Kurdistan has gum trees! They are everywhere, the side of the road, grave yards, gardens. When I was leaving Australia a friends asked me what I will miss and I said gum trees and lantana. Well guess what they also have lantana here but in this country gumtrees are the pest not lantana.
I wonder it is this small things that draws me to this land because today as we were driving to Halabja I felt it. This place is beautiful and every time I see someone farming the land here my heart becomes so full of love. Today I was told that Halabja is the second most fertile region in the world! They grow everything and today I noticed how this country is made up of farmers. There are lots of military and the most amazing intellectuals and human rights advocates but everyone has a story of land. When I arrived Rosemary told me she had heard a Kurdish poet who said, "the mountains are our only friends". The government here is treacherous, religions and neighbors can turn on each other but the mountains....
Today I ate the sweetest figs of my life from the second most fertile region in the world and I heard the stories of the horrible things that had been done to the people of that place. We talked about whether the best wine of the world could be made in Kurdistan because of it's amazing grapes and were shown the mass graves of the people of Halabja who died in Saddam's chemical weapons attack. Aras told me about the world famous walnuts they grow in their mountains and how he had to bury 24 members of his family. He showed me photos of snowy fields and green forests and explained how 5000 people died because of the attack that destroyed his town because they happened to be there on the 16 March 1988. They have rebuilt, Saddam is dead, they have the certificate to prove it, the rope that hung chemical Ali and the sandal of the man that hit Saddam's statue when he was overthrown. Aras got to see Saddam for four minutes when he was held by the Americans and tell him that he would die for the terrible things he had done. The land in Halabja looks healed but the scars on the hearts of the survivors can't be washed away by the deaths of the perpetrators or the payments made by one of the 530 companies responsible for making the weapons.
So i sit there listening to stories of how 68% of the victims were women and children and looking at pictures of bodies strewn along roads and water holes and think of forgiveness. Of reading again and again stories about how the only road to healing is forgiveness and hate is a weapon that burns your soul. But how do you forgive when you need to carry this story so that the world knows? When you know tragedy is still happening and line your walls of images of fleeing refugees and children drowning in the Mediterranean as these people do?
I don't know but I still feel the sweet taste of figs on my lips, the breath of a living land in my heart and the laughter of new friends in my ears and I know that there is hope.
I wonder it is this small things that draws me to this land because today as we were driving to Halabja I felt it. This place is beautiful and every time I see someone farming the land here my heart becomes so full of love. Today I was told that Halabja is the second most fertile region in the world! They grow everything and today I noticed how this country is made up of farmers. There are lots of military and the most amazing intellectuals and human rights advocates but everyone has a story of land. When I arrived Rosemary told me she had heard a Kurdish poet who said, "the mountains are our only friends". The government here is treacherous, religions and neighbors can turn on each other but the mountains....
Today I ate the sweetest figs of my life from the second most fertile region in the world and I heard the stories of the horrible things that had been done to the people of that place. We talked about whether the best wine of the world could be made in Kurdistan because of it's amazing grapes and were shown the mass graves of the people of Halabja who died in Saddam's chemical weapons attack. Aras told me about the world famous walnuts they grow in their mountains and how he had to bury 24 members of his family. He showed me photos of snowy fields and green forests and explained how 5000 people died because of the attack that destroyed his town because they happened to be there on the 16 March 1988. They have rebuilt, Saddam is dead, they have the certificate to prove it, the rope that hung chemical Ali and the sandal of the man that hit Saddam's statue when he was overthrown. Aras got to see Saddam for four minutes when he was held by the Americans and tell him that he would die for the terrible things he had done. The land in Halabja looks healed but the scars on the hearts of the survivors can't be washed away by the deaths of the perpetrators or the payments made by one of the 530 companies responsible for making the weapons.
So i sit there listening to stories of how 68% of the victims were women and children and looking at pictures of bodies strewn along roads and water holes and think of forgiveness. Of reading again and again stories about how the only road to healing is forgiveness and hate is a weapon that burns your soul. But how do you forgive when you need to carry this story so that the world knows? When you know tragedy is still happening and line your walls of images of fleeing refugees and children drowning in the Mediterranean as these people do?
I don't know but I still feel the sweet taste of figs on my lips, the breath of a living land in my heart and the laughter of new friends in my ears and I know that there is hope.