Teach a man to fish...

We're also doing projects to ease the "brain-drain" that happened. The past 20 years of this country was tough on the professional sector; engineers and other professionals that had the ability to leave did, and others got jobs as taxi drivers or whatever to scrape by. Schools basically shut down, infrastructure projects stopped...so there's this huge gap of knowledge, some expatriates have come back, but most of the skilled engineers are in their 60s now...well past the life expectancy of a normal Afghan. We're transitioning efforts to "teach them to fish, versus giving them a fish"...aka, passing knowledge sets and bringing the engineers, skilled trades, and contractors up to speed with the rest of the world. In the past we just brought in contractors from the US and Europe to get projects done quickly, now we're building the capacity for Afghanistan to do stuff for themselves. Very exciting time...it's pretty wild to see a guy that's never had the opportunity to learn a trade or do something worthwhile, then he's taught how to be a plumber or electrician...and now he can get a good job, support his family and get make a difference. Another cool thing is once Afghans are skilled, it’s MUCH cheaper to hire them versus skilled tradesmen from Germany...so you can do a whole lot more projects for the same amount of funding...see, there are win/win situations...I may seem like a idealist, but I'm a realist...as a engineer i have to be. I guess I'm so optimistic because I see what's really happening versus the "woah is me, the sky is falling" media perspective...i'd be hella-depressed if CNN footage was all I saw about Afghanistan.