Voices of Wartorn Iraq

I swore to myself I would write this entry eventually, collecting all the people and opinions I came across in Iraq and compiling them into one big ugly, mess of a blog post in an attempt to make sense of an even more messed up country. But man, does that sound like a lot of work.

In the meantime, enjoy this badass picture I took of the Kurdish flag atop Arbil's citadel in the middle of a sandstorm, which somehow communicates everything I couldn't put into words anyways.

(For instance, why would they allow the highest-flying and proudest flag in the city to remain torn when they could easily replace it with a new one? Probably because it's Iraq.)

Waking Up In Selime Valley (Cappadoccia)

So this is what it feels like to be born...

All of the above were taken within a window of about an hour within a radius of about a quarter of a square kilometer within Selime Valley in Cappadoccia

 
And some bonus pics, taken in and around the area before and after:

Istanbul, In Pictures

Yup, so I'm still in Istanbul. Our time together, however, is waning. Last night, riding a ferry across the Bosphorus with my friend Shivang, gazing out over the mosques and bridges of the Sultanahmet area, I felt an emotion that seemed unfamiliar to me; for the first time since I arrived in Istanbul two weeks ago, I was bored. What was once a magical, awe-inspiring ride across one of the world's most famous straits, now seems no more spectacular than a bus ride on the Milwaukee Public Transit System.

Okay, maybe a little bit more spectacular.

Anyways, ten minutes later, I booked a train to Cappadocia. And in six and a half hours, I say goodbye to this city for the foreseeable future. I have a seventeen hour train ride to look forward to, so I'll save my thoughts for a long blog post to be written on the train.

In the meantime, here's some pictures taken in and around Topkapi Palace: