team for a month-long visit to “help” them. The colonel literally said he didn’t see the need for the IJC “invasion.” Great I thought; I’ve walked into a hornet’s nest of defensive foreigners. On the second day, the colonel also said he didn’t understand the need for an IJC “mentor” team to come and “check” his team’s work. Fortunately, one of my key skills is understanding other people’s/organizations’ perspective and finding common ground. The past few days took all of that skill to stay welcomed and to actually find something that we could all do together to help each other execute the mission. The RC isn’t perfect, but to be fair, for several of the issues we didn’t think they were working they showed us their detailed plans and orders to their units to work those issues. They also showed us where they post on their homepage a lot of the information we were looking for. So there’s a lot of improving that IJC HQ needs to do as well. Overall, it was still a nice visit. Again, it was good to get away from KAIA, to see and appreciate another part of Afghanistan and the ISAF mission. I took a few pictures while at Herat, but I haven't had time to compress the files and upload them to the MacBook. I'll post the pictures later.

New Dorm Room

Well, I’m finally settled into a new dorm room, with another American major in my career field and deployed unit, and a British squadron leader (the Royal Air Force equivalent to a major) who works with me in Future Operations as a fellow Air Planner. When we moved in we had two desks and two chairs already assembled. Most other rooms had to assemble theirs. I’m glad I didn’t have to mess it that. (I assembled enough furniture for our Germany house to last me awhile.) We don’t have our wardrobes yet, but I think there’s ‘plenty’ of room to spread them out in the room so we’ll have a little personal space. We’re ‘supposed’ to start getting them next week. I started collecting empty water boxes and was planning to duct tape them into a cardboard chest-of-drawers, but I guess I’ll just wait for the wardrobes. The room is approximately 9 feet wide and 18 feet long. At first, I thought it was going to feel tight or cramped, but when I laid down to go to sleep the first night I looked over at one of our piles of bags and realized how far away it was…there was 4 feet of floor space between me and our gear! In the tent, I had 3 by 6 feet of floor space my bed and the wall of the tent, and that included my 2 by 3 foot footlocker. So even with three people and lots of personal bags, the room actually feels roomy. It’s all relative, I guess. So when you go to bed tonight, look around and appreciate your spacious American accommodations (or American-like for those in Germany!). I’m not trying to make anyone feel guilty, but rather blessed for all that you have.

The new dorm buildings are on the developing, West-end of the base. Check out how much dust that van is kicking up. That’s on a paved road, but the sand and dust have built up an inch or two over it. Imagine how pleasurable it is when a vehicle passes you while you’re going for a run…I’ll tell you it’s not fun trying to breathe through all of that dust.

Here’s the view between the buildings. There’s no landscaping yet, but I’m sure tons of gravel are on the way.

Here’s my master suite, as viewed from the front door. We don’t have our wardrobes yet, so everything’s sitting out or piled up. You can’t see it, but there’s a desk to the left, behind the front bunk. I sleep in the bottom bunk to the right. We had to raise the bunk up on cinder blocks so could store some bags under there. We also have bags on the one upper, empty bunk. My American roommate sleeps in the bottom bunk to the left. He brought black shower curtains and sheets to enclose his bunk. I guess he’s pretty serious around blocking out the light so can sleep (or develop film photography).

And here’s the view from the back of the room. There’s our second desk, although my American roommate has taken up that desk with his stuff. I thought I had too much stuff—I have a total of five bags, but he has even more stuff than I do and it’s more spread out. My stuff is packed or stacked in three neat piles right now. My British roommate only has two bags. Of course, he’s only here for four months (and still gets a mid-tour leave, but that’s another story).

No Football Bowl Day ... But Buzkashi Instead

Yesterday a mass e-mail went out to the IJC saying that we had been personally invited by one of the Afghan generals to attend a Buzkashi match (for lack of a better word). Buzkashi (translated as “goat grabbing”) is an old Central Asian, mainly Afghan in fact, competition where men on horseback wrestle for control of a goat or calf carcass, race around a pole or flag, and place the carcass in a circle. (Check out Wikipedia for more information.) I have seen the sport on the Discovery Channel, so I had an idea what it was like. The invitation was limited to the first 50 responders. I knew I wanted to go, so without too much decision-making effort I responded that I wanted to go…I was the ninth person on the list.

