Goodbye Iraq. Last week has been an intense and mind blowing experience. What was at first intended to be a single day action in Zakho (with an immediate return to Turkey), eventually became a six day mission, delivering toys to hundreds of refugee children in four different camps. This could not have happened without the help of a large amount of people which I hereby would like to thank (this post is in English so the people mentioned here understand what I write): 1. First of all, the numerous Iraqi Kurdish people that helped us along our way. We received so many warm welcomes, free lunches, tea, cigarettes & taxi rides, it was truly heartwarming. 2. Thanks to the anonymous Peshmerga sergeant who helped us crossing the Iraqi border within 30 minutes and guided us to Zakho. 3. Thanks to war journalist Paula Slier who gave us useful advice on the safety situation and was willing to share her valuable Iraqi contacts. 4. Thanks to Kawa Samad, a man from Erbil (who lived in Delft for a couple of years!) who gave away a large amount of gifts that we intended to buy in his store, once he heard that we wanted to give these gifts to refugee kids. 5. Thanks to Colin Ruth and Dali Fred (Nasser) for showing us around Zakho. 6. Thanks to Bashdar, Sindi and Ribaz for helping us in Erbil. 7. Special thanks to my travel buddy Alex Bradbeer who joined me on this mission and who supported me mentally during the frightful moments (and I hope I did the same for him ;-)). Alex, I could not have wished for a better travel companion than you, we are a great team! 8. Finally, thank you all, friends, family, former class mates, flat mates and colleagues, people I did not know before, everyone, thanks for the immense support you gave me, by commenting on my posts and sending me messages and emails. You dont have an idea how much that meant to me. Without that support I probably wouldnt have stayed that long. Also many thanks for sharing and liking the videos and the posts. It helped tremendously in creating awareness for the terrible situation in which the refugees live in Iraq. Winter is coming and I hope that in the event a national fund raising is initiated, you will still recall the photos and stories on my Facebook wall. In this respect it is worth mentioning that Algemeen Dagblad interviewed me and will publish a short article in this Saturdays edition. Hopefully this will create additional awareness about the refugees in North Iraq. Thank you all for joining me on this journey that lasted for almost a week. Altough I feel relieved leaving this country (the situation is too unpredictable and I am still afraid for IS), leaving this country feels also as if I leave the kids. I do not know yet how I will cope with that after this experience. I just dont know. Paul
Posted on: Thu, 16 Oct 2014 06:12:28 +0000
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