The Army had this elaborate plan to find the caves. Dozens of soldiers would be dropped via helicopter into an isolated valley in Taliban country, each carrying enough equipment, food and water for several days of marching.  From there, they would target ten or so suspected cave sites that had been reconnoitered by air, dotted into a nearby mountain range.  It sounded fun, so I tagged along, and jumped off the helicopter onto the muddy farm field with everyone else. Almost before we had a chance to hit the soil, the Blackhawk lurched up again into the sky, the roar of the rotors quickly fading away.  Soon it was quiet. The rising sun was just peeking over the horizon.

The platoons regrouped, and then headed off for their objectives. The one I stayed with was lead by an ebullient and witty staff sergeant from Indiana named Steven Caldwell, whose platoon was a motley group of young men from across America.  They irreverently cracked jokes as they marched, mostly banter about their girlfriends back home or discussions on the bathroom habits of local Afghans.  Also along for the ride was a somber Air Force dog handler named Schwartz and his pride and joy, a black German Shepherd named Bleck, who was trained to sniff out explosives.  All of them were hauling huge packs full of 100 pounds or more of gear, along with their heavy weapons and ammunition.

The entire first day of the mission was earmarked for finding the first two caves, but a short walk took us to the spot where they were, and it turned out they weren’t caves at all, just natural ridges in the rock that apparently looked like caves from the air.  Caldwell shrugged, entered the information on a rugged handheld GPS-type device that he was using to find the targets, and we continued on to look for the rest, some miles ahead on a windy path.

We passed through several villages along the way, the Pashtun tribalists regarding us with curious stares as we walked by.  A few hours of hiking brought us to a road that hugged the base of a long, imposing cliff face.  Caldwell glanced down as his computer and back up at the moutainside.

“Looks like the next few caves are right up there,” he said, pointing to a spot on the cliff far above us. He looked over at his men, “Who’s coming with me?”

No volunteers. Caldwell rolled his eyes, and muttered several unprintable things. Then he drooped his pack with a thud onto the dirt.

“Fine, just watch the road. I need the K-9, though,” and with that, he started clamoring up the mountain. Schwartz and Bleck scrambled up after him.  Soon they were all over the ridge and out of sight.

I hesitated for a few minutes, trying to convince myself there was something productive to photograph right where I was, without venturing up into the heights. The platoon laughed and loudly started back with their discussion about the Afghan’s toilet habits.  I sighed, slung my camera over my shoulder, and headed up the mountain.

It was ridiculously dangers; the route up ranged from a steep incline to nearly vertical, and the rock itself was a grey shale of some kind that had a disquieting tendency to disintegrate as you searched for a foothold on it.  One slip on this thing and you’d go for a long, painful tumble onto jagged rocks somewhere below.  Eventually, I caught up with Caldwell, Schwartz and Bleck on a narrow ridge.  They were barely sweating.

“Caldwell, you’re from Indiana,” I said, panting. “Where did you learn how to climb mountains?”

He smiled without looking up from his computer.

“Man, I’ve been stationed in Alaska for five years. We do this stuff all day… a-ha, it’s over by that crevasse.” He bolted off and started making his way literally across the base of the long vertical crack that wound down the cliff face.  Schwartz and Bleck gamely followed after him.

The way they went looked nearly impossible to me, so I hiked up a bit instead, looking for a better place to cross the crack. But there was nothing a few feet up either, and I couldn’t go down because I couldn’t see, so I went up still farther.  Still there was no way to cross. Before long, I couldn’t go up any more and the sides were nothing but an inclined slope of loose pebbles. Somehow I’d gotten 50 feet over the others, and was completely stuck.

After a few minutes of self-pity, I lunged to the left and danced across the crumbly slope like a barefoot teenager on the hot sands of vertical beach.  I made it to the crevasse and awkwardly landed on my rear, and instantly started sliding down.  But inside the crack I could use my feet to slow myself and it was actually kind of fun, like a waterslide.  (My pants would disagree; I shredded them and, as they were my only pair, an Afghan tailor working on the Army base later laboriously put them back together.)  Finally, I tumbled to a stop at the bottom, landing with a cloud of dust right next to Caldwell, who was still absorbed in his GPS.

