Afghanistan Update: Kandahar to Kabul

An update from Elysia on her trip from Kandahar to Kabul:

My last update, a month ago, I was in Kuwait, getting ready to tackle the last leg of my journey into Afghanistan. Well, here I am.

On November 19, I departed Kuwait and arrived at Kandahar Air Field, in the southern part of Afghanistan, for my initial processing into the country. The base at Kandahar is large, and has lots of amenities. No Starbucks, but a Green Beans Coffee (“Honor First, Coffee Second”), KFC, Nathan’s, an Italian restaurant that serves good pizza  and a TGI Fridays. 

However, the highlight (or lowlight, depending on how you look at it) is something known as The Poo Pond. It is a large waste water repository, open air, and located right smack in the center of base. Depending on the wind direction, you can smell it well before you lay eyes on it. And it is adorned with a series of spouting fountains — whether they’re decorative or have some utilitarian purpose, such as keeping the crap moving, I don’t know.

I’d previously read about all the dust and sand present in Afghanistan and Iraq, and having deployed to Bahrain in 2007 and experienced several dust storms, I figured this wouldn’t be any different. Plus, I’d just been through the desert in Kuwait.

Well, this was different, alright. Kandahar’s air was filled with fine dust particles which constantly invaded my sinuses and lungs. By the end of my two days there, I was ready to go, but not before picking up the “Kandahar crud.”

The next leg of the trip was a C-130 ride from Kandahar into Kabul International Airport. The ride itself was uneventful, and through the few windows in the plane, we caught some spectacular views of the sun setting over snow covered mountains.

The topper of the flight was the combat landing that brought us into Kabul. I’d heard it described before, but there’s nothing like experiencing it firsthand. Let’s just say I was glad not only that I had my seat belt on, but that all the cargo was strapped in tightly.

Here’s someone else’s video of a C-130 doing a combat landing, probably at an air show. The purpose of this landing is to descend quickly and coast a very short time on the runway in order to avoid being a low-flying target:

Once in Kabul, I was met at the air terminal by the person whose job I was taking over. Boy, was he glad to see me! We had dinner at a Thai restaurant at the military base adjacent to the airport. Apparently, that restaurant’s been there for quite a few years, and is owned by a Thai woman who had the brilliant idea of opening a restaurant in a combat zone, where no one else would deign to. Her entrepreneurial boldness paid off, as the business seemed to be thriving.

The next day, we were picked up and taken to Camp Eggers, located in the “green zone” of Kabul, where the Ministry of Defense and the U.S. Embassy are all located. I was introduced to a number of people in different offices whose jobs related somehow to what I was doing, but quite honestly it all started to become a blur as I continued to fight off the crud.

That night, we mounted a vehicle and convoyed through the city. On our way, I saw many things that you would expect to be commonplace in a city — lots of regular cars, a large, bright neon-trimmed building that looked almost like a carnival but turned out to be a wedding hall, bakeries, electronics shops.

As we approached the outskirts of Kabul and the buildings became more and more sparse, it dawned on me that I was now heading toward my home for the next 7+ months.

Tagged as: airfield, C-130, Camp Eggers, combat landing, Green Beans Coffee, Kabul, Kandahar, Kandahar Air Field, Poo Pond, South Park Post Office, TGI Fridays