Afghanistan Culture Dinner

Hello. Today we had an authentic Afghanistan Dinner. Here at the training FOB (Forward Operating Base) Camp ARMY STRONG, there are several Afghanistan Nationals who act as interpreters and help us understand the mind and culture of the Afghan people.

The Afghans traditionally eat on the floor. They sit around a large carpet with the village elders sitting at the 'head' of the carpet. The others sit according to age and/or position within the village. The Afghans also eat using their hands. This is where understanding the culture becomes very important. Afghans eat only with their right hand. In muslim culture, the left hand is considered 'unclean'.

I've included some pictures of our experience eating dinner in the Afghanistan tradition. The first picture is of the Afghanistan interpreter who was instructing us in the proper way to eat.
It was pretty funny to see everyone try to eat with their hands. Sounds simple, but the Afghans have a particular way they hold their hands. It gives you a spoon-like effect. I swear some people were about to eat with their face in the plate.

The people in the pictures are some of those in my team. I have 7 Sailors and 3 Army soldiers. We will not deploy together as a team, but we came
together for the sake of training.

Tomorrow, we have to pick up our Humvees. Our team will get 3 of them. One is like a truck, with a bed, one is a standard Humvee, and the third is a full up-armored Humvee. We also have to pick up our Communications gear, 2 M240 machine guns and 1 .50 cal machine gun.

Enjoy the pictures. As always, if there any questions, please ask or post a comment below.

Night...