“Hey there,” he said. “Man, this ain’t no cave here, either. You about ready?”

“Whenever you are.”

It is moments like these in foreign lands that always prompt me to get philosophical, even existential: Why am I here? How did this happen? Why exactly am I hanging on the side of a mountain in Afghanistan this morning? I’m not in the Army, I didn’t sign up for this. I should be back home, watching TV or canoodling in bed of having a strong espresso in Brooklyn. Or just about anywhere else.

But in the end, things tend to work themselves out, I find, and the satisfaction of photographing and documenting the most important issues of our time far outweighs any temporary discomfort, or even fear.  In the end, I found a way down by quickly dancing across the inclined slope like a barefoot teenager bouncing on the hot sands of a vertical beach, and continued on with the mission.

Chris also writes for dscriber.com about his experiences in Afghanistan. To read more about this particular day, click here.

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The Americans left the earthen walls of their base around dawn, taking a left on the dusty unpaved path that runs outside, in the direction of the boarder with Pakistan.  But they weren’t going that far.  Just a few miles in fact, to the nearest village, for a routine foot patrol.  A few Afghan men watched from distant hills above us, crouching stock-still as we passed.

After a half hour we arrived a tiny hamlet, a dispersed collection of mud brick houses set among farm fields and tiny hay barns.  The largest building by far among the dozens or so in the area was the mosque. It was also of mud, and was around the size and shape of an old one-room schoolhouse on the prairie.  Several other buildings abutted the mosque, forming a simple town square fringed with hewn long benches.

The purpose of the patrol was ostensibly to search the farm houses in the area, looking for weapons or signs of militant activity. So as not to rile the locals too badly, the American forces I was traveling with, led by a burly Staff Sergeant named Adam James, brought along members of the nascent Afghan police force to do the actual searching.  The Afghan police didn’t look any different than the men sitting idly in the square, save that they wore heavy blue coats that read “Police” in English on the back.

Staff Sgt. James laconically directed these Afghan forces to begin their search, seeming almost bored; he has two hours of Iraq under his belt before coming here, and has a seen-it-all sort of air about him.  Before long, like everywhere else in the Third World, young boys materialized from the ether and started gathering around the visitors.  No girls approached us, though I could see some in the distance, leading pack animals around or tending to the fields.  Sgt. James ordered some of his men to nearby high ground to watch the road and the land around us. Once these sentries were in place James relaxed, sitting on the log bench and taking some of the pale yellow Afghan hot tea offered to him by one of the men of the mosque.

I looked around at the surrounding hills. “Hey, isn’t this Taliban country?” I asked.  “Pretty much,” James said, blowing on the tea glass while holding it gingerly by the rim. “Aren’t you worried you’ll get ambushed?” I asked. “Naw, they wouldn’t do it here,” he said. “They’ll wait until we’re on the road heading back to the base.”  “Oh. What might you do to prevent that?” “I’ll call in helicopter support. They’ll cover us, and then we’ll head back.”

Just then, one of the soldiers watching on a hill called won, stringing some words together he probably never had uttered before in his life: “Looks like we got a bunch of camels heading for us, sir.” Everyone turned to look down the road.  He was right. In minutes, they were among us.

It was a colorful caravan of at least fifty camels and as many ponies, all laden with ramshackle cloth bags tied with homemade ropes.  Hundreds of angular bearded mean in turbans and shalwar kameez and as many women covering their faces walked alongside.  Sleepy children with wild hair and runny noses rode on hand-woven saddles on the humps, their heads rocking in time with the rhythmic sway of the camels’ steady gait.

They were passing through and didn’t stop, but the Army’s Pashto translator managed to shout out some questions as they lumbered past, and we got the gist of their story — they had been on the road four days so far, and had about a week to go; they were fine thank you though one of their camels was going lame; and they were heading for warmer climates for the winter, toward the village of Salerno and coming from Ghazni.

As the caravan disappeared into the dusty distance, we all watched it quietly, with the kind of instinctive awe one gets when you see something that seems to walk out of history.  Had one stood on this road during the autumn migrating months a thousand years ago, that caravan would have looked completely the same.

