Saturday, April 30, 2005
Forty-eight soldiers deadForty-eight dead in April and counting. How many civilians? We don't keep count. They're expendable, just that much less important than our own men and women. Given the lack of interest and coverage (only one question about Iraq posed to Bush during his press conference), it's clear we don't give a damn about all this death. 10:23:54 AM | Where the hell is the outrage? In our "Culture of Life"? 
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Photos from AfghanistanS sent me several wonderful emails today full of pictures. I'll post
the ones that I can. Look below for an excellent post on an irrigation
system S came upon during a patrol. It's quite interesting! 2:10:08 AM | All of the comments in italics are direct from S. Those in regular text are mine.  Here is a picture of the Russian officer's club. It is complete with a swimming pool and bar. Too bad it is all badly destroyed. There are unexploded bombs all over the place here, and we have to be careful not to venture off the road, because of all the mines.  S passed this caravan of nomads on one of his missions this past week. Notice the rooster riding the donkey. Now he's traveling in style!  Sunrise. The flag and tents in the foreground belong to the Hungarian army.  German armored vehicle. The Uber Hummer! Or as S says, "Hummer on steroids." S says it stands over 12 feet tall and is imposing, to say the least. I guess when the Germans do military they do military. Dang. Notice the iron cross between the two windows.  Afghan house under construction, made of adobe brick with adobe plaster.
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Afghan Irrigation System -- from SS learned about this irrigation system while on patrol.
I'm going to let the archaeologist describe this to you in his own
words. The text in italics is his directly from the email: 1:59:05 AM |  This is a tiered, man-made, irrigation system that runs for miles and serves a farming community of hundreds. It must have been an enormous undertaking, and I have trouble fathoming the ingenuity of the whole system. All constructed without any machinery. Basically, the people have used the power of a river to make water move uphill, then they channeled it into several tiers of canals that run down the side of a mountain. The pressure that builds causes the water to move into channels at the base of the mountain that take the water to rice patties as far as ten kilometers away. All the while, the water rushes very quickly and the channels are constantly worked to prevent them from becoming stagnant. At any time, just a few shovels of mud can redirect the water to other canals. It is just amazing. There must be a tremendous amount of cooperation and coordination involved in this.  This is what a canal looks like from close up. The mud walls are constantly being worked. In the three days that we operated in the area, the water was stopped in two canals in order to make them deeper and keep the water moving. They are generally about 4-5 feet deep, and 3-4 feet across. The water is usually about 6-10 inches deep.  This is the system of tiers. To the left is one canal, then a footpath, then a rock wall which supports the second canal. Above that, a third canal. At the base of the hill, the canals spread out in two directions, taking the water to the rice patties seen in the following picture.  The rice patties at sunrise. The two large buildings in the background: on the left is the queen's palace, on the right is the King's palace. Look how lush and green the rice patties are. They are filled with water, and a network of raised paths criss-crosses them for people to walk. The trees mark where the canals run. The farmers live in adobe brick houses. No running water or electricity, so they all use the canals to bathe and drink from. That is why it is imperative to keep the water moving quickly I suppose. We observed people bathing in the water and coming to it with ceramic vessels.  This a family of farmers who benefit from the irrigation system. The two men, father and son, spent the entire three days I was there tilling their fields from Dawn til dusk, while the girls collected water and played at the river's edge. These fields are tiered, so I suppose that after planting they will be flooded. Rice is eaten with every meal in Afghanistan. It is so important, that our soldiers almost rioted when rice was not served with one meal. These farmers were the most friendly people I have met in Afghanistan. Talking to them gave me such a good feeling and reminded me of my friends in Oaxaca, Procopio and Thomas. I gave them MREs, and they were very happy. They were so surprised when I spoke Dari, and they spoke very highly of America for ending the war. These people have suffered the most from all of the destruction, but their community is under reconstruction. They are now benefiting from the peace, which gives me a good feeling. One farmer even came to us and told us where we could find a stash of RPG rounds that some "bad men" were looking to use against us. The people don't want any more fighting, and they are the real reason things are going well.  This is the river that powers the whole system. These men are dredging the river, they worked all day up and down the banks. The rocks are collected and quarried into gravel, which goes at a premium in Kabul, because the roads are so horrible. I wish I could show more pictures, but that would make the file too big for many to receive. I think an in-depth anthropological study of this irrigation system would really benefit archaeology, as it is totally primitive. It could lead to showing the type of political organization needed to operate such a complex canal system. Maybe it could even be used to contrast/support the idea of developing chiefdoms based on water control. I don't know, but it is really cool. Fascinating, huh?
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Last update: 8/24/05; 8:16:24 PM .
