Landed in Iraq

Jun 25th, landed in Iraq after 48 hours of travel.


My first Arabic Diet Pepsi!


Meeting and official lunch with the President of the Barzani Charity Foundation, Musa Ahmad.


Our car and license plate.


Life in the fast lane.


Mosques are a common site.. this one is very beautiful.


Our new neighbor, Bobi the Samoyed.


Mosques everywhere.


A helpful quote.


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One of the Latter-day Saint Charity endeavors we are very proud of is the “water borehole” project bringing water to over 10,000 Iraqi Kurds. After drilling down, pipes need to be lowered into the ground to reach the underground water aquifer. Iraq is one of the countries most  vulnerable to decreased water and food availability.  The country is now 40% desert. Last summer residents in several areas of Erbil protested in the streets. We at Latter-day Saint Charities are partnering with the local Barzani Charity Foundation (for project engineering) and the Public Water Department of the Governorate of Erbil (for drilling equipment) to drill 7 new boreholes and deepen 3 wells that have gone dry. These wells will bring life-saving water to close to 10,000 persons in these areas. Here is a new generator being delivered to run the pump for a borehole well. Here they are lowering pipe into the well.  This well is particularly meaningful to the people of Kurdistan.  It will...
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We were called in early January 2020 to serve a humanitarian mission in the Kurdistan region of Northern Iraq in the Middle East.  Unfortunately, Covid hit and we stood by for over a year but now our departure day is finally near at hand. Soon we will be flying to Erbil, Iraq.  Anciently and geographically, Erbil fell within the Assyrian empire and was very near Ninevah, the city Jonah was called to preach to and finally  arrived in after his days in the belly of the whale when he tried to escape his calling. Erbil, (also spelled Arbīl or Irbīl) is the capital of the  Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq and, according to the Archeological Institute of  America, Erbil is very possibly the oldest continuously inhabited place in the world.  Over the millennia, Erbil has been ruled by such empires as the Sumerians, Assyrians,  Babylonians, Medians, and Achaemenids and later the Sassanid Persians, Greeks, Parthians, Arabs, and Ottoman...
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Here is a photo taken recently, before Covid, of Elder Bednar with our Iraqi Saints from Duhok (a city near the Turkish border) and Sulaymaniyah (a town near the Iranian border). We enjoyed a rare Branch evening out with a few of our members from Duhok. We took a fun little drive with our members up to the Duhok dam in the mountains outside of town. A better view of the Duhok lake created by the dam. Elder Mark Tiyari is the first (of two) missionaries from Iraq. He is serving in Newport Beach, California and will attend BYU upon completion of his mission. Sister Valentina Merzoian is the second missionary from Iraq and is serving in the London, England mission. Mark and Valentina are also cousins! Here are some photos of our apartment in Duhok. It also doubles as church on the Sabbath, all the members come here.  Our living room. The kitchen... The master bedroom. The dining area at sunset. The guest bedroom. A view of the city of Duhok. Another view of Duhok. One of Suddam Hussei...
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