Day Thirty Eight

I woke up this morning after an amazing night's sleep. It's getting warmer here, and the heaters are working good in my hut. I had some back problems yesterday that were bothering me, so I took some medication before bed and woke up feeling great.

The weather was fairly decent outside and the bathroom/shower facility was back up and running. Did I mention that I had to walk across camp yesterday because my bathroom/shower facility was "out of order?"

I got to work and Rohullah Amin showed up shortly afterwards. We sat down and went over basic editing information and I
taught him how to import video and start laying shots down on a timeline. He is the type person that just wants to play, so it was hard keeping him tempered for a while. Once I did finally cut him loose to try and do it on his own, he did very well. Despite not being able to read English and read all the things in the program, Rohullah Amin does a good job memorizing what I do instead. It's an amazing thing. Just think about it. Try to navigate from your home page to Google to search for something in particular, type in what you're looking for, search all the links it provides, then choose the correct one...and do it while all the words are in Dari of Pashto language! I couldn't do it. That's kind of what he's dealing with in this program, and his only choice is to memorize the steps, or learn the words. Rohullah Amin does both.

He was very excited about making things flip and turn. I think he might've used every single possible effect there was in the program's effect palette. I taught him how to create new titles and put them over video. He struggled with "in" and "out" points in order to select the clips he wants to use. He kept hitting the "in point" and "out point" at the same point in the tape, which wouldn't allow him to do anything. I finally explained it to him so he understood. I told him to hit the "in point" at the beginning of the General's speech and then hit the "out point" at the end of his speech. Then I told him that he was now going to select everything in between. He finally got it. It was cool to see the smile on his face when he figured things out. He kept saying "Brother good teacher" to me. He calls me "brother" all the time. I just kept telling him that it wasn't me...he was the one doing the work.

Three hours went by and we finally parted ways. I went and got Rohullah Amin and our interpreter lunch, so we ate before they left. I walked them to the gate and Rohullah was very happy. I think he now realizes what potential he has and can run with it. He told me that he was going to go back to his office and put together a video for me to review when I go there tomorrow morning. Perfect. Now he's getting it. WE'RE TRAINING! Sweet.

My time in the gym was good tonight. I went earlier than normal, and got a great arm workout in after running three miles (I wasn't feeling it today - go figure, right?) After that, I hit my abs good again. We went to have dinner after that, which was different for me, as I normally work out late and don't eat with everyone else. It was nice to sit and relax. After that, we went back to the office and watched a movie and Sandy showed us this site called "People at Wal-Mart." WOW. If you haven't seen that site, go check it out. You'll see what I mean when I say, "WOW."

That's all for today. I'm anxious and excited to see what Rohullah Amin has for me to review tomorrow. It's great that he has the initiative and great that we're headed in the right direction. More training is needed, but we're getting there at a little faster pace than we were before. That's a good thing and hopefully a sign of things to come. Regardless, I'm still doing what I do...and doing it one step at a time, one day at a time.