Afghanistan — March and April

Now that our adventures in South Africa have been appropriately chronicled, I will turn back to my mission in Afghanistan: the reconstruction of Kapisa and Parwan provinces. These two months were filled with many quality assurance inspections to ensure a quality product was being built, contractor meetings to gauge progress and capacity, and Afghan government meetings to plan, program and execute new projects.

The Afghan government representatives often join us when we go to the sites. For example, here the provincial line director for Rural Rehabilitation and Development joined us to inspect a compacted dirt road. This road is concurrently being paved with asphalt by another contract. Thanks to the chief for capturing this scene.

Here we are inspecting a deep well (>100 meters). Unfortunately, the quality isn’t quite what I hoped. So, the minister and I offered some suggestions to the contractor. With the chief’s fish-eye lens, you can see the whole scene.

As you can see, mobile phone technology has pervaded the market. Before 2001, there were no mobile phone carriers. Now, there are four with almost good coverage.

Answering some of the many questions from the people.

The people in this area (especially the children) loved to have their picture taken. In particular, the digital display was fascinating.

If you notice, this is the same man who was intently using his mobile phone.

These boys were a bit apprehensive at first, but warmed up to us (at least that’s what it appeared).

Doesn’t this boy have amazing eyes? Also, many children’s heads are shaved for the Afghan New Year (Mar 21). I was told they do that to help it grow back better in the future.

These next few images are of the people in the area.




The flowers were in bloom. As a good husband, he picked a bouquet for his wife.

These flowers poked out in one of the HESCO barriers on the forward operating base we stayed at.

These kids were collecting water for their family from the river.

It was still a bit chilly on this trip.


The view from the inside of our vehicle.

As much as I enjoy getting out to our projects, this room is where I spend a lot of time. Here we are meeting with the government officials to help us select a contractor. Once that contractor is chosen, we meet often to discuss everything from the design to execution of the project.

Here are a couple contract proposals. We’ve worked extensively to train companies (~200) on how to submit an adequate proposal. As a result, we’ve seen a huge leap in the quality of proposals submitted for our projects.

Here we are back out in another part of the province.

This is one of the many bazaars in the main population centers of Kapisa.


It seems I have a lot of pictures of old men. I don’t intend to, but they are often very photogenic and animated.

This kinda reminded me of what I expect a town in the west of the US looked like in the mid-nineteenth century. Sort of an Afghan Wild West (or east in this case).

To continue with the antiquity theme.

This pensive man was part of a discussion about development. The people need to help bring security. Then, we follow with development projects. The two are inextricably tied.
So, that covers my time up until mid-April. So, until the next post…
–Jim