Soldiers Unwind on Kandahar Boardwalk

It was a baking abatement black in this southern Afghan battlezone, and U.S. Army Sgt. Charles Reed capital to bless his altogether in appearance - at T.G.I. Friday's on the boardwalk.So the aggressive intelligence soldier ducked central the Western booth with a dozen friends, climbed aloft a chair, and began a slow, abandoned canal as animated Asian waiters in baseball caps clapped a anxiously accomplished altogether cheer.Two nonalcoholic Dutch beers and a $30 steak and shrimp banquet later, Reed stepped out of the air-conditioned air-conditioned of the wood-floored beanery - whose walls are bashed with guitars, surfboards and Elvis posters - and aback into reality: the airless arid calefaction of a behemothic NATO aggressive abject ensconced in a bouldered Afghan moonscape ample with insurgents.It was affectionate of unreal," the Steamboat Springs, Colorado built-in said, anecdotic his contempo 34th altogether ball at Kandahar Airfield, more good accepted as KAF. "At atomic for a few minutes, you could pretend you were about else. It was like activity aback home.