She says "We're not in Kenya anymore boys!"

Well, as is common for us, our blog is well overdue and contains some revelations that may be surprising to those who haven't followed our steps through the world on stalkbook.

After being forcefully encouraged to leave Sudan early last year, we anticipated a relaxed new life in Kenya. We had a year of uncertainty and anxiety that was buffered by settling into a lovely home filled by our beloved 4-legged friends, and a generous, kind and fun housekeeper, Margaret. Our house was a 5min drive from an enormous beautiful forest where we walked Rhodes & Whiskey every second day, and gradually settled into two communities of like-minded folk. Life was good, except for the lack of work and income in Kenya. He had various short contracts in nearby countries whilst I actively pursued employment opportunities in Kenya with no success. The absence of work in Kenya meant a lack of residency, leaving our planned adoption on long-term hold and our household belongings stuck in Sudan, 1 year after we left.

Offered a contract in Erbil, Kurdistan with our good friends at ZOA, I agreed. Following a persistent lack of success of finding work in Kenya, and tired of living apart, He somewhat reluctantly began pursuing options in Erbil also. Here we find ourselves, together at last, working for ZOA and Medair, living in a shared teamhouse. Rhodes and Whiskey remain in our Kenyan home with our beloved Margaret in Kenya, awaiting my return to prepare them for the move in a few weeks. We will likely move into our own place then if we can find somewhere with a garden larger than a double-bed.

Kurdistan is an autonomous region of Northern Iraq, with an approximate population of 5.5 million, governed independently but officially recognised as a federal state of Iraq. Certain areas are still disputed by the Kurdish and Iraq governments, and this is of particular relevance at the moment since the war against a certain OAG* is being fought by both Kurdish and Iraqi armies, and the war is seen as an opportunity by some to determine the disputed areas. Erbil is about 70km from Mosul where the major war offence is currently taking place between the Iraqi and Kurdish armies and the OAG. It's a modern city with quite a bit of wealth in some areas, and terrible poverty in others. There is a huge population of Iraqis who have been displaced here, and Syrian refugees who have fled here, many of whom live 2-4 families per house. 

The weather is extremely cold in winter, including a lovely day of snow recently, and extremely hot in summer, with not much spring or autumn in between, though we are super-excited by the promise of sunshine and 18 degrees today. 

It's an ethnically and religiously diverse region (Arabs, Kurds, Turkmen, Persian, Kakai, Yazidi, Assyrian, Chaldean people etc. of Islamic, Christian, Yazidi, Kakai and various Zoroastrian faiths). Most people speak at least 3 languages. Although my limited Arabic is of significant use here, we are slowly picking up some Kurdish also.

My work is split 2/3 on emergency program response to those being displaced by the conflict in Mosul, 1/3 HR and IT for the office. His work is split between management as the Deputy Country Director, and a program focus on a particular region. It is an unexpected delight that His previous boss from ZOA is currently the interim CD Medair, so they're enjoying working together again. Both on short contracts, we're trusting the big man to make it clear how to stay here and where to continue working to give us some much-desired stability. There is a lot of work available here, and given that the door seems to have closed on Kenya, at least for now, we hope to make Erbil home for the foreseeable future. 

Although Mosul is only 70km in distance from Erbil, it usually takes us 3 hours to drive each way due to frequent military checkpoints. A 6h turnaround trip makes our actual work time precious. I get a lot of knitting done when I'm not driving :). I'm now recognised by many military personnel as the Dutch woman who drives, speaks rubbish Arabic and sometimes knits - it opens a remarkable number of doors (although it is legal and not uncommon for women to drive here, it seems to be quite shocking for those in rural areas, especially when I'm driving male colleagues around).

A home in Qaraqosh, belonging to a family who had been displaced in an earlier war from the south of Iraq, and have now been displaced again. This kind of damage is common in the villages and cities we're working in, outside of Erbil. It is estimated that repairs to the 6,000 homes in wider Qaraqosh, just one of the many damaged towns will cost in excess of USD100,000,000.

A local village leader (Mukhtar) and his wife, posing during our assessment of the emergency needs in their village. The mukhtars are very important for our work as they can identify who has been displaced into the area, who has left and not yet returned, and who stayed throughout the occupation. They our local source of statistics and identification. There was a deliberate act of the OAG in Mosul to remove all the mukhtars, making such identifications and categorisation of populations much more difficult.

SHEEP! Our assessment of a small village near Mosul was put on hold to allow this flock and its shepherd to pass through.