I did worry a little bit about the security situation. The e-mail said it was going to take place at the Kabul stadium. While there is always some threat just driving the roads here, my main concern was actually being in a large crowd of people and thinking that one of them may sneak in a weapon or something, but I figured since the Marines were the ones coordinating the event, they would probably be well represented there and that I and 49 well-armed Marines and Soldiers could adequately protect ourselves. After an uneventful, but bumpy ride (especially since I was in the very back of the armored Suburban) we arrived at the “stadium.”

I lost my bearings from riding backwards and having one, small window to look out, but we were somewhere on the western outskirts of Kabul, on some rolling hills near the foot of the mountains, at what would probably only be considered a horse stadium. There were a lot of armed ISAF and Afghan soldiers standing guard/overwatch at every high point around. While there were nearly 50 horses and riders, there were very few spectators. I felt a lot safer realizing that this was really an event arranged almost solely for us. And before the match, several US helicopters landed and unloaded Gen McChrystal (COMISAF), Gen Rodriguez (COMIJC), and at least six other general officers. Then I knew I was as safe as I could possibly get in Afghanistan, so I was able to relax and enjoy the sights.

First of all, it’s just really neat to see the Afghan riders (and horses) up close and personal, smile at them and nod Hello, and to receive some acknowledgement back from them. They were mostly looking at us like we were the strange, exotic ones. It was nice to see more scenery. We could see more of the mountains and more of the city. Whichever part of town we were in is going through a building boom. There were several miles of lots that have been walled off, most foundations and support structures of large houses in the process of construction. (I think that’s a very good sign for the security and development of Afghanistan.)

Then of course, we got to watch and enjoy the match. And no surprise to me, it was extremely cool to see in person. There isn’t a lot of constant, fast-paced action, as there is a lot of positioning, pushing, and wrestling to pick up the carcass from the ground (they have to reach down while still saddled on/to the horse), but when a rider did finally pick up the carcass it got exciting as the tried to break free of the pack and race down the edge of the stadium, literally just a few feet from where I was standing.

Only a few of the riders went all the way around the green flag at the other end of the field, with most racing about two-thirds down before turning back to place the carcass in the circle for a ‘score’. But there really is no scoring per say, or even a time limit for the match. When a rider places the carcass in the circle, he wins that turn and receives an award or prize. Today, it was “straight cash, Homey.” When a rider scored/won that turn, one of the other riders who was obviously partially in charge would ride up to the winner and hand him cash. I think the riders that went farther down the field before turning around to return to the circle received more prize money.

I’ll try to share and explain a little more in the captions to the pictures below. (Due to limited bandwidth and the desire to post as many pictures as possible, I’ve had to compress the pictures. But you should get the idea. And you can still click on them to increase the size.) Overall, it was a great experience, a true once-in-a-lifetime event that I’m glad that I ventured out to attend.

I was standing at the gate when some of the riders and horses entered the stadium. This was my first sight of the event and it was so close…very cool.

Now this rider was your stereo-typical Buzkashi tough guy…hairy chest at all. And yes, he won several turns.

Even tough guys have to check their cell phones one last time before the match.

Here’s the prize-money man. Yep, that’s a big stack of Afghani cash in is hand. After a rider won a turn he would ride up to them and give them a few bills, although I have no idea how much of course.

This guy was the character of the match. At first, I thought he was some sort of referee because he seemed to be hollering at the riders a lot, but then seemed to be hollering at the crowd a lot, too. It was kind of an epic, sing-song hollering though. I think he was more like an announcer or color commentator. He cracked up the official reviewing stand once and was promptly paid a prize as well.

Buzkashi - More Action!

So here I am, right on the edge of the Buzkashi action.

Each turn starts off with a rugby-like scrum near the finish circle in front of the official reviewing stand. The riders whip their horses into the scrum in order to push others out of the way so that they can grab the carcass from the ground. (Editor's note: click on the photo and check out the armed security on the building in the background. Good to see.)

