Homage to Kurdistan

Yesterday evening I ended up in a kurdish restaurant.
My starters dish had very peculiar stuff, which I always associate with that region: humus, that souce made out of chickpeas, spinaches, beans, this roll filled with cheese that I often saw called cigarillo, taziki, that white sour sauce made with yogurt, and these wine leaves which wrap around rice. Then all the main courses, poultry, lamb or just vegetables, mainly grilled, contained of course a lot of bulgur in tomato sauce, which is nothing but coarsely grinded wheat.

   

I immediately remembered that it is quite a "peculiar" moment for the kurdish people and I started perceiving my being there almost like an homage to them. These people tortured by history, a strong national identity without a state, split and repressed between the turkish nationalism and the Saddam Hussein sunni leadership, they lately found a kind of role in the post-war Iraq, just to share the impossibility to stabilize the country, and now with the breakthrough of the Isis they seem to be again the chosen victim. They can very little against the rich and well-armed terrorist group, without a direct support of western countries; ok war is a complex issue, but now either it will be a disaster or hundreds of thousand of refugees will flood, hopefully to Turkey, but they have their issues with kurdish militians as well, needing a huge humanitarian help. And finally at least Turkey will have to intervene to defend the border...
Well I don't feel like commenting much more, my knowledge of Middle East is too weak. I just leave you with a couple of meaningful pictures.

U.S. air strike in Kobane, kurdish town in Siria under attack by Isis.  Copyright Reuters

Kurdish anti-Isis manifestation in Düsseldorf, 11.10.2014.  Copyright Reuters