Luckily for the discerning reader, I have been unable to access any means of communicating with you for the last two weeks, but as they say; ‘every silver lining has a cloud…..’ My band of merry men and I are now to be found in a district called Panjwa’i, some fifteen miles south-west of Kandahar city. Our small camp is nestled between two mountain ridgelines of Pyrenean (not to be confused with perineum) aspect, and about three hundred metres from the green zone that sprouts around the nearby Arghandab River. There is a degree of notoriety afforded Panjwa’i as a result of being the place from which Mullah Omar fronted the Taleban in 1994, and as you would expect local sympathies are wildly divided between insurgents and both international and Afghan security forces. We are currently a very tiny cog in an operation to provide security and freedom for the locals by diminishing the insurgent hold on the area.

Due to the nature of the operation and size of the insurgent footprint there are more bangs in the night than in the red-light district of Amsterdam. Attacks are carried out where necessary and with precision, not a claim that can be made by the insurgents, as the two children killed by one of their Improvised Explosive Devices whilst playing in the tress a couple of days ago are testament to.

There has been a definite change in the weather over the last few days and the nighttime temperatures have dropped dramatically necessitating the first judicious use of extra layers since we arrived in Afghanistan in April. We have moved in to autumn as the harvesting to our south will testify, and although I doubt Keats would have been moved to quill and parchment by the vista, there is something more pleasant provided by the contrast to the urban degradation, waste and noise which has been our daily environment for so long.

With the exception of a couple of large marijuana fields, well small fields but 14ft plants, the majority of the land is used for grape production. The terroir may not be able to induce oenophiles from Pomerol or Paulliac to openly sob with joy, but it is warming to see the local harvest be delivered to the stands of the bazaar to our west, a legitimate, contained, local economy.

And the grapes taste pretty good. We have made friends with a few of the locals, and in exchange for a few US dollars per week, they purchase a few bits from the bazaar for us. The most popular of which is the Na’an bread. Out of ignorance of the ingredients of this fine unleavened meal, we had been referring to it all tour as ‘toe-nail bread’, a wildly inaccurate slur as it turns out. The bread is filling and quite delicious if a little salty, and is often enjoyed with Nutella (given to us by the Canadians) as a little boost during the night. I do not know if Josephine Baker or Bettie Page ever suffered from nerves the first time they performed for an audience, but I did. Last Thursday night (who knew?), I decided to make use of the solar shower in the middle of the car park. The night was ‘of cloudless climes and starry skies’, almost romantic, when, as I was working a lather with my usual vim and vigour, I turned around upon hearing the small screen being retracted, I noticed nine or ten Afghan men had taken a pew to enjoy the view. Now, I am in no way as handsome or nubile as the younger men I command, but the ambient moonlight had clearly worked some magic on my naked form, and had the native audience transfixed. It was without doubt the scariest thirty seconds of my life ever, and I exited (without drying myself properly, mother) as fast as decency allowed. I returned to my tent a little shaky and thanked my lucky stars that the situation had not deteriorated to something approximating one of Caligula’s parlour games.

Wildlife update – One of the most undesirable of god’s creatures that we share our bijou abode with is the Camel Spider. Not so named due to it’s resemblance to the preferred vector of TE Lawrence, whilst doing his anti-Ottoman gallivanting, but because the camel is their usual prey. Just think about that for a moment, a spider attacking a camel. In terms of size discrepancy and hunter-to-hunted ratio that would be roughly the same as an otter attacking a bull elephant or a chaffinch preying on a shark, and then us calling it a ‘Shark chaffinch’. (If you happen to be a zoologist reading this and happen to have proof that an Elephant-Otter exists, please keep it to yourself). Anyway these beasts have necessitated the erecting of the mosquito nets, as there are only so many mornings one is prepared to wake up with said arachnid perched on head/shoulder/chest. They also have the ability to reduce some of my soldiers from the courageous chaps they are to squealing like a chorus-line or sounding like the assembled patrons at SoHo’s G-A-Y when Kylie takes the stage.

Elsewhere we have a couple of stray dogs that like to join us on patrols, they have proven surprisingly affective at keeping motorcyclists from getting too close, and as a result are most welcome allies.