Revelations in Iraqi Kurdistan
15/06/2012
On my way back from a spontaneous single-day 800 kilometer voyage to visit the ruins at Gobekli Tepe I was lucky enough to find a pair of very nice Kurdish men who offered to take me all the way to Erbil, the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan. The border crossing into the autonomous north of Iraq was one of the most pleasant I have experienced: it involved little more than handing over my passport to a friendly secretary and waiting ten minutes in an air conditioned room while being served complimentary tea; a welcoming introduction to the fiftieth country on my journey.
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The journey from the border to Erbil was only a few hours drive, but Ahmet and Bahmn made sure it was enjoyable by taking me to visit scenic dams and an amusement park along the way, not to mention they had a mini fridge in the backseat of their van which they kept stocked with cold beers for the road. Not what I had expected for a first day in Iraq, but no complaints. |
Erbil held my interest mostly for the historic citadel at its center, which is a candidate for the ‘world’s oldest continuously inhabited city’. Up until the end of the Saddam era it was still in use, serving as government offices, but has since been vacated so that excavations and restorations can begin. As I climbed the steps to the citadel and exchanged the bustling hum of the bazaar for the eerie silence of the crumbling buildings, I thought I would have the place to myself but realized I had been followed in by a military guard. This made me nervous for a quick second before realizing that he was there as a personal escort, possibly to keep me safe, possibly to keep me from nosing around too much. Either way it was a good introduction to the millenniums of rich history that have Iraq’s cradle of civilization as their backdrop.
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That first stay in Erbil was a quick one; the citadel and a particularly well manicured public park are the only places of interest, so there wasn’t reason to stay long: the rest is all Dubai-style super construction trying to keep up with Iraq’s oil and gas boom. The rest of Kurdistan, however, does have some travel-worthy destinations. The most interesting for most travelers is Halabja, both for its natural beauty that tempts all sorts of hikers and campers, and for its tragic place in Kurdish history. Through a fellow international hitchhiker’s website I came into contact with Couchsurfing host Qaesar, whose family warmly welcomed me into their home with a hot meal, tour of the town and an evening trip to their home village in the cool mountains near the Iranian border. We sat around and chatted in broken English, and Qaesar’s sisters told me about life in such a politically volatile area. It didn’t take much probing before they were sharing their life stories, tears and all. One of his sisters had chosen not to marry, and although she was proud that this had guaranteed her a degree of freedom rarely experienced by women in the area, it meant making ends meet on her own. She was a teacher and made enough to get by, but life was hard and she seemed lonely, to say the least. The other part of her story came at the mention of the Halabja memorial and the horrors of Saddam Hussein. As if they had been waiting there the whole conversation, tears immediately rolled down her cheeks as she described the younger brother she had lost in the struggle against the dictator that ruthlessly controlled the country for 30+ years. The night finished in warm hugs and hopeful ‘see you agains’. It would not be the last time emotions flowed freely at the mention of Kurdistan’s past.
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The second day with Qaesar we once again headed to the mountains, but this time in the direction of Ahmad Awa, famous not only for its beautiful greenery and cascading waterfall, but also as the place that the three American backpackers were kidnapped by Iranian border control and held for two years in Iran. The Iranians claimed that the Americans had crossed the border illegally, sans visas, and were suspected to be spies for the CIA. The western media obviously took sides with the backpackers’ claim that they had been innocently hiking on the Iraqi side and were kidnapped and taken to Iran by border guards who were themselves illegally in Iraq. Besides serving as a good lesson on the flexible nature of international borders, this story has also served to keep a lot of tourists, and tourist revenue, out of the beautiful area; upon realizing how close I would be to Iran even I was a little nervous. However Qaesar assured me there was no problem, and after hearing several firsthand accounts from different locals, I realized (surprise surprise) that the western media may not have been letting onto the whole story. The locals unanimously claimed that not only had the Americans had crossed into Iran on their innocent hike, they had done so under the cover of night and had stayed across the border for two days before they were captured. I won’t add any personal viewpoint here except to point out that it is always necessary to question what mainstream media tells you. As for my experience in those mountains, they are a beautiful place for a hike and a picnic, filled with locals from all parts of Iraq, and definitely should not be missed by any travelers who find themselves in Kurdistan.
