Although I truly loved my time in the villages of Kurdistan, we heard some pretty hard stories. The afternoon before we spent the night at Kani Spi we visited a cemetery in the Barzan region. During Saddam Hussein's reign 5000-6000 men from the region were taken to the south, tortured, then murdered and put into mass graves. It is my understanding that only in the past couple of years they have brought the bodies back and created the cemetery we visited. My group had a worship session at the cemetery, which was really powerful.
During our time in Kani Spi we learned how they fear attacks from Iran and especially Turkey. Iran and Turkey in the last twenty years have been bombing the border villages on a semi-regular basis. We would learn more about this situation as we visited a mayor in another region on the border of both Turkey and Iran, and visiting a school in Sunneh, near Iran. Kani Spi actually lies within three miles of the Iranian border and we could clearly see three Iranian military bases on the mountains overlooking the bases. Kani Spi also lies near a mine field that was planted during the Iraq-Iran war. Many people in the village have been killed as well as severely injured because of mines. We were warned to not go wandering too far from the road because of the danger of land mines.
The mayor we met with was very excited to have an international delegation come visit and learn about the situation. He had invited the press to come and indeed there were a lot of men with cameras to record our time with the mayor, as well to a camp the local government had set up for internally displaced people. Last summer a lot of villages had been displaced to the camp and had to put up with some bad conditions as winter set in. However, now they have built new trailers that are really nice. This summer there were no bombings, so luckily the new camp has not been used. We can only pray that it will stay this way! But bombings are still a problem, especially from Turkey. A few days before we got there, one village in this region had its water supply bombed. The meeting with the mayor was really informative and our quickly put-together press conference went well. We made the news all over Kurdistan! Here is a link to one of the news stories...it is in Kurdish but still exciting. http://www.kurdistantv.net/default1.aspx?page=articles&c=news&id=94605
That night we stayed at a cultural center in the city of Rania. It was a nice place to stay and got to talk with some of the workers of the center, one who has visited EMU before! The next day we headed to the village of Sunneh, where we visited a school. We first met with the principle and teachers who told us of how the school operated even after severe bombings and shellings from Iran and the the entire village went to an internally displaced people's camp where the conditions were terrible! The story of the village and amazing people and teachers was incredible to hear. The town has been shelled so often although thankfully not this year. We then went to one of the villager's house for a great lunch and to hear his story. We got to go on his roof and see the places where shells had hit. After seeing his field we went back to the school and interacted with the children. This was a highlight of the trip! They were all so cute and we had fun singing songs and being silly with them. I would really encourage everyone to watch CPT's video about the village at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sf5paHI-U_E We then drove back to Rania for a short concert by some students at the cultural center before heading to Sulaimani.
During our time in Kani Spi we learned how they fear attacks from Iran and especially Turkey. Iran and Turkey in the last twenty years have been bombing the border villages on a semi-regular basis. We would learn more about this situation as we visited a mayor in another region on the border of both Turkey and Iran, and visiting a school in Sunneh, near Iran. Kani Spi actually lies within three miles of the Iranian border and we could clearly see three Iranian military bases on the mountains overlooking the bases. Kani Spi also lies near a mine field that was planted during the Iraq-Iran war. Many people in the village have been killed as well as severely injured because of mines. We were warned to not go wandering too far from the road because of the danger of land mines.
The mayor we met with was very excited to have an international delegation come visit and learn about the situation. He had invited the press to come and indeed there were a lot of men with cameras to record our time with the mayor, as well to a camp the local government had set up for internally displaced people. Last summer a lot of villages had been displaced to the camp and had to put up with some bad conditions as winter set in. However, now they have built new trailers that are really nice. This summer there were no bombings, so luckily the new camp has not been used. We can only pray that it will stay this way! But bombings are still a problem, especially from Turkey. A few days before we got there, one village in this region had its water supply bombed. The meeting with the mayor was really informative and our quickly put-together press conference went well. We made the news all over Kurdistan! Here is a link to one of the news stories...it is in Kurdish but still exciting. http://www.kurdistantv.net/default1.aspx?page=articles&c=news&id=94605
That night we stayed at a cultural center in the city of Rania. It was a nice place to stay and got to talk with some of the workers of the center, one who has visited EMU before! The next day we headed to the village of Sunneh, where we visited a school. We first met with the principle and teachers who told us of how the school operated even after severe bombings and shellings from Iran and the the entire village went to an internally displaced people's camp where the conditions were terrible! The story of the village and amazing people and teachers was incredible to hear. The town has been shelled so often although thankfully not this year. We then went to one of the villager's house for a great lunch and to hear his story. We got to go on his roof and see the places where shells had hit. After seeing his field we went back to the school and interacted with the children. This was a highlight of the trip! They were all so cute and we had fun singing songs and being silly with them. I would really encourage everyone to watch CPT's video about the village at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sf5paHI-U_E We then drove back to Rania for a short concert by some students at the cultural center before heading to Sulaimani.
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