Regular readers of this blog will know that I travel a lot in my day job – and sometimes it takes me to places I might not otherwise visit. These places can be unexpected in ways both good and bad.
I’ve just returned from Erbil, in the Kurdish region of Iraq – and for the first time in my many years of travel – I had a moment there where I was genuinely afraid for my safety. It was a disturbing way to end a visit to a country that up until that moment I had found both interesting and friendly.
This was my second visit to Erbil. I really enjoyed my first visit (read about that one here) – but this visit was about to end on an uncomfortable note.
When it was time to leave for the airport – my driver didn’t arrive. That wasn’t entirely unexpected, so I asked the hotel to arrange a car and driver. They did and off I set.
About 100 meters from the first of several airport checkpoints, I happened to glance into the front seat – my driver was holding a hand gun in his lap. A big one. BIG! One of those guns you see Bruce Willis carrying – the sort he loads by slamming a magazine clip into the handgrip. After which he shoots down a helicopter or two. Just in front of the car was a checkpoint with airport security police carrying AK47s (or something along those lines).
It came home forcefully to me at that moment how very different this country was to anywhere I have been before…
The police waved us off the road to a security building – where my driver took out his gun. Let me tell you, it is not nice to sit in a taxi with an angry man waving a gun around less than a meter from your face. The security men took the driver and his gun away and left me sitting there.
With the guns no longer visible, I decided I wasn’t going to be shot… but I was concerned that I might get dragged into the investigation… maybe have my luggage searched.. possibly be detained. I was worried that at the very least I would miss my flight… and at that moment, more than anything else in the world, I wanted to get out of the country.
The driver returned about five minutes later – looking very, very angry. He drove me to the airport terminal building – breaking speed restrictions and almost colliding with another vehicle on the way. I jumped out quickly, grabbed my bag and thrust a handful of money at him. Then I walked away into the terminal itself as smartly as I could.
I felt much safer inside.
I boarded my plane and we took off. I thought my troubles were over…
But a middle aged gentleman in the seat across the aisle from me very quickly downed too much white wine and started singing in a stentorian voice – in a language that may have been Russian or Kurdish.
The flight attendants cut off the flow of wine – but that didn’t stop his singing. Perhaps it was his national anthem – he seemed very proud of it and also seemed to feel it deserved repetition – for three hours!
I was never so pleased to hear the words “we have begun our descent…” in all my life.
Now I am safely home in London and someone asked the question – would I go back. The answer is – yes. I will take extra precautions, but I am not going to let one moment sour my memories of a whole culture.
Beside – I am a writer – how long do you think it is going to be before that taxi driver, or that drunk passenger make an appearance in one of my novels?