Soon the local police finished their searching and it was time to return to the base. Sgt. James called in for Apache attack helicopters to cover the road, but none were available.  So, instead we hiked up into the hills and returned cross-country on the high ground, the soldiers marching single-file on the ridges of the ancient mountains. We were back in time for a late lunch.

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We are delighted to share the following post, created by Jacklynne Hobbs from Market Photo Workshop.

It has been a season of strikes and protests in South Africa, with demonstrators spilling into the streets of Johannesburg and other cities to voice their discontent about wage levels and inadequate provision of social services. The resulting scenes of barricades, clashes with police and general mayhem have enabled students from the Photojournalism and Documentary Photography Programme (PDP)*, run by the Johannesburg-based Market Photo Workshop, to grapple with the difficulties of producing spot news images.  But, they also highlighted a recurrent dilemma for PDP administrators: How do we train young photojournalists to cope in hostile environments without exposing them to unacceptable risks?

Municipal workers staged a country-wide strike in South Africa towards the end of July to gain a salary increase. The main union representing workers demanded a 15 percent wage hike. (Photo courtesy of Madoda Mkhobeni/PDP student/Johannesburg)

The answer, in part, was to develop a course on conflict reporting that put students in the line of fire – or, rather, paint.

During this fortnight-long initiative, learners were sent off to a paintball range in eastern Johannesburg alternately to take part in and photograph matches between opposing PDP teams (with digital SLRs being prudently discarded in favour of disposable cameras). Our hope was that these rapid, adrenaline-fuelled games would give the designated photographers an immediate sense of how easily journalists can be caught in the cross-fire of a conflict situation – the presence of cameras notwithstanding. Agonised shouts of “I’m media! I’m media!” from photographers who had been hit by paintballs suggested that this lesson was learnt with a vengeance.

The course also included lectures that gave students the opportunity to pick some of the best minds in the business of documenting hazardous environments.

Photojournalists who visited the Photo Workshop to share their experiences with learners included Joao Silva, on contract with The New York Times – and a veteran of war zones on several continents. During a slide show of his work, Joao took students into the thick of battle by giving them a moment-to-moment account of the events behind a series of images from 2006 showing a wounded US soldier being hauled to safety by a fellow officer – this after their platoon came under sniper fire in the central Iraqi town of Karma.

Alon Skuy of The Times, a local newspaper, gave insights into how he managed to capture scenes from last year’s outbreak of xenophobia-related violence in South Africa. At the time of the course, Alon’s photographs of this violence were on exhibition in Johannesburg.

In the course of the protest, several workers trashed the streets of Johannesburg. A SAMWU official was quoted as saying that the union did not condone these actions, but did try to understand what had prompted them. (Photo courtesy of Lucky Mofokeng/PDP student/Johannesburg)

And, in the Photo Workshop’s first experiment with Skype video-conferencing, students chatted to Philadelphia-based freelancer Lori Waselchuk about her experiences in New Orleans during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Rising tensions in the waterlogged city presented journalists who were covering the natural disaster with a number of challenges.

Striking employees pictured before Nelson Mandela Bridge in Johannesburg. Fifteen years after South Africa’s first democratically-elected president took power, the country continues to face huge difficulties in raising living standards: reports indicate that about a million families still reside in shacks, and lack basic services. (Photo courtesy of Madoda Mkhobeni/PDP student/Johannesburg)

Presentations on the state of press freedom in Southern Africa and about the history of conflict photography rounded out the course, along with several screenings of films that showed journalists operating under pressure (The Year of Living Dangerously proved of great interest to students).

The protests resulted in several injuries. Although many workers had demanded a 15 percent wage increase, they ultimately settled for an offer of 13 percent. (Photo courtesy of Bethule Nkiwane/PDP student/Johannesburg)

As a result of the course a toolkit has been developed for the Photo Workshop that gives students pointers on how to prepare for work in a dangerous area, what to do once there and on steps to be taken afterward for safeguarding images and staying in good mental shape. With unhappiness about the pace at which lives in South Africa are being improved unlikely to abate soon, this kit is essential to serving the needs of both present and future learners who aspire to a life in photojournalism.

