 Engineers from the 500th Engineer Company and paratroopers from the 173rd Airborne Brigade came together to help the Vajnayaki family home in Vaive, Latvia. The engineers worked to lay the foundation for a new chicken coop and worked on other projects around the home. The 173rd paratroopers worked with members of the Latvian Army to cut down trees and split them to be used as firewood during the winter. First Lieutenant Aaron Malepit talked about what it means to be able to work on the project and to see the effect it has. This isn't very different from what we typically do. We're an earth-moving company, so what we're doing right now is excavating the earth with our back co-loader. The only difference between this and what we typically do is we don't really get to see the direct effects of our work. So this is nice for everyone because the reason we're here is to help build relationships with our NATO allies and our Baltic partners. So being able to actually see the effect that we're having on the community is really good for our soldiers. From the Michigan Army National Guard, I'm Specialist John Brandenburg.