I enjoyed my second trip to Kabul since settling down in this most hospitable of countries, and I must say it was nice to leave Herat once again, if only for a few days and to spend most of my time away in Camp Phoenix, by far an unexciting place to be.
We flew out last Sunday on ISAF 72, an Italian C-130. All the flights are military, operated by various countries, and they all have the same number attached to them. In this case, ISAF 72 will always be Italian. It did not have a good reputation, it would appear Italian pilots like to "shake" their cargo around for lack of a better term, and occasionally the cargo gets sick. Well, I found my flight with them rather uneventful, not comfortable by any stretch of the imagination as I was in a C-130, but nothing happened that would have caused my stomach to churn. The return flight with the US Air Force was another story. We spent the last 20 minutes of the flight at a low altitude banking left and right in what I understand is a combat approach. Why you might ask a combat approach when we were landing in Herat in the peaceful western part of Afghanistan? Beats me, and I was starting to get annoyed by all these maneuvers after the first 5 minutes. I did not get sick, didn't even come close, but some poor Afghan bodyguard to some Afghan National Police bigwig wasn't so lucky. Fortunately a trash bag was within easy reach.
While in Kabul, I spent most of the time in the aforementioned Camp Phoenix where I took part in a briefing to a bunch of generals, and we went out to Camp Morehead on the other side of Kabul for a graduation ceremony for the commandos that will be stationed out west. This meant that I would get to enjoy another couple drives through the center of Kabul, the weather wasn't the greatest for pictures nor was the vehicle I was riding in, but I still took a few pictures that show the overall extreme poverty and gloominess that is Kabul. Enjoy if you'd like these mediocre pictures...
pictures from kabul
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