Xtremehorticulture

Xtremehorticulture of the Desert

My 30 Days of Ramazan – Day 3

2 Comments / agricultural chemicals, dehydration, fasting, ramadan, ramazan /

At 7:25pm at the end of Day 2 I heard the call to prayer and my ice cold water was ready. I had it in the freezer in 1.5 liter plastic bottles, frozen. At 4 pm I had taken out the frozen bottle and put it on the shelf at 95F indoor temperature. By the time 7:25pm rolled around about half of it was water, the other half still ice. Nice, I thought. When you are thirsty and time is moving slowly you have lots of time to plan. But I didn’t realize how thirsty I would be. I drank half of the bottle and then cursed when the remaining water was still frozen. It didn’t thaw fast enough and I wanted more. I immediately went to the freezer and took another 1.5 liter out to thaw while I waited for the ice to melt. Every few minutes I drained the icy water from the bottle. One bottle helped but my mouth was still dry and my throat was still parched but my belly was full of water. The ice thawed fairly quickly and in the next three hours I drank three liters of water. When you first drink water after a fast, you are dehydrated and it has been hot, it is amazing how, within less than 15 seconds it seemed, your body releases this wave of water entering your body as a wave of sweat. My body poured of sweat from the water I drank. I was wiping it off of my face, neck and underarms with a towel and it was still dripping down my sides. Tomorrow, I thought, I better take the frozen water out at 3 pm, not 4pm!  I have an infrared temperature gauge with me for measuring surface temperatures. I wonder what my body temperature was? My body must have shut down in a reaction to dehydration. With this wave of water coming in, it released it in an attempt to reduce my body heat. It worked and my body was cool from the evaporation. I will take a shower before I go to bed, this additional cooling will help me to sleep. I enjoy their round bread but after awhile it gets a little old and you do yearn for a Western-style sandwich. I found chunky peanut butter, covered in a layer of dust, tucked away in a back shelf of a food store not too far from where I am staying. (I have been here now three months and I am still not tempted to call it home…. yet.) There are plenty of jams and jellies and honey. I also found a toaster for $8 in a local store and a square loaf of bread at a store that catered to Khaariji (foreigners). So I cut off two slices of bread, put them in the toaster, buttered them with a good layer of butter, peanut butter and jelly. It went down very easy and filled me quickly. My confidence returned! I didn’t need to get up at 2:30 am to drink water and eat! Ha! I will be fine! I decided to retire early and continue to read the book I downloaded for my Kindle, “Lions of Kandahar”. My belly was full and I fell asleep. The Third Day. My alarm went off at 5:00am since I didn’t need to get up early this morning. When I awoke I could feel my mouth was dry. Not a good sign this early in the morning I thought. Maybe I should have set the alarm for 2:30. After getting the staff on target for the morning I was headed into the bazaar to pick up some agricultural chemicals and a sprayer. I tried to dress as inconspicuously as possible by wearing local clothes. My staff told me I looked local. I had tested it one day by having staff follow me and observe how people reacted when I walked through the busy bazaar and outside the mosque. The staff told me no one noticed but two boys who stared at me. I asked them if they knew why. My staff told me it was because I was fat and laughed. Thanks guys. I will never totally blend in but if I can move around in crowds drawing as little attention as possible I feel much safer. My white beard, now about three inches long, helped. It is relatively safe where I am but you never know who is out there in a community of 300,000 people. Kidnapping is the biggest threat and there is always a bounty on Khaariji (foreigners). While in the store and looking at agricultural chemicals an older man, a customer, started talking to me in Dari. That is a good sign. He thought I was local. The shopkeeper was young, maybe 30. I had a white beard and I was looking at the chemicals. This customer was going to get advice from a “white beard”, not a boy. Age commands respect in this culture. The shopkeeper boy explained what this farmer wanted and I helped direct him to the right chemicals (the same ones the boy was telling him to buy.) I could hear a sigh of relief come from him when I told him which one to use for melon fly. The shop boy and I were now friends. I bought my chemical and sprayer and headed back to the office, cutting through the crowd of vegetable and fruit vendors, about 100 meters, to my beatup Toyota Corolla. With my eyes straight ahead I watched through peripheral vision and no one looked at me except the vendors yelling to me what they were selling and the price. It was now about 10 am and already breaking 100F I guessed. The sun was very hot and my mouth was very dry. I drove to the government building for a meeting but I could see that they were already starting to break up for the day. With a quick

