Full circle. Do over. Déjà vu.

I’ve woken four consecutive mornings in Mazar-i Sharif….Afghanistan. It was 3 years, 5 months and 9 days ago that I first arrived in Mazar. I climbed down off the plane onto the tarmac, made my way to a large cart loaded with luggage and claimed my own.

An elderly man and his grandson, dressed in rags and cheap plastic sandals, loaded my luggage onto a rickety old cart and pushed it out through the rain past the sagging chain link fence, over rough uneven ground pocked with muddy puddles. I picked my way along behind as we exited the “international” airport.

Some 1,258 days later the day began much the same. I climbed down off the plane onto the tarmac and here the similarities ended. A security advisor I had first met more than a year ago, met me at the tail of the plane and helped me claim my luggage. We walked toward a newly renovated International Airport, complete with a large new terminal, a new tower and other clearly improved infrastructure.

For five days now I have woken in the city that first fired my imagination and challenged the limits of my endurance. I don’t yet know what to make of my experience here. New colleagues, new office, new guest house and a changed security scene all conspire to make this experience wholly different from the original.

30,192 hours after I arrived for the first time, I begin AF 2.0.