Here’s a closer shot of the scrum with a good example of how they pushed and reared the horses forward into the pile in order to move others out of the way.

After a rider is able to grab the carcass, he races down the right side of the stadium, heading for the far end of the field. I think they always headed down the right side in order to block other riders from being able to snatch the carcass from them. Notice how the rider has to lean to the left to balance the weight of the probably 100-pound carcass.

Here the prize-money man decided to get in the mix and tried to steal the carcass. Seconds after this picture, he had caught up to the other rider and I saw the his RIGHT hand reach out on the lower LEFT side of his horse as he reached out to within inches of grabbing the carcass from the other rider. Mentally, I had focused in on his hand so much it almost felt like I was watching it in slow motion. It was only after they passed that I realized how far to the left he must have been leaning off of the horse to get that close to touching the carcass while the other rider was speeding away.

Buzkashi - More pics

Here two guys who seem to be part of the red team work together to win a turn. I'm not sure why no one contested their finish. Usually several riders rode alongside the main rider as he neared the finish circle and push or guide his horse away from the circle.

These two were the prettiest horse AND rider at the match. They didn't even try to mix in the scrum or any of the chases. They just raced back and forth every now and then. I'm not sure who he was trying to impress ... although I kind of was ... more so of the horse, mind you, which was beautiful, than of the rider, who was kind of cool too. (Notice teh quilted version of the Uzbek robelike President Karzai likes to wear. There were a few children wearing the quilted Uzbek robes too. They were cute.

"What are you looking at? Go back to work!"

Tebow's Swan Song

I was able to wake up a little earlier this morning and watch the first half of the Sugar Bowl on a big-screen TV with sound. Then at half-time I had to attend one of my morning meetings. Fortunately, the daily IJC brief (my second morning meeting) is broadcasted across the mission computer system that also has streaming video feeds of AFN. I was able to open two separate windows on my desktop and watch the second half of the game. Even though the picture was 3-inches wide and without sound, it was still fun to watch the Gators play. I like watching football, but I'm like Pavlov's dog when I see orange and blue of the Gators playing. It's great. And I'm extremely happy the Gators didn't come out flat like Alabama did last year. Being Tebow's last game and with the issues surrounding Coach Meyers' health and status for next year, you would have thought they'd rally around the team and play well. I'm glad they did. It's great to be a Florida Gator!

Your coach has a heart condition and you still dump ice-cold Gatorade on him? What are you thinking? Are you TRYING to kill him? I already thought this was the dumbest tradition in football. It was probably hilariously surprising the first time someone did it (history says probably the '85 NY Giants), but it's too clichéd, inconvenient, and meaningless now. Stop the Gatorade dunking already!!!

I'm glad such a talented football player and quality young man had such a wonderful last game. The University of Florida owes Tebow a lot of gratitude for being such a good role-model, as well as football athlete. I hope he finds success in the NFL. Thanks Tim!

2 Months - 9 Weeks Done

Below is a message to Val a few days ago when I officially had 120 days left; now it’s down to 117!

“Sweetheart,

Attached is a screen capture of my deployment calendar thus far. I update it every few days. There's not a lot of information on there, but it helps me keep track of the highlights, as well as count down the days. I just thought you'd be interested. The thing that jumps out to me is that lately I PT every Tuesday...whether I need it or not. I've got to get into a routine; a Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday workout schedule would be nice. I've got to work on that. (5 December is purposely censored; it's a home-coming surprise.) As of today, I only have 120 days left, so we're a third of the way through. Even though 120 days still sounds long, being a third of the way through feels good. Three of the main guys I've been working with lately are all here for an entire year and they got here just after me. When it comes up in conversation (like me being happy that I’m a third of the way through already) I feel so bad for those guys. I definitely can't complain (to them) about being here six months. One guy just got divorced and is using the deployment to build his finances back up, so I don't feel too bad for him, but the other two have wives and kids so I do feel pretty bad for them. Still, I feel bad for myself, too, because I'm away from the most wonderful family in the world and I love you guys so much. Hang in there. We're doing pretty well so far. I'm really looking forward to hitting that half-way point! I love you, Angel of mine!”