In February of 2025, my friend Kit Monsen invited Christopher Lange and myself to come on a skiing trip to Iraq. Lange and I were sceptical – typically, we’re the kind of people to go on a skiing trip based solely on the quality of the skiing. And, well… We kind of assumed Iraq wouldn’t have quality skiing. We were however intrigued. How often does the opportunity to travel to Iraq come up? After some quick google searches, we found out that the destination we were travelling to – Choman, in the Kurdistan region in north- eastern Iraq has some spectacular mountains, and gets quite of bit on snow. On slightly less than two weeks notice, we booked our flights.
What followed, was one of the most memorable trips of our lifetimes. Dodging minefields on the way to and from lines, having ridiculously good food every day, being absolutely blown away from the friendliness and hospitality of the locals, sleeping together on blankets the floor, and playing music every night with our hosts Reband and Mahdi, on instruments we’d never even heard of.
And on top of that, we actually scored some pretty damn good skiing, which in my opinion is never a given regardless where yo go – if you only go there for eight days.
This journey largely broke down the preconceived notions we had about a country we’d grown up thinking of as one of the most war torn, dangerous countries in the world, and shone a light of the struggles of the Kurdish people, who, despite achieving a 92.7% majority favouring independence in a 2017 referendum, and largely functioning as an independent state, is not recognized by any nation as a sovereign state.
This journey largely broke down the preconceived notions we had about a country we’d grown up thinking of as one of the most war torn, dangerous countries in the world, and shone a light of the struggles of the Kurdish people, who, despite achieving a 92.7% majority favouring independence in a 2017 referendum, and largely functioning as an independent state, is not recognized by any nation as a sovereign state.
Thank you very much to Omar Chomani at Visit Iraqi Kurdistan who made this possible, to our hosts Reband and Mahdi, and to all the lovely people of Choman who made this trip an absolute delight. Bashi Kaka!
Hope you enjoy the film:):)
