Did Ed really just fall off a camel?

If there is one thing about Aghanistan, there never seems to be a shortage of material to take in. The day began with the team re-living some of the stories from yesterday....We had the chance to spend another amazing day out at Barek Aub.

Donning brand new shower kameez's and headgear we approached the day with a whole new look. Once we reached the camp, we began distributing the meat to all of the schoolchildren. Instead of having a picnic solely for the children, it was decided that passing out bags of meat for the entire family would be a better way of serving the community. The people of Barek Aub currently rely on food distributions for their meals and normaly would receive things like rice and other non-perishables. Meat is an extremely rare commodity out at the camp and receiving a bags of beef for the family would have made for a great meal that night. After we finished distributing the food, we had the pleasure of getting a visit from a pleasant woman working with Save the Children. I think its safe to say that she will only realize how fortunate the people of Barek Aub are to be working with W___ and his staff at later date. Once that meeting was finished, a couple of the Flat Irons guys rallied the kids together for a time of music and dancing. With Marcus and Jordan on the guitars and one of the locals providing the percussion, this quickly turned into a dance party displaying all of Kabul's latest moves. In fact, all of the men from the team (sorry ladies) had the chance to display a blend of American and Afghani choreagraphy with Ben taking the cake with the injured bird routine never seen before in this country. It will live on for years to come. At some point in the day, a few soccer balls made their way outside for some soccer/volleyball/rugby games. After losing about 300 arm wrestling matches to the boys, we proceeded to take a tour updating us on all of the progress from the camp. It was so encouraging to see all of the progress being made at the camp with a new school and new clinic in the middle of the construction phase. As Julie had described earlier, both of these services are operated out of homes, and to have the larger, dedicated buildings will be a blessing to the camp as the population continues to grow. W___ concluded the tour with a trip to the deep well that appeared to be completed and functioning quite well. A few members of the team had the opportunity to sample the well water are still doing well! All in all, it was another great day at Barek Aub. Despite the obvious language barriers, we still had a great time connecting with the kids of the community and just having the chance to spend time with them.

We didn't make it to far out of Barek Aub before W___ flagged down one of the local shepherds with one of his camels in tow. After a brief negotiation, the camel was on the ground ready for its first passenger. Going one by one seemed to be taking a little too long for the camel's liking, so we proceeded to having two passengers at the same time - one in front of the hump and one behind. When it came time for Ed and myself to ride, we made it onto the camel w/o out a hitch, but the dismount got a little interesting when the camel lowered itself and Ed had nothing to grab onto. The scene resembled a bad rodeo with the camel eventually getting the best of Ed, but I must say that he did a great job of trying to staying on as long as he could.

The day ended with a trip to one of the military bases for a service. As tiring as the day had been, it was great to rejuvenate with a group of like minded people.

If there is one that has made this trip what it is so far, it has been connecting with the people. From interacting and learning from the Sozo staff to playing games with the children, it's very apparent that this is an extremely special group of people and it has been humbling to have received such a warm welcome from everyone.

Lee Thomas Lagomarcino