Christmas celebrations are starting early for an Arthington couple who welcomed their daughter home from Afghanistan this week.

RAF Sgt Nicola Parker will be at the centre of a family celebration with her family during two weeks leave from her duties in Helmand Province.

Nicola, 32, is taking a break from her work helping to rebuild the war-torn country.

And although heavy snow could put paid to some of her plans for visiting friends and family she will be enjoying an early taste of the festive season with her proud parents Christine and Leslie Parker, along with her brother Michael, 43, sister Jeanine, 45, brother-in-law Christopher, and nieces Josephine, 16, and Zoe, 13.

Nicola followed a childhood dream to join the RAF 15 years ago – and she says her job has lived up to all her expectations.

The places she has served in include Kosovo, Iraq, and Sierra Leone. Her duties now involve helping with the rebuilding of schools, hospitals and the local infrastructure of Afghanistan.

She said a lot of her work centred on helping women, many of whom had lost their husbands.

“I have quite a lot to do with the females in Afghanistan, helping them to become self-sufficient and to be able to support their families.

“A lot of the males in families have been killed over the years.

“It is very, very rewarding work,”she said.

Nicola said local people were normally welcoming .

“We are there to help them and a lot of them are very receptive to us,” she stressed.”

She said she had found her work in Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan particularly rewarding, adding: “The job I am doing at the moment is actually the most rewarding because we are actually helping people to rebuild.

In a country where women are very much treated as third class citizens Nicola says she has had no problems being accepted by Afghan men. “Afghan men treat western women very differently to the way they treat their own,” she said. “We are like a third species – there are men, and women, and soldiers. With female soldiers they treat you as a different race, and they treat you as an equal.”

Although there are inherent dangers with Nicola’s work she says it is not something she dwells on.

“It is always at the back of your mind – but if you think about it you wouldn’t do anything,” she said. “It is obviously there and obviously there are good times and bad times.”

Nicola’s mum Christine said: “It is a worry but at the end of the day she is doing what she has always wanted to do. You can’t live your life worrying about it.

“You just have to think she is working. She has said that if anything happens then she will have been doing what she loves.”

“She is very, very happy and just loves what she is doing.”