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The second part of Halabja’s fame originates from that horrible day on March 16, 1988, when Saddam Hussein ordered the bombing of the town with nerve gas, killing between five and six thousand people and injuring many more. Today a memorial museum stands in Halabja with the names of all the victims, alongside photographs taken by an Iranian photographer who unexpectedly arrived at the scene of the destruction minutes after it happened. The only way to even begin to understand the horror experienced by the people that day is to study those photographers and look into the eyes of the mothers and fathers and they futilely tried to protect their young children from the deadly dust. Today the memory of those lost in the Halabja bombing are mourned by the surviving locals who are still rebuilding their town, but their memory is also celebrated: they are looked upon as martyrs who gave their lives to save the Kurdish people. It was only after more than five thousand innocent villagers suffocated to death under the effects of nerve gas that the rest of the world finally decided to do something about their struggle and impose a no fly zone over the region, which was the first step to their salvation. Let us hope the world doesn’t make the same mistake again, and wait too long before taking action. (Ahem, Syria).
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After saying goodbye to Qaesar and his lovely wife and daughter it was on to Sulimaniyah for a proper tour of Kurdistan’s second city. I once again met up with my Turkey-Erbil hitchhiking friends Bahmn and Ahmet, who had invited me to stay there with their families. They demonstrated top-notch Kurdish hospitality and showed me the best of the city, from ice cream in the old bazaar, to games of pool in a dusty bar, to beers on top of the nearby mountains. The lions, hyenas and brown bears pacing in tiny cages in a back corner of the amusement park was an unfortunate lowlight (that an animal rights activist looking for a random project in the Middle East might want to tackle) but playing on a giant jungle with Bahmn’s three year old daughter Nma brought my spirits back up considerably.
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Unquestionably the most politically interesting site in Sulimaniyah is another Saddam era relic: Amna Suraka Prison (Red Intelligence Prison). Nowadays it has been turned into a kind of freedom-struggle museum summing up all the horrors that Kurdish people had to face under the Ba'ath regime, from the cruelest forms of torture, to the Halabja massacre, to the mass exodus of Kurdish people into Iran, and beyond. One of the museum guides spoke French so I was able to get his direct account of what went on there, making it much more poignant than the rough translation I had listened to in Halabja. The bullet-ridden walls and life-sized stone statues depicting various forms of torture only served to magnify the stomach-churning disgust that one feels immediately upon entering such a place.
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The next day the facts learned in the museum were made much more poignant. Hitching out of Sulimaniyah, I got a ride with a man who had been a Peshmerga fighter in the struggle against Saddam. He seemed happy when I said I had witnessed Red Prison, and with the few words of English he could muster he proudly indulged my interest by telling about life during the struggle: days without food or water, losing friends, getting shot at and hit with shrapnel from bombs and grenades; he was even captured for a short time and his scars confirmed the gruesome forms of torture I had witnessed the previous day. It is one thing to read about the horrors of war in a book or see them on TV, but to be in a country that has only recently seen the first rays of peace and to talk with people who still have fresh scars on their bodies and in their minds brings a much deeper level of understanding and sympathy.
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On my way back north towards Turkey I had a plan to head along the semi-famous Hamilton Highway (famous at least among travelers who aim for the ends of the earth). The idea was to check out the undeveloped northeast of the country and do a little camping and soul searching, however the friend I had stayed with in Erbil had left me with an open invitation to come back to his place, and since we had had such a great night of conversation the first time around I decided to postpone my craving for mountaintop silence for one more night and head back to the capital city for another visit. Little did I know I would not leave there for nearly three weeks (overstaying my visa twice), and enter into something that would have a significant effect on both the travel plans for my near future and on my general ideas for the direction I want my life to take.
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I will not go into too much detail here except to hint at an answer to a question I get rather frequently from people interested in my travel story, and that is about relationships while living a nomadic lifestyle. Yes, traveling can be lonely and so for many backpackers indulging in exotic flings around the world is understandably a top priority, but personally relationships (flings included) are something I have avoided. That said, these things are sometimes beyond the control of personal creed, and that is how I ended up in Erbil for so long and left with plans to head back in the near future. The two of us are cut from very different cloth, but it is amazing how great of a time two very different people can have together, and how much personal growth can be made in the process. Sometimes the curve balls life throws are for the best.
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I am back in Turkey now and writing this blog about a month and a half late, so the ‘Georgia and second whirlwind tour around Turkey’ entry should be coming soon. If I haven’t said it enough times before, Turkey really is a great country.
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