We had a big event over at the District Center today. A class that was teaching a bunch of local widows how to raise chickens, so they could feed their families and earn a little cash, was completed. As their graduation present, they each got a bunch of chickens to take home and keep in the chicken coops they had built during the class.
As is typical of Afghan activities, it was chaos. Things that were supposed to happen, didn't. The start time came and went long before things actually started. Things that weren't scheduled, happened. This is Afghanistan, and if you're wedded to a schedule, you won't make it here!
But finally, each woman came up and received her chickens. The fun part was putting the chickens into cardboard boxes to take home. The chickens were not at all interested in being stuffed in any cardboard box. So every couple of minutes, one of them would escape and go running around, chased by wildly screaming kids, until it was captured and brought back. A few minutes later, another one would make a run for it. Eventually, though, all the chickens were loaded up and taken off to their new homes. Twenty women now have a way to help themselves, and their kids, survive.
Kids were everywhere today. This is a small part of the batch. One of our soldiers wanted to take a picture of a couple of kids, and one of the women saw that, so she started rounding up every stray youngster in the area. She was definitely in command: these kids did as they were told! They just didn't necessarily look at the camera, though.
I've said before that soldiers are kid-magnets. Female soldiers are girl-magnets. Here's one of our young soldiers playing patty-cake with local girl.
As the soldiers left, this young girl hung onto their hands all the way out the gate.
These three young princesses came late to the ceremony, but were definitely the belles of the ball.
As is typical of Afghan activities, it was chaos. Things that were supposed to happen, didn't. The start time came and went long before things actually started. Things that weren't scheduled, happened. This is Afghanistan, and if you're wedded to a schedule, you won't make it here!
But finally, each woman came up and received her chickens. The fun part was putting the chickens into cardboard boxes to take home. The chickens were not at all interested in being stuffed in any cardboard box. So every couple of minutes, one of them would escape and go running around, chased by wildly screaming kids, until it was captured and brought back. A few minutes later, another one would make a run for it. Eventually, though, all the chickens were loaded up and taken off to their new homes. Twenty women now have a way to help themselves, and their kids, survive.
Kids were everywhere today. This is a small part of the batch. One of our soldiers wanted to take a picture of a couple of kids, and one of the women saw that, so she started rounding up every stray youngster in the area. She was definitely in command: these kids did as they were told! They just didn't necessarily look at the camera, though.
I've said before that soldiers are kid-magnets. Female soldiers are girl-magnets. Here's one of our young soldiers playing patty-cake with local girl.
As the soldiers left, this young girl hung onto their hands all the way out the gate.
These three young princesses came late to the ceremony, but were definitely the belles of the ball.
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