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My 30 Days of Ramazan – Day 4

4 Comments / fasting, glyphosate, ramadan, ramazan, saffron /

I cheated today. I put a small bottle (1/2 liter) of frozen water next to my bed and woke about 4am. The alarm didn’t go off but I grabbed my bottle of now warm water and drank about half of it and went back to sleep. You older folks can sympathize. You know if you wake up early in the morning there is a very good chance you will not go back to sleep. Not true when I was much younger but this fear of not going back to sleep and not getting my rest affected my decision whether to get up or not. Probably subconscious but I thought my alarm was set but it was not. Vineyard with disease problem near a Level 2 village in northern Afghanistan I got up at 5 am because I had staff going into the villages today early. I give the villages security numbers from 1 to 3. These numbers I establish from local reports of “undesirable” activity which might be a problem for myself or my staff. Taliban controls much of the rural areas while city centers are much safer. Those of you who understand, most of the security is handled by ISAF.  If a village is remote, it usually is not safe for any of us. This gets a “3” ranking. There are other villages which are safe for locals but not for me. If I do go into places like this I should spend only about one hour there and get out. I never tell anyone where I am going. I watch my driver. He is secure and I trust him but he makes mistakes too. He does not know where we are going until we go and he is not allowed to use his cell phone while we are gone unless it is from the office. Places like these are given a “2” rating. Then there are places that are relatively safe for us all and this is given a “1” rating. This morning it was a “2” so I was not going and I knew my staff was experienced enough to handle it without me. Before they go I brief them, cover what needs to be done and review and send them on their way.   I was having a hard time this morning. I just couldn’t wake up. I don’t know if it was the lack of caffeine or the dryness I felt in my mouth from the previous days but I just found it very hard to get going. So a little after 5 am I had a small (maybe two to three ounces at most) cup of coffee with extra Maxwell House freeze dried crystals thrown in. That did the trick. Now I understood why opium was used by some in extremely poor villages where there is little food. I didn’t need or want any opium but caffeine is a legal drug and got me on a little bit of a high for the morning. I was now on after burners. Iranian glyphosate, same percent active ingredient as Roundup Pro I had salary contracts for staff to finish and didn’t get out the door until nearly 10 am. I had to test some Iranian glyphosate I found at the bazaar and see if it would help to control some of these woody weeds in our new saffron plots. First it was Iranian glyphosate so I had no idea if the label was accurate, secondly I was spraying some weeds I did not recognize at all. I didn’t even know if this would work. I had formed a saffron working group of educators and we were putting together four saffron demo plots to demonstrate how to correctly plant, manage, harvest, and process saffron. Saffron is very labor intensive and does bring in enough income to make a possible alternative to growing poppies. Some of these Extension agents had never grown saffron. Saffron with straw mulch Many of the farmers do not know how to grow it either and do it incorrectly. I was told that the local saffron was better than the Iranian and that is saying a lot. These plots, it was hoped and we did a good job of documenting for many illiterate farmers, would show them how to do it correctly. The spraying went well but it was hot and by the time we finished. I knew today would be probably one of the toughest days of the fast, at least regarding dehydration. Hunger had disappeared for the most part or it was covered up by the more acute dehydration. During the spraying I felt a bout of heat stroke coming on; intestinal cramps, dizziness. We finished quickly (as quickly as you can because these people are now my friends and there were lots of questions about what we were using, why and the rate of application and explanations were in full sun.) When we got back to the office around 2 pm my staff had returned from the villages and had very good reports. That is always good to hear. My mouth was full of cotton. My voice sounded different. I could tell the dehydration had affected the sound of my voice. My lips were parched as well as my staff’s. I told them all to go home and rest. The Professor who was working for me, a very kind and devout Muslim, had trouble pronouncing some words as well. I had trouble concentrating. We all tried to conserve moisture by using as few words as possible. We all rested in the air conditioned office and spoke very little. After they all left finally at 4 pm I went upstairs and laid down to take a rest. As I did, I remember saying to myself, I am not hungry. I wonder why… as I dozed off.

