There is a small bus station close to the Old Wall so just walked there and got a 8.30am bus ticket to Cizre (18TL).

Passed by Mardin (A city on the hill) on the way to Cizre.

Met a British lady, Emily on the bus who is traveling to Northern Iraq as well. Arrived at Cizre around 12.30pm and took a shared taxi to cross the border at Silopi, Turkey to Zakho, Iraq. There were 3 passengers in the taxi and we paid the driver 30 TL. From Cizre to Silopi, it’s around 40 minutes drive.

We were able to get a 10 days Iraqi visa on arrival at the border

and spent around an hour at the border before crossing over to Zakho which is not too bad.

At Zakho, the iraqi side we took another taxi to Dohuk (USD 30 for the car, 15 USD each). Dohuk is the 3rd largest city in Northern Iraq and we arrived in Dohuk after an hour, around 4pm (The clock is an hour faster in Dohuk).
Got a shared room at Hotel Parleman (10,000 Iraqi dinar each, 1USD ~1180 Iraqi dinar).
Walked around the bazaar.

In Dohuk, there were only electricity and water for 5 hours a day. They used generator most of the time.

Ate at Mandal restaurant, recommended in the Lonely Planet guide. There were many dishes and cost 8000 dinar each(USD7).

Iraqi Dinar

Almost no one speak English in Dohuk. Learned a little about the politics in Northern Iraq from Emily and the owner of the Hotel (he speak a mixture of Arabic, Kurdish and few words of English).

Didn’t feel well later at night and this is the second time I got food poisoning, not sure where did I get it.

Here is a little summary about the history of Iraq. Iraq was home to the earliest known civilization, the Sumerian civilization and Iraq has been home to continuous successive civilizations since the 6000 BC. Throughout its long history, Iraq has been the center of the Akkadian, Assyrian, Babylonian, Hellenistic, Parthian, Sassanid and Abbasid empires, and part of the Achaemenid, Roman, Rashidun, Umayyad, Mongol, Ottoman and British empires. Iraq gained independence from the Ottoman empire in 1919 and from the United Kingdom in 1932.

Became a republic in 1958 and after a few military coup, the Baath party gained power and Saddam Hussein rose to assume the presidency from 1979 until 2003 after which he was toppled by the US led invasion.
Saddam is a Sunni Muslim. After the Islamic Revolution in Iran, Iran became a Shiite Muslim theocratic state. Since there are more Shiites in Iraq, Saddam was afraid that the majority of the population will rebel against him. That’s one reason Saddam declared war on Iran.
The war ended in stalemate in 1988, largely due to American and Western support for Iraq. This was part of the US policy of “dual containment” of Iraq and Iran. Between half a million and 1.5 million people from both sides died in the 1980–88 war.

Saddam also attacked Iraqi Kurds and Shiites and commited many war crimes against them. After the Iran-Iraq war, the economy in Iraq was in shambles so Saddam attacked Kuwait to steal its resources. Iraq refused to withdraw from Kuwait against the demand of UN security council and was attacked by the US led international coalition.

On March 23rd, 2003. Bush claimed that Iraq was developing weapon of mass destruction and Iraq was attacked again. Government authority was transferred to an Iraqi Interim Government in June 2004, and a permanent government was elected in October 2005.

Today, cities such as Mosul and Kirkuk are dangerous because al-Qaeda took advantage of the insurgency to entrench itself in the country together with an Arab-Sunni led insurgency and violence. From what I heard is that Bin Laden paid some Arabs to create terror. Also soldiers from the Baath party during Saddam times lost everything so causing terror is their only way out.

Northern Iraq which is the region of Kurdistan is relatively safe. Kurdistan is sort of an autonomous region in Iraq, with its own government and military, the Peshmerga.

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