In Muslim countries Fridays are holy days. For this reason my sister Lori, who works at the local university, has Friday off every week. Our office is Open Sunday through Thursday during the day. So we try to do something together on Fridays. Up until now that meant sitting around the house talking to each other, walking through the market or up to the dam, or getting together with friends. We never really went anywhere because we did not have our own vehicle.
This past week we decided to take care of that problem and we decided to buy a vehicle. We were not sure what type we wanted to buy. We had to weight affordability with gas consumption and usability in our local terrain and for what we do. After long deliberation and heated debate we decided to get a Nissan Patrol. For those of you who do not know what a Nissan Patrol is, think of a cross between a Toyota Land Cruiser and a Land Rover Discovery but then think much more affordable. These vehicles are every where around here.
Now that we were armed with our Patrol and Friday was upon us we decided to take a trip around the countryside. Lori had been complaining that she had not really seen anything since she was here. We had gone to other countries and had driven around Kurdistan but she had never really left Dohuk. I felt her sorrow so I am now making a point to take her with us whenever we can.
This Friday our path pointed to the North East. We left Dohuk and drove pass the dam winding around tight roads with sheer cliffs on one side and breathtaking rises on the other. As James wove our Patrol through the maze of roads, flowers, rocks, cliffs, small mud brick villages, and flocks of sheep I felt that I was back in the land of the bible. For the most part technology has not touched the small villages. They live today almost as they lived 2000 years ago.
Winding along our path we made our way to Zawita. This is a small town located in-between two mountains. On the upper side you have a military training base and a small city. The main road from Dohuk to Ramadi and Sasink cuts through lower Zawita in a gully. The sides of the road are lined with stores and restaurants. Each place is built into the mountain with terraced platforms dug in above them. The platforms are planted with grass and tables and chairs are placed there. Vines are interwoven in strategically placed poles to allow for a shade covering during most of the day. Due to the location the sun only beats down on lower Zawita during the middle of the day. This leaves Zawita cool all day long. It is a great place to escape the constant bombardment of the sun.
Traveling past Zawita you see the evidence of the major road project in Kurdistan. There is an American consulting company here so you can see they are leveling the road and adding aggregate to ensure the road is strengthened. This may be one of the only roads in Kurdistan that is being built this way. I am sure more will follow. The roads here are not as windy as they were before Zawita. This area has rolling hills with villages dotting the landscape. Everywhere you go you can see the distinct pale blue buildings that are evidence of UNISEF building another village, pump house, school, Sheppard shack, or basic houses. The houses around it are not painted at all, so the owners of the UNISEF homes never find a reason to change the color. It is easy to see how much the world is helping here when you just drive around the countryside.
One of the good things about traveling North of Dohuk is that you do not have to stop all the time for military or police checkpoints. For the most part there are no terrorists up here. The only real concern is for the PKK and they are smart enough not to attack people inside of Northern Iraq. This is a type of safe haven for them, as long as they do not hurt anyone here. Some times the Turkish army will travel into this are to follow some PKK troops and hunt them down, but for the most part this area has remained peaceful since 2003.
We continued on this road until we came to the city of Sarsink. Sarsink is located in a valley in which Saddam Hussein harassed the Kurdish people constantly. Many of the Peshmerga forces that fought with Saddam were from this area. It was known as a breeding ground for fighters. For this reason Saddam built a palace at the top of a Mountain overlooking the valley and constantly sent planes in to bomb any buildings he saw, and sent helicopters to hunt for and kill anyone that was seen walking in the valley. For this reason Sarsink never really grew, but also for this reason they bred some of the toughest and most belligerent Peshmerga for fighting Saddam. We drove through Sarsink and started up the mountain to Saddam’s Palace. This area had become a popular tourist place. Families would go up into the mountain to picnic. On our way up we realized how dangerous of an idea this was as we saw minefield signs all along the side of the road. We saw places that were clearly marked as mine fields as we saw children playing in them with the parents not far behind. James and I shook our heads in disbelief and continued up the mountain.
The road going up the mountain is a two land road but you would not want to test that theory with two trucks. The road serpentines its way up the mountain with the outer edge of the road being help in place by retaining walls. The retaining walls are built from cement and then square cut blocks of stone are pressed into the cement to make a uniform pattern. Due to theft of disrepair many of the stones are missing from their settings to the walls now look pockmarked and worn. As you near the top the road rides on the ridge of some of the mountains allowing you to look down for thousands of feet on both sides of the road. The last little bit of the journey is almost straight up and the trucks straight 6 engine was starving for oxygen in the light air and snarguled the last half a kilometer.
