About a month before Christmas, the phone rang and on the other end of the line I hear a gentleman’s voice say: “Hi Mike, this is Ken ****. I’m calling from Kabul, Afghanistan. Needless to say, Ken had my immediate attention…
Ken proceeds to tell me how he and his other contractor friends were wanting to do a traditional American BBQ feast for their fellow comrades and was wondering if we would ship into Afghanistan. Well, you guessed it; in a few days a care package was on it’s way half way around the world…
It’s been a while since I spoke to Ken and I had honestly almost forgotten about it. Well, I got an email today from Ken, and here’s what he had to say…
“Hello Mike,
Hope you and the gang there had great holidays. As promised, here are some pics of the two smokes we did right before Christmas and on Boxing Day. Our first cook we had to use a grill that our hotel had on the rooftop bar/grill. But we had ordered a smoker on Amazon, so we were able to use it on the second cook. We got some pork butts from Dubai, since Afghanistan is a Muslim country and there is no pork here. It cost us $15/kg…crazy expensive. We are planning on doing some more cooks when the weather warms up. We are in Kabul, right by the airport and it is in the 30s and teens at night with snow, so not conducive to being on a rooftop smoking all day. My partner Gary is the one in the pictures. He is originally from South Africa, but has been in Virginia for the past 30 years. He is a Forensic Firearms Examiner and I am a Cellular and Computer Forensics Mentor at the Afghan National Crime Laboratory. We are both retired Law Enforcement.
Thanks again for your help. Talk to you soon.
Ken **** “
Be sure to scroll to the last pic. It really puts things in perspective….
^^^^—- That one’s got the “fun” switch…
Thank you for your service, Ken!! And, Thanks so much for including Oakridge BBQ in your Holiday celebrations so far from home. It means the world to us, and to me personally it’s one of the highest honors I have.
God bless!
Mike