This is it! Your big chance to redeem yourself. Name the painter for 20 points. And for an extra 20 points: name the individual portrayed.
Ahhhh, the long forgotten Art Quiz. It has been a long while, and I'm thinking that everyone has fully capitulated (...or fully forgotten). Anyways, the answers are: Raffaello Sanzio (a.k.a. Raphael) / 'The School of Athens' / Plato & Aristotle (left and right respectively)
I cant figure out what happened to the first 22 days of this month. Poof! they have simply disappeared on me.
Anyways, as i am getting short on time over here, in the next few weeks, I'll try to put out a few posts describing what we have been up to (in better detail than usual). So check out the gallery when you have a chance: Projects Part I
Prior to initiating his ongoing altercation with the United States, UBL resided here in Jalalabad, three of his known residences are located within four miles of my FOB; one of which is within easy walking distance. While living here, he did a bit of engineering work here and there (Engineering and construction being his family trade). One of his projects included a major repair of the Irrigation Headway in Ka-ma district which is a few kilometers North of J-alalabad where the Kunar river joins with the the Kabul river. The Ka-ma Irrigation Headway feeds water to about 8,000 hectares (80 square kilometers) of arable land. UBL's repair was not so good and has now crumbled to almost nothing. Since that time, numerous Humanitarian and/or Aid Organizations have tried to patch up his mess; all have failed in dramatic fashion.
The is a picture of the existing half-@ssed repair job; funded and executed by an unknown NGO (who ever it was, wont own up to it...). When I first laid eyes on the work, I couldn't believe what I was looking at. The whole structure is made of gabion baskets!
Gabion baskets are basically steel mesh baskets which are filled with rocks. They are typically used for retaining walls, and are used extensively across Afghanistan. They are also extensively miss-used across Afghanistan. In this case, the water control gates for the Irrigation Headway have been wired strait into the baskets. The structure failed with the first flood of the year as the gabion baskets could not even begin to handle the pressure leveraged by this particular river. The baskets collapsed onto and ruined the control gates.
This is our repair underway, it will be reinforced concrete and in a much better location...and it will last a great deal longer than five months. In your face UBL!
A little more on irrigation:
Nan garhar's Arable Land
Nan garhar's Critical Irrigation Infrastructure
Existing primary irrigation structures are in red. The dashed lines represent the primary canals and the red fields indicate the area irrigated.
The blue areas represent projected irrigation structures. The small blue circles represent locations that will support and benefit from medium size watershed dams. (The dams will also double down as macro-hydro power production plants). The longest red dotted line at the center is Nan garhar's Grand Canal (or Dur anta Canal). At the Eastern end of the Grand Canal is the Dur anta Dam, which serves as the Canal's single source of water. The Grand Canal feeds about 35,000 hectares of arable land. It's primary artery is 72 kilometers long with well over a thousand kilometers of secondary and tertiary canals.
The Dam, the Grand Canal, and all associated structures were built with the financial and technical assistance of the Soviet Union between 1965 and 1967 (approximate). The Dam was designed to provide 50 cubic meters of water per second to the canal while simultaneously using the remaining available water to generate 11.5 megawatts of power. Due to a number of reasons, the Grand Canal now receives only between 30 and 40 cubic meters of water per second, while the electrical output is typically around 5 or 6 megawatts (with a high of 8.5 megawatts and a low of .5 megawatts).
The canal as it runs through Sur-kh Rod District
Pump station #1 in South J-alalabad
Failed secondary canals near Ad-ah Farms
The canal's maintenance facilities. Unchanged since 1965...asbestos roofing and all.
The Grand Canal has about 25 major siphons. The picture above is the up-stream control gate of the fifth siphon along the canal. The siphon was damaged some 15 to 20 years ago and has been deteriorating at an accelerated pace ever since. If it were to completely fail, it would shut off irrigation to a tremendous about of land, and cut off the livelihood of more than 600,000 Afghans.
Over the last year, we spent a great deal of time documenting and cataloging the problems with the Grand Canal. And then we spent a bit of time setting up a major repair project, which will start in a few months.
From left to right: Ken, Chad, Nadir, 'yours-truly', Sadat, & Clay
Today marked our last day together as a group. Chad is flying out this afternoon....though it will be another two or three months before he is reunited with his family.
Tora-Bora over Khogyani -- a recently finished USAID DBST road
The road through Gandomack Sherzad
An impossibly bad road in central Hisarek
Up stream from Goran Kach
For my daughter, who likes balloons.
btw --> Rheagan added some great pics to the gallery
Back in October, a friend of mine, from Yokota, asked what it felt like to be in the "homestretch". As I still had five and a half months left at that point, I couldn't even bring myself to reply... But now it is a little different: Today marks the beginning of my last full month in Afghanistan. But, I am also in a desperate rush to push each of my projects into a state that is amenable to the hand-off in March.
This is me with Shawn W., the Team's Department of State representative (a very sharp fellow).
