Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Pictures of the day




These are my pictures for today. A little sharing of culture. A couple of Air Force guys were playing catch with a football and the Afghan nationals asked for a lesson on how to throw it. If you look close you can see the football in the air, tumbling end over end after a left-handed Afghani made his first attempt. Don't know if that is because he was left-handed or that he grew up playing the other football (soccer). The other picture is of the delivery of a new vehicle to the base. I thought the driver looked interesting and how he decorated his truck. Most trucks have tassles and bells hanging on the corners of the windshield, thus they are commonly referred to as jingle trucks by us.
We awarded a new contract today to install some fencing and remove barriers to an Afghan contractor. The contractor, Mike, speaks very good English and I was able to visit with him as we reviewed the job site this morning. He used to be a school teacher, taught English, science, math, and other subjects. Once this war started he became an interpretor for the US Forces and now has become a contractor. He is a new contractor for the base, but has quickly become one of the better ones. He owns heavy equipment - dump trucks, excavator and employs about 50 workers. When they install the fence they won't be using an auger or post hole digger like we would, they dig the post holes with a pick axe. Mike was quite proud of his new clothes he had on today, he just had them tailored. He offered to get our measurements and have a set made for us. We respectfully declined. Mike also has a shop in the local bizarre on base where the locals can sell goods to the military, he seems to have picked up on the American way quite well.

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