Photos

I haven't been great about taking or posting photos because my life has been a lot more restricted on this trip. But the link below will take you to some photos from this week.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2235464&id=7408617&l=81c12f2185

Sorry it has been a while...

Work has been nuts. You probably have seen the news articles about Karzai's decree on security companies, which obviously affects my work considerably. So just as my job is getting traction, the work is speeding up, all of a sudden we are in limbo. Should we keep going in the same direction? or scale back considerably in case we have to find ways of working without our security providers? Just creating contingency plans has become a full time job on our project. Throughout all of this, is the little-discussed fact that many of my good friends could be out of a job soon. So, it has been busy.

In other news, it rained today. It of course dried up instantly, but for a short period of time, the dust smell was replaced by a wet dust smell.

I also checked my credit card bill and realized that since I have now spent two months in a cash-economy, the only items on my bill this month are charity contributions, which made me feel warm and fuzzy.

Tomorrow is Saturday, which with our work schedule is really "Monday" so while my buddies back in DC are getting ready to go to all sorts of Halloween parties, I am gearing up for the begining of another 6-day work week.

Change of scene

Ah, flowers and trees and birds and fresh fruit! I have spent the last couple days at the compound of one of our subcontractors, soaking in all the normal-life. They have a lovely big garden with chairs and big cages full of parakeets. And they have a cook! Who uses okra and serves fresh fruit with every meal! It has been delightful.

In other unrelated news, a little sparrow somehow got into my room this morning, scaring the bajesus out of me. I told him he woke me up much too early and that I couldn't deal with the idea of dealing with him myself. Furthermore, if I had to call the housekeeper to take care of it, I didn't think either of us would be happy with that outcome. He was very reasonable and spent the next hour flying from my curtain rod to the top of the dresser and back, and then as I dozed back to sleep he somehow made it out the same air vent hole he came in through. Smart bird.

Dining hall genius

Nutella Bread Pudding.

And that is all there is to say today.

मुस्क्ले मेमोरी

Ok, so I don't know what is going on with my blog website, but it translated my title into Hindi and I don't know how to change it back?

Anyway, the title was supposed to be Muscle Memory because the sound of the jets flying overhead bring out a reaction in me that I blame on what few war movies I have seen. Imagine that "wheeeeeeehauuuuuuuuwooooshhhhh" going right over your head, and your muscles just clench up expecting the boom to come that would come in the movie. Except there is never a boom here, they are flown by our guys. I clearly don't understand sound waves either, because most of the time I can't figure out which way the jet is coming from, it just sounds like they are coming from all four directions.

I am posting a few photos of awesome things.

First is a bunch of French cheese and baguettes, brought in by a coworker from her vacation in Paris. I am not sure how long they were in her luggage, but they sure tasted good. Non-alcoholic beer washed everything down. Made for a good weekend.

Second photo is of the two best things I bought today. The little bus is a pen-holder and that is REALLY what the buses here look like. We call them jingle buses and they have bells along the bumper, absolutely hilarious. The can is a peach drink that has actual small pieces of peach in it, imagine someone chopped up canned peaches and served the syrup and chunks as a drink. Yum.

3 points to England

There is a British coffee shop on base that is responsible for today's point allocation.

1. Apple juice slushees: Refreshing, sweet, not electric-green. Just delicious apple juice frozen into a slush.

2. Curried chicken pies: Little puff pastries filled with chicken curry, not like a pot pie but rather rectangular so you can grab one on the go. Greasy and delicious.

3. Hot dogs wrapped in a long tater tot: I didn't actually try this, but the concept is brilliant. I can't believe an American college student didn't dream this up earlier. It is like taking an American staple, corn dogs, and making it even more fabulous.

My first photos of this chapter 2 of the blog are not really related to this post at all. The aunties assured me that they wouldn't get cranky at photos of me in body armor, and maybe it was mom all along who was squeemish and just blamed it on the aunties? Anyway, first photo is of me in my road trip outfit. Pretty cool, except that the vest has scratchy velcro that leaves long gashes on my arm when I take it off without paying attention, and snaggs my beautiful scarf I bought in Turkey. Oh well...

Second photo is from my short stint in Kabul. Proof of why life out here is not too rough; we can get Thin Mints in the stores?

They have quiz night here!

I am really quite easily entertained.

The team out here is great. As all projects seem to go, they are a mixed bunch, from Australia, Italy, Scotland, the Phillipines and the US. This is one of the hardest places in the world to do our job well, and yet everyone seems to be in a pretty pleasant mood and get along with one another. I am sort of filling in where I can since what I came out here to do has taken longer to get started up than we thought, but the work is interesting and I am learning.

All in all, life is just fine.

Update: trivia night was put on by the Brits and the questions were QUITE brit-centric. We found a young British marine and shanghaied onto our team to give us a fighting chance on any questions pertaining to British sports/tv/music. Combined with our resident feisty Aussie's liberal use of cheating off the blackberry, we ended up in 3rd place. Not too shabby.