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My 30 Days of Ramazan (Ramadan) – Day 1

6 Comments / afghanistan, fasting, Islam, Muslim, ramadan, ramazan, thirst /

Hard to see but there is a bed on top of the roof. It is cooler to sleep on the roof at night than inside those cement ovens No, I am not Muslim. But all my staff are and they observe the 30 day fast of Ramazan. It is Ramadan in Arabic but Ramazan in Persian, Urdu and Dari, languages common in Afghanistan. The start of Ramazan here began on Friday, July 15, at 330am. Here, daytime temperatures in the protected shade of my indoor/outdoor Taylor thermometer had the outside at around 115F. I am glad I installed the evaporative cooler on the fourth floor on the roof because inside the temperature during the day dropped to 95F.  With fans it was tolerable. It was, after all, dry heat. I was struggling what to do about Ramazan. I am not Muslim so I was not compelled to follow this annual reglious event. However, I felt it would be very inconsiderate for me to have water or food in sight of my staff who were following it (almost) religously. One of my staff I saw had hot tea during the afternoon of the first day of Ramazan. So I decided to join them in Ramazan. Not for religious reasons but to not weaken them in their own fight with temptations. This meant no food or water from about 330am to 730pm. When the Mullah had his call to prayer in the morning, all eating and drinking stopped for the day. At night, when he made his call to prayer again was the signal you could then eat and drink. During the day there were three more calls to prayer for the religious. Blue mosque at Mazar i Sharif. Even though I walk by it frequently this is not my picture. I havenever taken one of this mosque but “borrowed” it from Wiki. I didnt go around and tell everyone I was going to follow the fasting part of Ramazan. I just did it. The first day of Ramazan fell on their Holy Day, Friday, so I was alone. Here is my recounting of my first day of Ramazan. 1st Day. Many Muslims will get up about 230 am and eat and get their last drink before the fasting part of the day begins. I did not. I got up at my usual time of 430 am to start my day. I could tell I was having caffeine withdrawls. I usually have a cup of coffee to get me awake and ready for the day. Not today. I substituted two ibuprofin for my cup of coffee. Dry. Medicine is permitted. One of my staff who is a fourth year student at the University and works as our security person in exchange for a room at ground level, said he got up at 230 am and made some eggs, bread and tea (chai) for his breakfast but could not eat it. He told me, when he asked his Mother about fasting when he was much younger (children do not fast), she told him to get up at 230am and fix his breakfast so that he would not be late for the beginning of the fast when the Mullah had his call to prayer. Just like any Mother. Evaporative cooler on the fourth floor roof of our building. My headache subsided by 5am and I began my days work on the computer. Even though it is my day off (Friday) there is still work to do and the work kind of fills the void between the the sixth day of the week and the beginning of the next. I was feeling quite good until the temperatures started hitting around 105F and building heat inside the thick concrete walls of our building. They are quite resistant to temperature changes but once they have absorbed heat they are slow to give it up as well. So it is a bit like an oven in the house during the night. By about 4pm it was about 95F inside and about 115F outside, in the shade. My throat was getting parched and dry and I looked at the clock. I had at least 3 hours to go. I was inside out of the sun. What about all those workers outside working? They start right after the call to prayer is finished, taking advantage of the cool night air, and retire to the inside when it gets hot. But tomorrow I will be working again outside. Restaurants and stores with food are closed all day long until 730 pm when they will open their doors again. Who will buy food during that time anyway? The hunger by 4 in the afternoon was not the big thing. It was the lack of water. It was uncomfortable but not debilitating. I kept wondering about what it would be like when I was working outside starting tomorrow. Vent system we build to vent the cool air from the swamp cooler to the lower three floors down the central staircase. At 7 pm I went down to my staff’s room and knocked. “Are you ready to eat?” He politely told me he would eat later. The Mullah did not yet give his permission to eat. So I waited as well. 730 pm came and I downed a liter of water, some milk and some pasta mixed with spaghetti sauce. My staff member joined me. “Did you take enough?” I said. “There is plenty.” He showed me his large bowl. It was full of spaghetti pasta. “I will eat half now”, he said. “At 230 I will wake and finish the rest.” At 1am the power went off. My ceiling fan stopped and I started to roast in a pool of sweat. I got up, drank about 1/3 liter of water and opened an outside door located in the hallway. A cool night breeze entered the third floor but avoided my room due to a lack of cross ventilation. The thick plastic covering on the windows to prevent glass from shredding you in case of a

