Precious Cargo

I am finally here in Afghanistan. I arrived at Bagram AB yesterday morning. Don't know how long I will be here because I have to be worked into a flight to my final destination which I don't know what that is yet. We have an inbrief this afternoon and from that point we wait for orders and an outbound flight.

After we arrived and humped our gear to the transient tent (far bigger and with more room than the tent we had in Kyrgyzstan), I ate luch, took a shower, and laid down for a nap. I didn't wake up until 0530. I was out for about 15 hours. I guess I was really tired!

I took some awesome pictures of the mountains we flew over. Anyone who makes a life in this part of the world deserves to be called one tough hombre.

The C-130 that I flew on carried both passengers and cargo. It was an interesting mix of duffel bags, a light and generator set, a pallet of sealed boxes, and a bag of stuffed animals.

One can argue that the light set is important and that the duffel bags are important and that the pallet of sealed boxes are important. In my opinion, I thought the bag of stuffed animals and teddy bears was the most important.

Just think about the time and effort someone took to gather them all up. Then that someone talked to someone about how to get them over here. Then someone volunteers to throw them onto a bird that is headed overseas, basically making the same journey I did in getting here. I don't know the exact itinerary that bag took but it was just as long and ardous as mine.

Those stuffed animals and teddy bears are going to make some Afghan kid very happy and to me that makes that bit of cargo the most precious we can deliver.

CIAO'
CPT NightHawk