And here we are. We have arrived at what will, presumably, be our home for the foreseeable future. At one time it was an airfield. We have occupied several of the hangers which have the added benefit of providing some protection from the occasional indirect fire attacks. Always nice to sleep in the bunkers. No running through the night in PJs, body armor, helmet and flip flops.
For the moment the weather is fairly pleasant. We’re entering the rainy season. When it rains, the ‘sand’ turns something the consistency of wet cement and the adhesiveness of fresh molasses. Your boots gain about two pounds for every ten feet you walk. The mud cakes on them in thick layers that are very nearly impossible to remove. However, when it is not raining this area is really pretty nice. It is still a desert but there is a lot of vegetation. The other day I saw what appeared to be rice fields, big ones and a lot of them.
Many of the people in this region live in mud huts or woven reed structures. The mud huts look like, well, mud huts. Not terribly attractive. The woven reed structures are pretty cool looking. Not so much that I’ll be building my next house out of them but I do intend to take a lot of pictures of them. The homes and yards look fairly typical of third world rural dwellers. Interesting that I often see a mud hut with a woven reed structure next to it and in the yard are a satellite dish and a fairly new car. The implication is that these people are happy living in their mud huts and thus willing to spend money on amenities like satellite TV and new cars rather than better housing.
So, here I am. 300 days left on this deployment. Should be interesting.