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My 30 Days of Ramazan – Day 2

Leave a Comment / fasting, ramadan, ramazan /

Earthen pot in a tree. Formerly it was used for water. The water would evaporate from this clay pot and keep the water cool. Now it was abandoned to a tree and some home for a bird. The first day of Ramadan was uncomfortable. The second day started off well. I dressed in conventional Western clothes for the official Agricultural meeting every Saturday morning. Today one of my staff, a young guy in his fourth year at the University in Agriculture and my Agronomist, was going to present the concept of the PICS bags developed by Purdue University. It has had a few stumbling blocks in Afghanistan after a smashing hit with the storage of chickpeas in Africa. The bags have two inner heavy plastic liners that, if sealed correctly, shut off all the air to any inhabiting insects in the bags thus suffocating them in about two weeks. When you have a valuable commodity you raised and you plan to store it for a long period of time you dont want varmints eating it before you do. This, compared to the traditional plastic woven bads, they did well. There were three problems with the bags in Afghanistan: most farmers didnt keep wheat long enough for there to be a varmint problem (they consumed it rapidly and they knew they were in competition with varmints), the price of wheat was flat and didnt increase in value after harvest like chickpeas did in Africa and the cost of the bags which were nearly 20X more than the woven bags. My young staff member did a smashing job of presenting the information. The room was hot with a ceiling fan on. It required alot of talking on his part. I was backup. First I had to introduce him to the crowd. Because he was so young they would not believe anything he said unless it came from a “white beard”…. me…One of the reasons I grew a beard when I came over was to gain some respect. In this culture older people are to be respected. Younger people didnt know anything… until they got old. So if I introduced him and told them I trained him and that he was presenting in Dari to make the presentation go faster then they respected him. The professional agriculturists in the audience asked alot of technical questions which were referred to me. This required alot of talking on my part. When you open your mouth and talk, it expels air and humidity. Something I was not acutely aware of until I started my fast. The humidity comes from your body… from the water you drank the previous day… the water that was supposed to last you until 730pm. My throat was already parched and it was only 11am. The room was getting hotter. I am sure the boy (he was 26 but still considered a boy because he was not married) was dry as well. When you know you have a limited amount of water in your body and you werent getting any more until 730 pm you are much more conscious of LOSING water. We exited the meeting and it was hot out. My guess was that it was over 110F but not by much. At 115F you start to feel the hair dryer blowing against your skin… if there is a wind. My staff immediately went for the shade of some mulberry and ash trees on our walk to our car and driver. One staff member saw one of the nonAfghan (not an American) standing in full sun and cautioned me because he was in full sun and they knew I was fasting. This guy was not fasting. He stopped me to chat and we chatted. Did I say we were in full sun? I was fully aware we were in full sun. My staff was fully aware we were in full sun BUT they were standing and walking in the shade. I concluded our talk quickly and they were waiting for me in the air conditioned beat up Toyota Corolla. It was beat up, the brakes squeeled, there was some sort of bump bump that came from the rear end when we rounded corners and the power steering squeeled but the A/C worked just fine. In hot Afghanistan we know our priorities. It was past noon now and we headed back to the office. I knew we had to conclude the day quickly. I was reminded by my project manager, an Afghan, that everyone was fading fast due to lack of water. I was too. I could feel it. We got in the office and turned on the fan. Low and behold the A/C worked and blowed a little bit of cool air. They wanted to break and rest first and then have our office meeting. I agreed and gave them an hour to relax and pray. I was late for our office meeting. I was busy on the computer actually finishing the writing of Day 1 when a staff member came up and got me. “Bob, we are all waiting for you.” I remember thinking that I wanted to go to the bathroom but didn’t reasoning I didnt want to lose any excess body liquid. In an hour that urge disappeared along with the sweat from my body. We are very casual in my office and close. My management style is to present what I am thinking of doing and let them pick my suggestions apart. They know Afghanistan and Afghans alot better than I do. They know the little sidesteps you have to do among members of different political parties, different ethnicities, whether you are Sunni or Shia Muslim, or just personality clashes. Afghanistan is filled with different layers…. very complex layers…you need someone to guide you through these layers…someone you can trust. Then we discuss our plan of action for the coming week. It took about 20 minutes and I was done. More liquid lost from my body and my throat

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