From desert to rock

It was a happy scene at Gander International Airport last Tuesday for reservists returning home after a seven-month stay in Afghanistan.

Children holding signs, Welcoming Home Dad, were brimming with excitement throughout the arrival area, and were joined by family, friends, and other army personnel, including Wing Commander for 9 Wing Gander, Lt. Col. Christopher Conway.

The reservists were stationed overseas to help assist with work on roads and canals to help deal with irrigation issues, some of the many troubles facing a country attempting to rise from the fall of the Taliban-led government in 2001.

Lori Collins was at the airport to meet her husband, Cpl. Herman Collin, along with their three children, who she said missed their father dearly.

"My daughter, every time she fell down she'd cry and say, 'I want my daddy,' over and over. It was hard for her."

Seeing him return was overwhelming for her. "We're proud of him, and we're very happy he's returned home."

The Middle East was familiar territory for Cpl. Collins, who has had four stays in the region, but he had never been to Afghanistan before taking this mission.

Master Cpl. Steve Sheppard had never been to the Middle East region before this mission, and said it was nothing like he had anticipated.

"I was expecting a more remote location with a lot less people, but when we got there, I was amazed at the size of the settlements," he said. "Even though their technology isn't that advanced, they have amazing agricultural waterways, which was pretty cool. They're limited in their resources, but they dig wells 30-40 feet deep and can pump water to the surface."

Master. Cpl. Sheppard was stationed in the Panjwai and Kandahar districts, and said his experience varied from place to place. His group would often come to work sites at 6 a.m. to begin checking culverts for explosive devices, and eventually set up in positions to defend those sites.

They would also split shifts to provide cover for the military's sleeping quarters at night.

In other cases, they would assist with quality control issues - looking at whether ditches were being dug wide enough or if proper grade was used on the roads, he said.

Danger lurking

Conducting searches for explosive devices is a daily reality serving in Afghanistan, and Master Cpl. Sheppard did have a close call during his stay.

"While doing a VPS (vulnerable point search), me and my fireteam partner found an 82-milimetre mortar that was positioned underneath our seat containers. We had to call in a quick reaction force, and they went and disarmed the device. That was a little hairy ... you never know when you're crossing a ditch.

"It's in the back of your mind - is today the day I'm going to find something," he said. "It makes the hair stand up on the back of your neck for sure."

Amongst those on the work cites were children as young as 10 years old, said Master Cpl. Sheppard. "They learned some English in school, so it was a second avenue for them to practice their English. They knew their alphabet and numbers. Any new word they could pick up, they definitely wanted to learn."

The level of poverty he witnessed was unbelievable, and Master Cpl. Sheppard said people in Canada cannot begin to understand how lucky we are to be in this country.

Lack of education was very noticeable when mixing with the general population, said Cpl. Collins. "It's slowly starting to change," he said, adding this made some of the work more challenging.

"But they had the drive to learn. Normally, you only had to show them how to do something once or twice, and then they'd become able to continue on by themselves."

The environment was incredibly dusty and dirty, along with being intensely hot. At times, he said, temperatures went as high as 55-60 degrees Celsius. The highest recorded temperature while Master Cpl. Sheppard stayed in Afghanistan was 62 degrees Celsius.

"Every part of your body is wet. There's no humidity - it was just baking hot," he said, adding the training in Jamaica did not prepare him for the dry heat.

"It was kind of like being in an oven. You'd lie on the ground and have to get right back up. Any metallic parts on a vehicle or your weapon, you had to handle them with gloves. It was physically impossible to hold your weapon without a glove on."

Being an avid camper, Master Cpl. Sheppard said he looked at the experience as a "seven-month camping trip."

Of course, it was unlike any other camping trip he'd ever been on particularly considering how far away it kept from his wife and two children back home in Valleyfield.

"In the night, you'd have downtime sitting on the computer. We had Internet at times, but it was very frustrating in terms of speed," he said. The reservists also had calling cards they could use to contact family for 35 minutes each week.

Seeing everyone at the airport was great for him, and his kids wanted to hear about everything that happened. "I just told them little stories about what dad was doing," he said.

For Cpl. Collins, it was a thrill being able to come home to Hare Bay and relax. "To hold my wife and kids was so relaxing. Knowing I didn't have to wake up in the morning and get ready to go out and do things I'd ordinarily never do," he said, adding everyday was stressful. "We learned to cope with stress, and we dealt with it in our own ways."

The return was extra exciting for Ms. Collins, who found out her husband is calling this his last trip to the Middle East. "It was stressful worrying about him and whether he was okay."