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To reach this remote district, a nine-person team from the Afghan presidential palace recently drove across rough, mountainous terrain where rock-covered paths turned to icy roads that repeatedly pushed their Toyota pickups to their limits.

When they reached a high school in Ruyi Du Ab, a two-hour drive from the capital of the northern province of Samangan, hundreds of men lined up to receive flour, sugar, rice, cooking oil, dates, blankets and rugs.

The community was still reeling from floods in the spring that left the largely agricultural area devastated. Farmers watched their crops and livestock wash away in the surging waters.

"There are families that didn't even have a single drinking glass left," one resident said.

An effort spearheaded by Afghanistan's new first lady, Rula Ghani, to get relief supplies to thousands of families as Afghans face winter has focused on remote areas where geography, climate and insecurity often hinder international aid efforts.

It is one of the first major projects undertaken by Ghani, who has said she wants a more public role than many of her predecessors, including Zinat Karzai, a gynecologist who was rarely seen in public.

In a country where most humanitarian assistance is distributed by the United Nations and Western aid agencies, Ghani's relief effort was funded by a $2-million grant from Saudi Arabia, part of a $130-million aid package that the government in Riyadh offered to Afghanistan during President Ashraf Ghani's visit in October.

Although President Ghani's administration has yet to decide on a Cabinet, the first lady's aid delivery was in part a way to show that the Afghan government could serve the country in ways other than politics. Yet it also carries risks for the first lady, a Lebanese-born Maronite Christian who has not concealed her background, which could be used against the president by conservative critics.

The last spouse of an Afghan leader to have a prominent public role was Queen Soraya, the wife of King Amanullah Khan, who ruled Afghanistan from 1919 to 1929. Soraya was politically active, serving as the king's education minister and joining his campaign against the conservative burka worn by some Afghan women.

For Ghani, who was active in charity work before her husband was elected president, the aid delivery was "an opportunity to not only reach the truly vulnerable but also for us to get a better sense of exactly what it takes to help those who find themselves in consistent need," she said in an interview in her office at the presidential palace.

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Afghanistan's first lady steps into public eye with rural aid effort