Tornado Alley (PROG)

[StephanieVanbryce]

Women are washing dishes at the entrance to a typical mud brick house. A cemetery is visible in the distance. Although there is no indication of this in the picture, the house sits at the base of a large hillside into which deep terraces are cut; a Zoroastrian Temple was situated here during the Kushan Period. The poplar trees planted along an irrigation ditch behind the house will later be used for building. These mud brick structures tend to be warm in winter and cool in summer; and aside from being somewhat dusty, they can be quite comfortable. After a period of time, new living quarters are built, and the old rooms become a barn or stable. A generation later the roof may be gone, and the walls remain as part of a courtyard or corral for animals. After a time, low walls may be used as a pen for smaller animals or as the wall around a garden.


Poplar Trees

Surkh Kotal, Afghanistan, January 1975