Wineka: Salisbury's perfect when not in Afghanistan

James' collection of artifacts from his various worldwide locales include passport masks and all manner of African art. Poto by Mark Wineka, Salisbury Post

Salisburian Will James, a civilian contractor now working in Afghanistan, admires some of the masks he collected during earlier assignments in Africa. Photo by Mark Wineka, Salisbury Post

Art from the Jameses' stays in places such as Uzbekistan mingle with the Christmas decorations and family photographs of their Salisbury home on South Fulton Street. Photo by Mark Wineka, Salisbury Post

Will James views some of the artwork he has collected from former Soviet republics. Photo by Mark Wineka, Salisbury Post

In Kabul, Afghanistan, Will James lives in a sprawling house with other civilian contractors.

Their compound is surrounded by a 15-foot-high wall with barbed wire on top. Armed guards and machine guns protect the perimeter.

To get to work each day, James rides in an armored vehicle with shooters keeping watch near him. The going is slow as they ease through streets congested with people, automobiles and horse and donkey carts.

A "chase" vehicle follows theirs. In case they're attacked, the men in the trailing vehicle can swoop in and possibly take James and his colleagues to safety.

Westerners such as James, in the capital city to help build the infrastructure, are big targets for terrorists who would like to snatch them or worse.

James works daily with an armed guard outside his office door.

Back at the compound, he exercises by using his road bike as a stationary cycle. He doesn't dare walk even a block away from his living quarters.

"It's a tough assignment so far," says James, 63. "This one is not much fun."

An energy attorney, James is several months into a two-year government contract in Afghanistan. The firm he works for has been hired to provide management of the electric utility in Kabul.

James spent the recent holiday break with his wife, Mary, and their 12-year-old son, Robyn, in the historic 1879 house they enjoy on South Fulton Street in Salisbury.

Five years ago, after a contract had expired in Bangladesh, the Jameses decided it was time to establish a home in the States. Using the Internet, they basically searched the East Coast for an older home in a historic town.

The search seemed to be leading them to Petersburg, Va., before an impromptu visit to Salisbury changed their minds. They bought their house and set about its gradual restoration, filling it with art and artifacts collected from their various outposts overseas.

The decor carries a heavy emphasis on things from Central Asia and Africa.

They say Salisbury was the right choice.

"We love it," Mary says. "What a gem of a town."

It turned out that Will's future contract work in places such as Ghana (three months), Liberia (1.5 years), Kosovo (1.5 years) and now Afghanistan were not family postings.

Mary says the couple have never ruled out the possibility of renting their Salisbury home if the chance comes for her and Robyn to live with Will overseas. Meanwhile, she communicates with her husband daily through Skype or telephone.

Because of the 9.5-hour time difference, Will calls early in the morning, often trying to catch Robyn before he leaves for Sacred Heart Catholic School. When Will can't get home during a break, Mary and Robyn sometimes meet him halfway at destinations such as Austria, France and Portugal.

Mary says the constant separation has given her a new appreciation for single mothers. But she quickly adds that many other families deal with similar separations all the time, especially those in the military.

In Afghanistan, Will says, the United States finds itself in the position of having to pay for everything, as it builds roads, schools and hospitals. The mission also takes in repair of the electrical system and trying to set it up as a self-sufficient enterprise.

"Right now, it's just a huge economic drain," he says.

The best way to describe James' job is to say he's the in-house lawyer for his company.

Afghanistan has an electric utility that has been abused for more than 25 years by a variety of sources, including communist Russia and the Taliban. Through the various occupations and rebellions, Afghans have come to think of electricity as an entitlement, something they should receive for free.

Today Afghan citizens are more likely to steal power than pay for it.

James says his company is working at a basic level to instill some sort of discipline on how electricity is produced, delivered and paid for.

Over the past couple of months, James and others in his firm have been trying to create a Duke Energy-type of company cloaked in a corporate identity distinct from the Afghan government, though the government for now is the lone shareholder.

The ultimate goal is to get that corporation on the same kind of footing as a private U.S. electric utility that produces and delivers power and expects payment from customers in return.

"It is not a popular idea — not something they're taking to easily," James says. "This is something that's going to be an ongoing battle of sorts for 15 to 20 years."

James grew up in Chicago and attended the University of Colorado on an athletic scholarship as a 400-meter hurdler. He earned a degree in aerospace engineering, then his law degree at the University of Denver.

For 25 years he specialized in energy law, with about 70 percent of his work involving oil and gas.

James then became intrigued by the emerging countries resulting from the collapse of the Soviet Union. He went back to business school, earned his MBA from the University of Chicago and signed on as a civilian contractor to help new or developing countries in privatizing their energy sectors.

In 1997, two months into a contract in Turkistan, James returned briefly to marry Mary, who was a Washington TV journalist. The couple first lived together in Turkistan.

They would live overseas for seven years, with his jobs taking them to stops such as Uzbekistan, the Republic of Georgia, Nigeria and Bangladesh. "It certainly has been a source of stories for dinner conversations," Will says.

In several of the former Soviet outposts, Mary taught reporting and anchoring techniques to fledgling journalists.

It was in Georgia that the couple adopted Robyn, then 3.

James says the United States faces a difficult job in Afghanistan, where social contracts and the rights of man are not necessarily accepted concepts.

"I look at Afghanistan, and I think that maybe they're 500 years behind," he says.

The recent increase in the U.S. military presence is important, even for the mission his company is on, James says.

"We can't walk away and allow the country to recultivate another (Osama) bin Laden," he says. "It's a huge financial drain, but so was 911. We can't let countries create those terrorists, launch them at us and just take it."

His early impressions see an Afghan government that is corrupt, top to bottom, with a philosophy throughout the country that says, "Get yours while the getting's good."

Still, James describes the value of U.S. foreign aid as "fabulous."

He also has seen great waste, though he thinks Congress generally has its heart in the right place.

"They don't set out to waste it," he says, "but they take their eye off the ball frequently."

James' work has made his appreciation for America even greater.

When in Bangladesh, many mornings he would walk to his office and pass thousands of people, mostly women, going barefoot to jobs where they would work 10 to 12 hours a day and make something like $30 a month.

"We never give a thought to the millions of people going through life in this drudgery," James says.

"... I come home and I say, 'By golly, what a country we have managed to create.' "