When it’s too much a challenge to find parking on Convoy, I’ve learned that if you drift west across the 805, you can find a smaller, yet no less diverse cluster of restaurants along Clairemont …
January 23, 2024
Afghanistan news and stories
Afghanistan news and stories
Going traditional at Afghani Food International Market & Restaurant
Shirtless at Danny’s in Coronado
“Attention!” It’s midnight on Friday. A shirtless, tattooed guy jumps up onto the counter at Danny’s, the Coronado bar in which Navy Seals and other special ops types like to gather to let off steam. …
January 19, 2022
Army platoon interpreter in Afghanistan ends up in El Cajon
Sher Mohammad Haidari heard the radio crackle with Taliban chatter as the Army platoon he was with trudged through a valley in eastern Afghanistan looking for a U.S. soldier who had abandoned his post. The …
December 14, 2016
Spring in Afghanistan
When I think of what spring means in San Diego, baseball games and announcements of new animals from the zoo come to mind. Traffic and tourists who don't understand common-knowledge speed limit. It means more …
March 17, 2014
Afghanistan: among the connexes
My walk from the barracks to the connex is familiar. Begrudgingly, my boots start on the walk to work. For exactly 100 steps, large gravel rocks are the path. They are everywhere the pavement or …
July 16, 2013
Dope and Diarrhea in Afghanistan: A Sordid Tale
Dope and diarrhea were the two main topics of conversation during my brief sojourn in Afghanistan back in 1976-77. The first everybody wanted, the second everybody had. Back in the day, before anyone had even …
June 21, 2012
Khaled Waleh, owner of Zia’s Afghan Café in North Park, helps me find his dad
‘He’s gone back to Afghanistan,” says Khaled Waleh. “He left last week.” It’s a shock. I’d come looking for Zia Waleh, famous for his intimate Zia’s Afghan Café in North Park, closed now but much …
June 6, 2012
Blood on the Pomegranate Tree
I remember it was noon on a warm and sunny day. The air smelled of food, dust, gun powder, and smoke, just like every day. I was a dusty-haired six-year-old wearing a sticky dress and …
June 17, 2009
Left in Hell
"They were careless people...they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the …
April 17, 2003
Why (and How?) Did a Navy SEAL Die in Afghanistan?
Another incomplete version of Roberts’s last moments emerged in a New York Times article on March 7 under the headline “Combat Mystery: Last Moments of Navy Man Still a Puzzle.”
April 4, 2002