Skype

Being removed from friends and family within the military environment isn't the same as it was 50 years ago, or even 5 years ago. Now, you can talk to anyone you want in the world for free through the internet. It's incredible. Sometimes unbeknownst to my skype-chat peeps, I take pictures for posterity's sake - and thus this post.

This picture already prominently featured in an earlier post.

My Mom and Dad

Dad pretends to be a crotchety old man.

"Ilana smile for a picture", I said. This is what I got.

Grandma Lola learned how to use the computer!

Just kidding! Mom was helping her out.

Both Grandmas!

Willie and Dena say hi.

It's Seth! You know... from this post!

And Ari, he made it!

YAHHHHRRRRRRRRRRHRGHGHGHG - she's a pirate.

Sometimes I get put on hold when real life calls.

Jackie is truly honored to be chosen for this post. More on Jackie in a future post.

Anyway, skype and google talk have really changed what life "downrange" is like. Society has romanticized the notion of the "war buddy" for centuries, especially in American culture. I think skype has worn down that connection that soldiers have on some level. It used to be a soldier was in a remote environment like this and there was downtime (this is what I've heard and seen, I clearly wasn't in any war back then), they could write a letter home or maybe even talk on the phone for a few minutes and then the rest of their time they'd socialize with each other practically every waking minute. Now, the situation is if there's a moment of downtime that soldier can be in instantaneous communication with his or her loved ones often face-to-face, so he or she rushes off to the computer.

Not that it's necessarily a bad thing, but that romanticized idea of a war-buddy may be a dying phenomenon for much of the military.

Kandahar Jewish Community Part II

Look at this flyer I made:

Awesome flyer, right?

I put it up all over KAF. While Warren was gone for on leave, people in our regular group had to step up to fill the void. I helped out by putting up flyers, and by making sure the food and cooking supplies that we have here remains kosher.

Being Jewish on KAF is easier than at most FOBs (once again, Forward Operating Bases). For one thing we have a bigger population and therefore more supplies and support. It's also just a larger base so there's more chance for overlap between cultures here. For instance the French PX and the British snack bar both have lox on their menus! Observe:

Seems like a reasonable price.

It was delicious.

Here are some more of the foods I'll go to when I get homesick.

I'd bet that this is more of an attempt at capturing the souvenir market and less of an overlap in cultures, but I see these around KAF all the time:

Kidush pourer thing.

I don't know what the Afghanis sell these as, but I've only ever seen them used for Kiddish wine at Jewish events. The idea is that someone says the blessing over the wine in the big cup, and then pours it into the holes in the top and siphons the wine into all the little cups on the bottom, so everyone can have some of the blessed wine. More pictures of those:

This one is more plain.

There are grapes on it, that means for wine, right?

OK, now I know I'm right, that's supposed to be Jerusalem on that cup!

As you can see from the flyer above, we only met for Rosh Hashanah on Wednesday evening, and then did our regular Friday night activities at the end of the chag. A non-regular attendee took a bunch of pictures and sent them out. Be prepared, the following pictures include some of the latest captured images of my beard. They may be shocking.

Preparing our "Kandahar Cholent" (it's made of whatever we've got) and matzoh ball soup!

Unpacking the Kiddush wine.

Tada!

Rickey lights the candles.

Shofar blowing.

Benari thinks, "He's going to faint".

Food!

Yummy.

At the other end of the table, a photo-shoot of Jacob and Avi takes place:

After dinner is over and all cleaned up, we have a little shofar jam session.

Shofar so good.

Shofar is hilarious.

Happy Rosh Hashanah from Kandahar!

Friday night, we had a turnout of exactly ten men show up to our Yom Kippur service. We went through the machzor and chose which prayers we'd like to focus on, say, or discuss. On Saturday we had a morning service where followed that same model. Our break-fast consisted of cakes sent by the kosher troops and the aleph institute organizations.

Sukkot is coming, and we're getting an actual Rabbi Chaplain. I hope it's as good as my Jewish experience has been here so far. Here's a picture of the Sukkah that I took around the second week I was here. I know it looks a little decrepit, but hey, there's a Sukkah in Afghanistan!

Almost forgot: Since my recent and auspicious mention in the Gross Schechter Day School Alumni Newsletter (which you can feel free to read), in which I discuss how helpful my Schechter education has been in allowing me to participate and help facilitate the Jewish service here in Kandahar, my mother has been encouraging me to also mention how important my experiences at both Park Synagogue and Camp Ramah in Canada have been in molding my Jewish knowledge. I might as well also plug my experiences at USY, the Siegel College of Jewish Studies, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Alpha Episolon Pi, The University of Vilnius's Summer Yiddish Institute, OSU Hillel etc. etc. etc.

Shout-out to Rabbi Rogozen, Michael Wolf, Rabbis Skoff and Marcus, Arlyne Bochnek, Amnon Ophir, and whoever the point people may be at those other things.

Helicopters!

Recently, Major Kraus, friend of the Education Center offered to have the Ed Center team over to his side of the base for a tour of the Army helicopters and a movie night in their rec room. It was a fantastic experience. Took a whole bunch of pictures. First we walked around the hangar where the skeletons of helicopters sat waiting to be put back together.

Helicopter skeleton.

Explaining things.

You see, after every so many hours of flight time a helicopter needs to be completely taken apart and put back together.

Looks like this one's got some sort of steam-punk rocket booster on the back.

Nope, it's just the engine uncovered.

Chinook helicopters have a lot of trunk space. Great for families.

From the hangar we went to the vast expanses of helicopter fields. Must've been hundreds of them spaced far apart - so it covered a couple square miles.

Looks like a helicopter version of Russian dolls.

We were there right around sunset, so it made for a good picture.

Ohhhhh.... ahhhh...

That little unicorn horn thingy there? That's in case the chopper flies through a place with wires - to cut them.

Wire cutter up close.

Castro reviews the troops' performance... Acceptable.

Fields and fields of helicopters.

Then we watched the sunset from their second story deck. Sandy sunset.

If anyone was on the edge of their seats waiting to find out what movie we watched afterwards - it was Bad Teacher. Just as funny the second time (I saw it in theaters). I guess working at the Education Center has some advantages - you meet people from every part of the base, because someone from any part of the base is trying to get an education - and in doing so you have some sort of a connection with the whole base.

Poo Pond

Government Shut Down Update: So the funding problem cleared itself up in less than 24 hours. Basically it amounted to a sleep-in and a trip to the bazaar. Phew. I was actually looking forward to a full day off. I didn't get to the intense work-out at the gym that I was planning for the afternoon before we got the word to head back to work.

Actual Post:

I've definitely mentioned the poo pond here at KAF before in this blog. The poo pond is a water treatment facility. You can see it in google maps if you search Kandahar Airport - it looks like a four-petaled flower made of poo-water. It smells, but I guess I'm used to it as people who are new to KAF have a more and more noticeable reaction to smelling the poo pond. Maybe when I leave here everything will smell so wonderful by comparison that I'll just stand still and breathe through my nose for hours on end.

Here's what the poo pond looks like.

Anyway, I took these pictures of the humorous signs people have put up near the poo pond edge. They are all variations on the same theme - that there are four extremely large pools of water smelling of poo very close by.

Hehehehe... dootie...

There's no yacht club here... that's ridiculous...

When I showed these signs to someone on base they said it ruined the movie Willy Wonka for them, making Augustus Gloop's elimination from the competition far more gruesome than it was to begin with... the biohazard sign isn't meant to be humorous.

And there you have it - the poo pond of KAF. Until next time.