Wainwright... the story thus far.

DAY ONE
I was a little shocked to get on the bus and discover that it wasn't just my blindingly white features that would make me seem a little out of place in a pretend Afghani village. I was also:
a) the only girl
b) the only one carrying a laptop, digital camera, ipod, and yoga mat
c) one of two people not speaking farsi
d) under 50.

On arrival at the army base, CFB Wainwright, I discovered that I was ACTUALLY:
a) one of 3 women out of a group of 35 role players
b) about to be one of only 20 women total in the exercise, the other 60 being men. These were the "villagers" who would arrive on Saturday, and who would include a few Calgarians in tow: Wally, Tyler, Charles, and Jamie.

THE BACKSTORY
In case you're lost, I'll back up a bit:

I am on the Canadian Forces Base, as a role player in some military exercises, where they train a platoon to deal with civilian situations overseas.

There are two parts to the army here - one, the real military part, with the guys who kick down doors and stuff, and the PRT, or Provincial Reconstruction Team, who I will be spending time with as a representative of CARE Canada - an NGO, or non-governmental organization who will need assistance from the army for things like security and liaising with other NGOs in the area.

WHAT I'M LEARNING
Oh yeah, just so you know, the army is FULL of acronyms. I have several pages of glossary notes just to keep up. I also have several pages of farsi notes as well and have conquered at least a few key phrases with the help of some of the older fellows:

Salaam Alaikum! (hello - Peace/Allah be with you)
Chetor Hasti (how are you)
Khob Hastom (I'm fine. - In pronunciation, this sounds like "hoobastank" but with a gutteral noise at the beginning)

WHAT WE DO
As for what we do here: mostly like a film set, we hurry up and do nothing: Have breakfast at the big meeting hall 151, get into costume and wait for someone to ship us to a village, and then wait for the army to show up. Have lunch, act for about an hour, wait some more, come back to base. Eat dinner, go to the gym, watch movies, play cards, play music, check email, read books, go to the brand new Wal-Mart in town, go to Mojo's the local hangout. That's about it.

Basically, there are 4 villages set up out here --- way way out here --- made out of shipping containers, and peopled with costumed "villagers" who set up obstacles that the army has to deal with; anything from roadblocks, to cordon and searches, suicide bombers, rooting out insurgents, dealing with nosy international reporters, snipers, medical emergencies, dealing with moslem culture, all kinds of stuff. The military guys all have laser weapons, and we have laser vests on, ("WES" vests) so it's like a big game of laser tag out there. If you get shot your vest beeps and tells you what kind of injury you have and how long you have to live (if you're not dead immediately). It's all quite intense, and while we live in the barracks and get fed incredible film-shoot quality craft services meals, a lot of the army guys are actually sleeping out there in the villages, and they can get a little high strung. There have been instances just in the training exercises where guys have gotten all paranoid, freaked out and shot a bunch of women. Uh, those guys don't get to go overseas. Or become officers. It's pretty important training for them.

Mass casualty days are particularly fun, I"m told. The F/X people are film guys who are pretty great at simulating things like blown off limbs and blood-pumping chest wounds and leaking intestines and the like. Apparently, in the past, several soldiers have run off puking, it's so realistic. And if you're seriously wounded there's a good chance you'll get a ride in a helicopter. Wheee!

As for the role players, we are the ones with "speaking roles" and consist of a big batch of translators, village elders, maaliks, mullahs, and air organizations such as UNAMA, USAID, CARE, and ACS (Afghan Civil Society). The translators stick with the army primarily, and help them communicate with the village leaders. We also have a Governor of Khandahar, an army colonel in the Aghan National Army (ANA) and police chiefs from the ANP (Afghan National Police), plus a couple of doctors and RCMP officers. We are involved in more of the planning activities as the PRT (Provincial Reconstruction Team) figures out how to handle everybody coming at them with different requests.

THE FOLKS I WORK WITH
Everyone is really interesting. The majority of the guys here are Afghanis who came to Canada to escape the terrible things going on in their country. Even the young guys have stories to tell of bombs falling on the kitchen table while everyone was washing their hands before dinner, or having relatives disappear, or secret romances. One young girl has yet to tell her family about her boyfriend of four years, because she is Sunni and he is Shia and this will be a very serious issue in the family. Another girl is engaged to a young man in the Lebanese army and will be moving to Beirut at the end of the summer. Makes you appreciate how easy we have it as generic Canadian-born westerners.

Speaking of which, it's now 4 pm. I've been "on call" since 6:30 this morning, --- which means sitting on my ass back at 151 --- and it looks like we're setting up for dinner. Maybe I should try to move my legs a little...