March 4, 2005

Willow Glen soldier serving in Afghanistan

Tom Ficarra enjoying living far away from home

By Carol Rosen
Editor

Tom Ficarra is a long way from his Willow Glen home. He’s even a long way from Philadelphia where he grew up. But the captain in the California National Guard, who’s spending a year in Afghanistan, is still having a good time.

Captain Ficarra visits a refugee camp to donate the warm clothes friends and family have sent to the children in Afghanistan. Together with two of his civilian contractor (former U.S. army) buddies, they are now asking friends and family to send school supplies for children, especially girls. Afghan children are segregated at school and often the girls receive fewer supplies than the boys.

“I’m happy to be here,” he told the Times. “Coming over here, it’s an adventure, it’s exciting. The people are totally different. I feel I have a purpose; that I’m doing something to help after 9/11. It makes me feel good.”

However, it’s taken some time to get used to the weather. Interviewed in early February from his station in Kabul, Ficarra mentioned that the temperature that night was about 15° F. and it was snowing. Kabul, he added, is in the mountains about a mile above sea level. “It’s about a mile high, like Denver, between snow and desert.”

Works with Afghan soldiers
His job in Kabul is to work with the Afghan National Army or ANA. He was deployed with other California soldiers, and eventually merged with an Indiana Guard unit consisting of personnel from 20 other states. “We work as mentors and advisors. My group works at the Kabul Military Training Center; it’s a basic training camp, the only one of its kind.

“My particular job is in the maintenance, transportation and fuel section. We get vehicles ready to go. I also work with the finance center. I help train Afghans that are full time soldiers in the aspects of the job, such as administration and operations.”

Ficarra is putting together a driver’s license program for the Afghan Army. Currently the country’s army has no licensing program. Called the ANA Operator Permit Program, Ficarra is one of several U.S. soldiers teaching and licensing the Afghani soldiers to drive trucks and tanks as well as other military vehicles.

Other groups of American and Coalition Forces, such as French, British and Mongolians, train different groups of Afghani soldiers, he added. They are teaching the soldiers to function efficiently with a good deal of organization. “We interact with the Afghanis on a daily basis. We are working to help make their situation better than what it was in the past,” Ficarra said.

So far, he’s seen little action. “It’s been pretty quiet in the Kabul area. Every once in a while a car bomb goes off or some guy starts shooting, but my group hasn’t seen any action,” he said.

His unit is not necessarily in Afghanistan to fight. While an active army unit is located nearly, Ficarra’s unit was sent to train the Afghani soldiers. “You’re put on orders for one year. But it’s situation dependent. If something happens, they [the army] might send in a unit. There is an active army unit close by. A couple of guys from our unit were sent to work with the Afghani army, to help them train in the field.”

Positive environment
Ficarra’s unit does have some interaction with the local Afghanis, which he calls “very positive.” It’s the first time they’ve had a break from war in 20 years, he said, and they are very happy to see us. “I haven’t heard a bad thing said [about us], and they are really receptive to us. They go out of the way to accept you,” he said.

Ficarra and two of his buddies, who are civilian contractors and retired from the U.S. Army, have asked their families and friends to send clothes for the refugees living in Kabul, especially the children. Throughout this winter, the three men have been receiving boxes from friends and family with clothes, hats, gloves, socks, jackets and other warm clothes because many of these people have nothing.

Since winter ended at the end of February, they would be interested in receiving school supplies for the local schools, which will be opening up in spring. They are concentrating on local girls’ schools since the young women usually don’t get the most supplies. Items such as pencils, pens, notebooks and backpacks are desired but anything would be appreciated. If you are interested in participating you can e-mail him at thomas.ficarra@us.army.mil.

Second tour
This is the second time Ficarra has been in a war zone. He first served in the first Gulf War as an MP with the California Army Guard. His group worked with the enemy prisoners of war (EPW), he said, putting them into prison camps and sending them home after the war was over. There was no abuse, he mentioned, most appeared to be glad to be taken prisoner and readily gave themselves up.

Seven inches of snow fell the day this photo was taken of Captain Ficarro and Captain Scott Brown from Texas. Brown is an engineer who is in charge of base facilities and, like Ficarra, a mentor to Afghan soldiers. The two are components of the main unit, the 76th Infantry Brigade from Indiana, along with soldiers from 20 other states including Texas and California.

When he’s not being a soldier, the 34-year old captain works as a graphics designer for the San Jose Mercury News. He’s been at the job for more than five years, about the same amount of time he’s lived in Willow Glen. He’s been in Afghanistan for about seven months, although when the Times spoke with him he’d recently returned from a visit home for the Christmas holidays.

While there are a number of things that are different between the United States and Afghanistan, probably one of the biggest differences is the women. U.S. soldiers do not “fraternize” with Afghani women, “it’s not highly looked upon when you’re on deployment,” he said. In fact, he noted that there is little interaction even with the female soldiers.
“Male soldiers don’t talk to local females. It’s more of a cultural thing, but this is a Muslim country and we go out of our way to respect their ways.”

“Everyone over here appreciates the help of the family and friends back in the states. The soldiers here really enjoy all the care packages, letters and e-mails we get and we couldn’t do this without the support from the people back home,” Ficarra said.