1 week in Free Kurdistan

[tomjez]

Hi everyone

I just spent one week in South Kurdistan as...a tourist! Wonderful experience, Duhok Mossoul Erbil Suleymanye Salahadin Amedi....thanks to kurdish people, to peshmergas, this was the greatest trip ever...

One bad thing I forgot my camera in the Taxi from Amedi to Ibrahim Qalil border...The guy is from Amedi and I have his number, hope I'll get it back!

[Rumtaya]

you mean in north east iraq

[avacicek]

did you see zakho?

[kardox]

you mean in north east iraq

no i think he means south kurdistan, iraq does not exist.

[sorgul]

bravo kardox

[tomjez]

Yeah exactly after a little trip in South east turkey I decided to cross the border and discover north east irak. It was great, the north irakians are a nice people and I even started to learn Northiraki, which is a beautiful language. Now I'm back in South Bosphorus in North West Turkey

Yeah I saw a bit of Zakho, mostly the area around Delal Bridge

For those who can read french here is my blog adress...sorry If I don't write in english, I might translate it though

http://istanbuldakitom.blogspot.com/

[Vladimir]

Northiraki

[Rumtaya]

Hi everyone

I just spent one week in South Kurdistan as...a tourist! Wonderful experience, Duhok Mossoul Erbil Suleymanye Salahadin Amedi....thanks to kurdish people, to peshmergas, this was the greatest trip ever...

One bad thing I forgot my camera in the Taxi from Amedi to Ibrahim Qalil border...The guy is from Amedi and I have his number, hope I'll get it back!

so you have been too in assyria i see how was it to enter my land??

[tomjez]

Well sorry to say that but I think it's better to be assyrian in Kurdistan thant in Irak...I work in a refugee help program in Istanbul, and all the Assyrians I met lived in Bagdad, not in Kurdistan
As far as Assyria is concerned, I saw Midyat in Turkey, and a few christian villages between Midyat and Idil
There were 30 to 35 assyrian families and a church in Amedi, and a few villages on the road between Amedi and Zakho...That what I saw...if you want to create Assyria you wil have a big job convincig 4 millions Kurds that 500 000 assyrians (half in bagdad) own this land...

For Vladimir: yeah I invented the concept of Northiraki...I would say that Kurmanci is western northiraki and Sorani Southernnorthiraki. In turkish i say "Küzeyirakci" and "Kuzeyiraklilar" for "Kurds"...for turkish kurdistan you must say "GüneyDogu" (southeast), so I invented "Güneydogucu" for Kurmanci in Turkey. The problem is that they are starting to understand I'm paying their legs...

[Rumtaya]

this assyrians who live in baghdad used to live beofre in the north iraq in their village after saddam started to destory assyrian villages then a lot of assyrians fleed to the big cities or let me say where forced to live in cities.


by the way i dont mean assyria you know by your self that some parts of iraqi kurdistan are parts of assyria so you have benn in assyria too please accept it.

[tomjez]

Well Yeah I accept it! But when I'm in Ankara the first thing I think is not "waw I'm in Galatia", when I'm in Amasya I don't think "man, this is Lydia!", no more than I thought "welcome to mesopotamia" when I entered Irak.
Assyrian people were slaughetered in during the first world war in the ottoman empire...today the majority of this people live abroad (you too I guess?). No more than turkmens they can pretend create an independant state! I dare say they don't anyway. There is no part of kurdistan that is populated with a majority of assyrians...or maybe you can say that you are in Assyria when you enter a christian village...

Or maybe you can explain what you call assyria?

[Rumtaya]

here you go the dark green one is assyria. got what i mean with you have been also in assyria.

well in iraq there are like 1,2 - 1,5 mio assyrians.

outside it there are like 2,0 - 2,5 mio assyrians.

but why you get angry i just said so you have benn too in assyrian bside in kurdistan i didnt say any bad thing lool.

realx my friend[/quote]

[tomjez]

I new I was in a zone previously part of an Assyrian empire! No problem with that. I just find it difficult to call it "assyria" now, because so much things happened since!
Persian Empire, Alexandre Empire, Seleucide Empire, Roman Empire, Byzantine, Seldjouk, Ak Koyunlu, Ottoman...probably Armenia too at one point! So how to call it...and I didn't get angry! I was really moved to hear the christian chants in Amedi while I was near the church...

[Rumtaya]

lol its assyrian heartland not the assyrian empire i mean.

at less it belongs to assyrian and if we want an assyria it should be the dark green area cause there do live assyrians. and if saddam didnt destoried the village there would have benn allot of assyrians.

The rest of what is in the map was assyrian empire.

dont you think my house should stay my house or is it ok if someone comes take his weaopon hold it to my head and say hello this is my house now.

[tomjez]

Of course not
But I think there is no region in Kurdistan that is "ethnically" assyrian, I mean only populated by assyrians. And I never heard of any demand of independance. There are some assyrian members on the kurdish list that won the election in Kurdistan...And Kurds are not saddam! If the assyrians of Baghdad and of abroad are willing to come back (like kurds of the diaspora do...), they should! Personnaly I think it would be great

Anyway here is the main danger for Kurds: TURKMENELI