Once we got to the guard-shack before the palace we pulled up and talked to the guard. Once he saw we were Americans he pulled the cross beam up and let us drive up to the Palace. When we arrived we realized that this was not common fare as we had the only car up there. It is amazing the things they let us Americans do that they will not let others do. We even got to walk around on the restricted levels and the guards smiled and waved at us. When locals tried to go up there the guard’s smiles vanished and they spoke harshly to them until the locals went back down the stairs. I felt bad for this so we went down as well.
After the first gulf war the people of Sarsink went to the palace and stripped it of much of its wealth. The PKK then took the palace and kept it as a command center and shelter. During a raid the Turkish military followed the PKK to the village and called in an air assault from helicopters and fast movers. The palace was bombed and riddles with .50 cal machine-gun fire. The surviving PKK soldiers tried to escape by jumping off the cliff and the back side of the palace and most of them fell to their death. This fight is very evident in the Palace now. Brick was used to make the inner wall of the palace and stucco was spread over the outside. This brick provides for great insulation but makes a deadly combination when the place us under attack. You see brick breaks off in shards. When the bombs hit the walls they released a spray of deadly brick shards into the air slicing through anything or anyone in their path. You can still see some of the shard embedded in the walls opposite of the blast marks.
We left the palace and started to drive down the mountain. We stopped at one point overlooking a ravine and had some juice and chips. It was not a proper picnic but we had not purchased the items that are required to do so yet. We know the items we need to buy and we will take care of that this week so the next Friday we want to go out for a picnic we can, and will.
The trip back was along the same route we took getting there. As James likes to drive we left him in charge of that, and I let my sister sit in the front seat the entire time as this gave her a better change to see what was going on around her. I had no problem in the backseat as the windows in a Patrol are very large and I could clearly see what was going on around me. I think some combination of pure air, physical exercise, the gentle jostle of the road, and it just being the weekend worked its magic on me and I was soon drifting off to sleep in the back seat. I woke up as we were coming into Dohuk. We drove through the market as our interpreter was with us, and we were going to drop him off at home. Our interpreters name is Sharzad Mosa but we call him Alex. He worked for the US Military in Mosul for about four months but now he is living in Dohuk with his parents. This kid is awesome and we use him a lot. Sharzad is a great help and we could not do most of the things we do here if it was not for him.
Getting back home we all were a little tired so we just sat around the office drinking water and talking. All in all it was a great little day. Lori was very thankful she go to see a little more of Kurdistan. I wonder where we are going to go next?
This past week we decided to take care of that problem and we decided to buy a vehicle. We were not sure what type we wanted to buy. We had to weight affordability with gas consumption and usability in our local terrain and for what we do. After long deliberation and heated debate we decided to get a Nissan Patrol. For those of you who do not know what a Nissan Patrol is, think of a cross between a Toyota Land Cruiser and a Land Rover Discovery but then think much more affordable. These vehicles are every where around here.
Now that we were armed with our Patrol and Friday was upon us we decided to take a trip around the countryside. Lori had been complaining that she had not really seen anything since she was here. We had gone to other countries and had driven around Kurdistan but she had never really left Dohuk. I felt her sorrow so I am now making a point to take her with us whenever we can.
This Friday our path pointed to the North East. We left Dohuk and drove pass the dam winding around tight roads with sheer cliffs on one side and breathtaking rises on the other. As James wove our Patrol through the maze of roads, flowers, rocks, cliffs, small mud brick villages, and flocks of sheep I felt that I was back in the land of the bible. For the most part technology has not touched the small villages. They live today almost as they lived 2000 years ago.
Winding along our path we made our way to Zawita. This is a small town located in-between two mountains. On the upper side you have a military training base and a small city. The main road from Dohuk to Ramadi and Sasink cuts through lower Zawita in a gully. The sides of the road are lined with stores and restaurants. Each place is built into the mountain with terraced platforms dug in above them. The platforms are planted with grass and tables and chairs are placed there. Vines are interwoven in strategically placed poles to allow for a shade covering during most of the day. Due to the location the sun only beats down on lower Zawita during the middle of the day. This leaves Zawita cool all day long. It is a great place to escape the constant bombardment of the sun.
Traveling past Zawita you see the evidence of the major road project in Kurdistan. There is an American consulting company here so you can see they are leveling the road and adding aggregate to ensure the road is strengthened. This may be one of the only roads in Kurdistan that is being built this way. I am sure more will follow. The roads here are not as windy as they were before Zawita. This area has rolling hills with villages dotting the landscape. Everywhere you go you can see the distinct pale blue buildings that are evidence of UNISEF building another village, pump house, school, Sheppard shack, or basic houses. The houses around it are not painted at all, so the owners of the UNISEF homes never find a reason to change the color. It is easy to see how much the world is helping here when you just drive around the countryside.