As the South African Broadcasting Corporation planned sweeping budget cuts to help it emerge from a financial quagmire, producers and others in the local media industry staged a protest against the effects this would have on homegrown programme production. The demonstration took place in August.(Photo courtesy of Mandisa Ledwaba/PDP student/Johannesburg)

* The Photojournalism and Documentary Photography Programme is run by the Johannesburg-based Market Photo Workshop with the kind support of Getty Images.

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Winner of a Getty Images Grants for Editorial Photography, Kai Wiedenhöefer has recently completed his project entitled Sharon’s Wall: Holy Land, Divided Lands

In his project summary, Kai writes, “During a sunset in August 2005 I was standing in a hole next to the Neve Dekalim settlement in the Gaza Strip. I was digging out an exploded Qassam rocket that Palestinian militants had shot there from the neighbouring Khan Yunis Refugee Camp, when I received the call from Getty Images that I had received the Getty Images Editorial Grant. The rocket ended up as a decoration in the apartment of a friend of mine in Tel Aviv, the Getty Images Grant resulted in a book publication.  The Grant was a major financial help to bring this project to fruition. The grant was feeding the hungry mouth of the panorama camera with 220 rolls of film which made the project very expensive. It helped me also to return for another two trips each for a month and close the project in spring 2006. In 2007 Steidl published my book Wall. Altogether it was the project I enjoyed most in my life as a photographer so far and the Getty Images Grant played a mayor role in it.”

See Kai’s finished photo essay at Getty Images.

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Scott Lewis, winner of a Getty Images Grants for Editorial Photography, recently completed the project where he documents immigration and the influx of new religions, faiths and worships.

In his summary, Lewis writes “Since the 1960s, a new wave of immigrants, largely from Latin America and Asia, has brought new faith traditions and practices. I’ve spent time documenting a selection of religious communities from the oldest, Quakers, to the newest at the China Buddhist Association whose temples serves mostly new Chinese immigrants to the active and flourishing Hindu Temple Society of North America (the first Hindu Temple in the U.S.).  I have tried to steer clear of what I feel is previously known or understood as well as trying to dispel some stereotypes, all the while tapping into the intense beliefs and joyous celebration of believers.  I have tried to steer clear of what I feel is previously known or understood as well as trying to dispel some stereotypes, all the while tapping into the intense beliefs and joyous celebration of believers.”

See Scott’s completed photo essay project at Getty Images.

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Andrew Testa, winner of a Getty Images Grants for Editorial Photography, has recently completed his project entitled New Beginning for Kosovo.

In his project summary, Testa writes, “With Kosovo’s widely expected independence delayed by Russian opposition and bogged down in diplomatic wrangling, I set out to make a portrait of this tiny corner of Europe, a province of Serbia, but under the jurisdiction of the United Nations, it’s population of two million besieged by power cuts and water shortages, its infrastructure in tatters and it’s financial institutions and businesses unable to function normally due to it’s unclear status.”

He continues, “During the three trips that I made with the grant money I had a mantra running through my head; it came from a long ago review of Waiting for Godot that described it as ‘a play in which nothing happens, twice.’  This seemed to me to be the perfect summation of Kosovo at that time, a place in limbo, a country in waiting that was completely hamstrung by the fact that it was not actually a country.”

See Andrew’s finished photo essay at Getty Images.

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Rena Effendi, winner of a Getty Images Grants for Editorial Photography, recently completed her project entitled Pipedreams: a chronicle of lives along the pipeline in Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey. 

Effendi writes, “Pipedreams is my first book that evolved from a long-term project documenting my country’s post-Soviet turmoil in which corruption, poverty and war were all related to, and fed by, oil and gas.  What I witnessed in this journey is that initial promises and expectations of trickle-down wealth still remain unfulfilled. Pipedreams is dedicated to the neglected people of Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Turkey, linked by the pipeline, and their faded hopes for a better future.” 

See Rena’s finished photo essay at Getty Images.

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