Not the Iraq You See on the Nightly News!

When many of you hear “Iraq” you think of what you see on the news. Desert, bombings, violence, people that hate Americans. While sadly that may be true in some parts of Iraq, mainly in the southern parts, here in Kurdistan it is the complete opposite!

Last weekend I had the opportunity to visit Hastyar, a student at the Life Center, in his village, Tesluja, just a few minutes outside of Suli. We left in the morning and went to a hillside that had a beautiful 360 degree view of the mountains. This was the day after it snowed and is a little higher in elevation then Suli so there was still snow all over!

The hillside we visited that once used to be a village, till Saddam destroyed it back in the early 90's. Now it is a popular picnic site in the Spring,

The view of the mountains and 1 of 3 cement factories in the area. The smaller building on the right is the mental hospital.

On the left is Mount Pryamagrew and to the far right is Azmir Mountain.

After taking a few photos, we headed to Hastyar’s high school. That day he had Kurdish, English, Math, History and Arabic. His school was a fairly large building, with a football field (soccer to you American’s reading this), but due to the snow from the day before, it was flooded and muddy. They also had a basketball court, but without a hoop, basket or backboard. So now the students use the basketball as a football (soccerball). Like Kirsten’s class that I mentioned in a previous blog, a majority of the students were girls, but as you can see from the photo below, I wasn’t the only guy this time. Again, all classes were in the same room and a different teacher came in for each subject. All the students were, like most people I’ve meet here, very warm and welcoming. I think just everyone of them invited me over for dinner!

His English class was more advanced then Kirsten’s was, when the teacher asked the students questions their reply was (in Kurdish), ask the visitor! She said I already knew the answers, so I didn’t have to answer and she wanted them to try first. Near the end of the class she asked me talk about what our classes were like back in America. I don’t know how many of the students understood me, but she said it was good for them to hear a native speaker and that it helped them. During history class, I really wished I could understand what they were talking about. Hastyar told me that they were talking about Halabga, a village south of Suli where within minutes Saddam killed thousands of Kurds; young and old, men and women. Someday we will visit this village that has a museum that tells the story about what happened. When we go there I will for sure blog about it and tell you more.

Some of Hastyesar's classmates. It's hard to see, but there is a small space heater that they were all sitting around to keep warm. Click on the photo to see more.

His last class was his Arabic class, but we played from hooky because he wanted to show me his home and his village. I told him that it would be just fine to stay for Arabic, but he insisted. He showed me his doves and chickens that live above their house and we drove around the streets for a little while. Click the above photo or here to see more photos. Next we picked up Goran, Hastyar’s classmate at school and fellow student at the Life Center. Then we headed up to Zewe,  a small village on Mount Pryamagrew. It was a beautiful sunny day, with very few clouds in the sky, perfect for photography!!  A visit to the mountains was just what I needed! I couldn’t have asked for more; good friends to share the joy of being in the mountains and magic hour (the time of day when the sun is low and lights everything with a warm gold glow)!! Some parts of the mountains reminded me of the North Cascades, while other parts looked like areas of Eastern Washington! Made me feel like I was home! Of course, as anyone who has traveled with me would guess, we pulled over many times driving up the mountain to take photos. At one spot that we pulled over in, we took of photo of Goran and I. As I stepped back, my foot went down in about a foot of snow! At another spot, there were some men that had build a small fire on the side of the road to stay warm and cook some kabob. Nothing like a winter picnic!! They offered us some and told me how much they love America. When I told them how good the kabob was, they offered to give us more to take with us, I told them thank you very much, but we couldn’t take the last of their dinner! Click on the photos below to see more images from Zewe.

Hastyar, myslef and Goran with Mount Pryamagrew behind us.

Mount Pryamagrew. Click on photo to see more images.

When we got back we had to switch cars and drive about 30 minutes north to Dukan to pick up some students that are taking classes there in what could be compared to a technical college in America. A friend of Hastyar usually does this, but that day he couldn’t so Hastyar did it for him. We picked up 7 students and then drove them to another village about an hour from Dukan called Bazian, near another cement factory that one of my former students works at. (There is a link to the photos in the Photo Gallery Page) Even though they didn’t speak English and I don’t speak Kurdish, we still had a good time, one of the students was playing different Kurdish and some American music for me from his cell phone. I almost died of laughter when he scrolled down to one song with a Kurdish title, hit play and I heard “My Humps”!! When we got back to Hastyar’s home his sister had made us a delicious Kurdish meal of rice, lamb, two kinds of soup, and shifta (a small meat patty with spices) After dinner, it was getting late so Hastyar asked if I wanted to spend the night. Here it’s  normal for people to ask you to stay the night if you visit. So his mother set up an extra mat for me to sleep on and after breakfast the next morning we went back to Suli, just in time for me to serve tea for the women’s morning English class.

Maybe now when you hear Iraq; you’ll also think of the Iraq I know,  beautiful snow capped mountains, peaceful villages, and people that love Americans.

Advertisement

~ by DJ Bradley on February 15, 2010.