JFFs core activity has been exchange of judo trainers between Norway and Afghanistan, where the aim has been to build competence in judo skills, refereeing, trainer skills, organisational skills, health care and knowledge about culture, history and religion. All in all twenty Norwegians have visited Afghanistan divided on fourteen visits and nine Afghans have visited Norway in three turns. The visits have lasted between 2 weeks and three months. Due to the increasingly tense security situation in Afghanistan and the fact that the visa application procedure for Afghans visiting Norway is extensive and often drags out to fill a whole year, the frequency of visits has decreased the last couple of years. The activity, however, is still increasing and during the last few years, JFF has build three dojos for two children and one for orphans. Today (end of 2009) we are building a fourth dojo which will be the first of our dojos outside Kabul, more exactly in Mazar-e-Sharif. During the years, many people have put down extraordinary effort both in Norway and in Afghanistan. In the following, a few milestones and major events are presented briefly. The Olympics in Athens 2004: Stig Traavik arranged wildcards for the Afghans in the 2004 Olympics in Athens, and Friba Rezayee was chosen to represent Afghanistan in judo (-70 kg class). During build-up for the Olympics Cecilie Lille and Gøril Johansen organized a stay in Norway for Friba and her training partner Tafseer, where they among other things participated in the Viking camp. Friba lost her first match in the Olympics against the Spaniard Blancka, but it was still a great political victory. The Paralympics in Athens 2004 An American sports organization organized a stay in Kabul for the Norwegian judo player Kristian Marki Nordheim. He there established the Afghan Handicap Association and was able to arrange wildcards for Afghans in the Paralympics in Athens (none of them in judo). In addition Kristian held regular trainings for boys and established judo trainings for the handicapped. During build-up for the Paralympics the athletes had a stay in Norway where they went through training programs at among other places the Norwegian top–level athletics centre. Vibeke Thiblin helped organizing this stay. Judo book in dari Shafiq Eqrar, project coordinator in Afghanistan, has made the draft for a judo-teaching book in Dari mainly intended for the children at the Aschiana centres. The book is being printed at Akademisk forlag funded by means originally intended for Christmas presents for the employees at the publishing firm. A great deal of work has been laid down to print this book, both by Shafiq, JFF and the publisher. The main problem has been finding software that makes it possible to print Afghan letters in a Norwegian printing machine. Despite all the problems the book was printed during autumn 2005. Fredskorpset-Ung Fredskorpset-Ung, meaning Peace corps for youths, financed an extensive exchange program including preparation work, a three month exchange, and after work. Two Norwegians (Lars Moland and Mathias Hansen) where visiting Afghanistan for three months in 2006, and all together 7 Afghans visited Norway; two (Shafiq Eqrar and Farhad Hazrati) in connection with the pre-project for three weeks in 2005 and five (Tafseer Siyaposh, Atefa Hussaini, Lina Ghani, Kambeiz Naseer and Jawied Folad) during the actual program in 2007. Due to the security situation, the Norwegian participants did not move outside the Kabul area, but the Afghan participants traveled and visited judo clubs in all the zones in Norway. Solidarity project JFF cooperated with Aschana, www.aschaina.com, for several years. Aschiana (meaning “the nest”) is an Afghan Non-Government Organisation that has provided services, support and programs to street working children and their families for close to ten years. They arrange different activities and offer street children basic education. JFF is providing judo training for the children who attend the classes. Judo has become an extremely popular activity and it gives the children extra motivation to attend the educational classes on a regular basis. JFF has also started the Solidarity project where Norwegian judo clubs are collecting money to provide the children with a meal after each training session. Every year JFF also sell Christmas cards. The price for one card covers the expenses of buying one judogi in Kabul. Norwegian judoplayers buys the cards and JFF send the money to Afghanistan where, for each card, at least one street child is provided with a judogi. Dojo building After having practiced judo outdoors, in old ruins, in tents and other less favourable locations, Shafiq Eqrar proposed to build container dojos for the street children. Since the Aschiana centres are forced to move around due to instability in Kabul, he designed a mobile dojo which can be moved when a centre have to change location. So far three mobile dojos have been built and the fourth are under construction. All the dojos have been built using local workforce. To quote Shafiq: “As a member of this society always we are trying to think how to support the poor people indirect through sport, knowledge and work. It means instead of everyday fish giving we must teach them how to catch fish.”