One of the good things about traveling North of Dohuk is that you do not have to stop all the time for military or police checkpoints. For the most part there are no terrorists up here. The only real concern is for the PKK and they are smart enough not to attack people inside of Northern Iraq. This is a type of safe haven for them, as long as they do not hurt anyone here. Some times the Turkish army will travel into this are to follow some PKK troops and hunt them down, but for the most part this area has remained peaceful since 2003.
We continued on this road until we came to the city of Sarsink. Sarsink is located in a valley in which Saddam Hussein harassed the Kurdish people constantly. Many of the Peshmerga forces that fought with Saddam were from this area. It was known as a breeding ground for fighters. For this reason Saddam built a palace at the top of a Mountain overlooking the valley and constantly sent planes in to bomb any buildings he saw, and sent helicopters to hunt for and kill anyone that was seen walking in the valley. For this reason Sarsink never really grew, but also for this reason they bred some of the toughest and most belligerent Peshmerga for fighting Saddam. We drove through Sarsink and started up the mountain to Saddam’s Palace. This area had become a popular tourist place. Families would go up into the mountain to picnic. On our way up we realized how dangerous of an idea this was as we saw minefield signs all along the side of the road. We saw places that were clearly marked as mine fields as we saw children playing in them with the parents not far behind. James and I shook our heads in disbelief and continued up the mountain.
The road going up the mountain is a two land road but you would not want to test that theory with two trucks. The road serpentines its way up the mountain with the outer edge of the road being help in place by retaining walls. The retaining walls are built from cement and then square cut blocks of stone are pressed into the cement to make a uniform pattern. Due to theft of disrepair many of the stones are missing from their settings to the walls now look pockmarked and worn. As you near the top the road rides on the ridge of some of the mountains allowing you to look down for thousands of feet on both sides of the road. The last little bit of the journey is almost straight up and the trucks straight 6 engine was starving for oxygen in the light air and snarguled the last half a kilometer.
Once we got to the guard-shack before the palace we pulled up and talked to the guard. Once he saw we were Americans he pulled the cross beam up and let us drive up to the Palace. When we arrived we realized that this was not common fare as we had the only car up there. It is amazing the things they let us Americans do that they will not let others do. We even got to walk around on the restricted levels and the guards smiled and waved at us. When locals tried to go up there the guard’s smiles vanished and they spoke harshly to them until the locals went back down the stairs. I felt bad for this so we went down as well.
After the first gulf war the people of Sarsink went to the palace and stripped it of much of its wealth. The PKK then took the palace and kept it as a command center and shelter. During a raid the Turkish military followed the PKK to the village and called in an air assault from helicopters and fast movers. The palace was bombed and riddles with .50 cal machine-gun fire. The surviving PKK soldiers tried to escape by jumping off the cliff and the back side of the palace and most of them fell to their death. This fight is very evident in the Palace now. Brick was used to make the inner wall of the palace and stucco was spread over the outside. This brick provides for great insulation but makes a deadly combination when the place us under attack. You see brick breaks off in shards. When the bombs hit the walls they released a spray of deadly brick shards into the air slicing through anything or anyone in their path. You can still see some of the shard embedded in the walls opposite of the blast marks.
We left the palace and started to drive down the mountain. We stopped at one point overlooking a ravine and had some juice and chips. It was not a proper picnic but we had not purchased the items that are required to do so yet. We know the items we need to buy and we will take care of that this week so the next Friday we want to go out for a picnic we can, and will.
The trip back was along the same route we took getting there. As James likes to drive we left him in charge of that, and I let my sister sit in the front seat the entire time as this gave her a better change to see what was going on around her. I had no problem in the backseat as the windows in a Patrol are very large and I could clearly see what was going on around me. I think some combination of pure air, physical exercise, the gentle jostle of the road, and it just being the weekend worked its magic on me and I was soon drifting off to sleep in the back seat. I woke up as we were coming into Dohuk. We drove through the market as our interpreter was with us, and we were going to drop him off at home. Our interpreters name is Sharzad Mosa but we call him Alex. He worked for the US Military in Mosul for about four months but now he is living in Dohuk with his parents. This kid is awesome and we use him a lot. Sharzad is a great help and we could not do most of the things we do here if it was not for him.
Getting back home we all were a little tired so we just sat around the office drinking water and talking. All in all it was a great little day. Lori was very thankful she go to see a little more of Kurdistan. I wonder where we are going to go next?
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