No pictures yet

Does it strike anyone else strangely that there are no pictures of my base camp up here yet? I’ve described it as good as I can, or at least as I want to, but I’d really like to put up some pictures, and I had my camera on my shoulder two times in the last 12 hours and didn’t take one shot.

Here’s the deal.

1. I’ve been a bit skittish about pictures since we are in a secure environment with the internet all around us. So if I post a picture, and some terrorist uses it to . . . terrorize I guess, then I’m responsible and so I’m being careful. I’ve been told to relax by a few others on the camp, and I’ve seen a couple people taking pictures, but I’d rather figure out the policy, then go from there.

2. The weather here is unlike anything I’ve ever seen, and often, there isn’t enough visibility to take photos! Like I’ve mentioned before, there is often a dust cloud over the valley that keeps us from seeing too much outside (really over) the walls. Also, every other day or so, I walk out the barracks door to a smell of smoke, and it looks like there has been a fire nearby – with lots of haze and visibility down to about 1/2 mile.

I think the misconception about Afghanistan is that it’s all desert. It’s not. The valley floor where Kabul is located is at 6,500 ft above sea level – over twice the elevation of Boise. Surrounding the valley are mountains on all sides. And on the flight into the area, you can see that these are serious mountains with huge escarpments and some very rough terrain. The range directly to the east is the tail end of the range that curves into Nepal and sports Mt Everest and K2, so this is some high mountain country with some very tough approaches. In any case, storms come through here quickly and they are violent, with high winds, lightning and huge peals of thunder. The guys in the office are obviously entertained by my fascination with the weather and the surrounding countryside, but I can’t help it. I’m from a place where that countryside would be over half the reason you love where you live.

All of this adds up to about a 75% factor of time when there is nothing that you can actually see over the walls of the camp. There is too much fog, too much haze, too much dust. Soon, I’m sure, I’ll start taking pictures of the dust. Maybe I can do a study on the lack of sharpness in this country. All the edges are blurry, and it’s difficult to see a way through the craziness of the city when the dust covers it all.

I’ve got a security orientation today and I’ll be asking about the parameters for photos, so after that, I should be able to do some postings.

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