Blogs from North, Iraq, Middle East

The Sun is raising some time between five and six in the morning. I am opening my tired eyes and the first thing what I notice is the city sign of Tikrit - somewhere here we can find the birth village of the notorious dictator Saddam Husain. I am just passing the area which was occupied by the radical organisation Islamic State in the years 2014 to 2017. I am sitting in the shared taxi with two other people. I have convinced them and the driver that I am a tourist. Would you believe it? A tourist in Iraq? Yes, that is me and I am traveling to Mosul - the city where no tourist eye has been seen for almost 20 years. And so the real adventure begins. Behind the gates of Nineveh I am ... read more

My day started at 4am not much point in going back to sleep when I needed to be at the airport in an hour, so I packed a few more things, took out the garbage and headed down to the cab rank. Twenty-five minutes later I had cleared immigration got my US$ and settled in till departure. The flight departing before mine was going to Bagram in Afghanistan and was full of American servicemen, I was sitting there amongst Africans wondering why they were going to Iraq when it dawned on me they were catching the flight after mine. A little after 7pm I headed through the gate and out to the bus, I positioned myself right near the front door as I had seat 2C and figured I could be seated before the rabble realised ... read more

Once more, I found myself heading towards the unknown, with all manner of scenarios playing through my head. I’d never planned to visit Iraq on this trip, but after talking to one of my Iranian friends and doing a bit of research, it seemed that there were a few cities in Iraqi Kurdistan that would be safe to visit. My curiosity got the better of me, and I set off on a detour through Northern Iraq en route to Turkey. Obviously I didn’t want to put myself in too much danger, and so did a bit of research before leaving. There are a few Kurdish controlled cities in the north of Iraq that are well protected and safe to visit – Sulaimanya, Erbil and Duhok. Two cities that were really not safe to visit were Mosul ... read more

Woke up early to leave for the next city, Erbil, about 180 kms away is the capital of Kurdish Iraq. I have to wake up reception, still sleeping at 9am, paid my bills and he wrote me a place I can stay in Erbil. Walked to the share taxi stand next to the bazaar, I paid 15,000 dinar and waited half an hour to get more people before we set off. 3 hours more or less we drove into dry desolate landscape, brown and arid at this time though there is already a chill in the air as it is now autumn, I noticed a number of checkpoints and we got checked 3 times, most soldiers can't read Roman letters and they thumb through my passport meticulously and asks where I am from as if my ... read more

For more of my photos, or to buy my book, please visit www.nickkembel.com Before you read ahead, forget everything you know about Iraq. The ancient Mesopotamian ruins of Ur and Nineveh, where civilization began and writing and law codes were invented, the site of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, the purported location of the Garden of Eden, and capital city Baghdad are all scratched off my Iraq travel itinerary. I am going to the ‘New Iraq’, a relatively safe and stable, visually stunning, and quickly developing semi-autonomous state in northern Iraq, occupied by some of the friendliest and most hospitable people in the world. My exposure to Iraqi people and culture actually began before I even entered the country. On a recent bus ride from Turkey to Syria, I shared a seat with Jabbar Hassan, ... read more