Fired

Before brunch I went to the gym and worked out for almost an hour. It was already getting hot, when I streched a little on the sun deck. Then I started preparing for something that I've never done before: to terminate an employment contract. One of our guards didn't pass the latest security screening last week, and the report left me no options. So I had an interpreter call him in (he was not on duty today) and invited him, the guard commander and the interpreter to sit down at the table in the briefing room. I also had K stand by in case someone would become aggressive. You never know with the locals. I explained as well as I could the reasons for the termination of his employment, expressed my sympathy, and signed the form. Then he signed the form. I gave him a copy and paid him his last salary. He was upset, of course. He said he had six children and was the only provider of the family. He said that he had worked for ISAF for two years and that he had always behaved well. He urged me to talk to ISAF to get him another employment. There was very little that I could do but to wish him good luck.

There was quite a lot of coming and going at to PO today. At dinner we had over forty people to feed, and fourteen vehicles. And by that time the generator maintenance crew had already left. This meant that all the Americans had to sleep outside - we keep a policy that PRT troops have a right of way to the accommodation barracks. They say that they don't mind, and it's probably true. After all, at the PO they can feel safe, they don't have to cook for themselves or bring their own portable toilets, which I hear they do if the camp in any ANSF (Afghan Natinal Security Forces) camp. The PRT CO also paid us a visit, and we discussed in private for a while.

In the evening the wind rose. The dust was flying in the street outside the gate so, that the guards on duty had to wrap a shemagh to cover their faces. In the street lights (there are street lights only outside our gate, nowhere else), the whirling dust looked just like snow.