Rose Gilbert

1 week ago | wpln.org | Rose Gilbert

This travelogue is just one part of my dispatches from Erbil. You can read them all on the project’s landing page here. Thursday — Sept. 12, 2024The Qaysari Bazaar is an absolute marvel. Nestled in the heart of old Erbil, this sprawling covered market sits in the shadow of the city’s ancient citadel, which is perhaps the oldest continuously inhabited place on earth. My first visit was wonderful and wonderfully overwhelming. People have been buying and selling here for more than eight hundred years.

2 weeks ago | wpln.org | Rose Gilbert

This travelogue is just one part of my dispatches from Erbil. You can read them all on the project’s landing page here. Wednesday and Thursday — Sept. 11 and 12, 2024My first few days in Erbil were spent exploring my neighborhood, making calls and sorting out the logistics of living in a new place. I secured myself an Iraqi phone number, and I successfully converted my stash of U.S. dollars into dinars.

3 weeks ago | wpln.org | Rose Gilbert

This travelogue is just one part of my dispatches from Erbil. You can read them all on the project’s landing page here. Sunday through Tuesday — Sept. 8-10, 2024Breakfast at the Classy Hotel Ankawa is an excellent place for people watching. It quickly became part of my morning routine. I would wake up, get dressed and then go down to the breakfast buffet to eat my fill of fruit, bread, eggs and cheese.

1 month ago | wpln.org | Rose Gilbert

Nearly two years ago, I came to the leadership at WPLN with a somewhat outrageous idea: to send me, a local general assignment reporter, on a five-week-long reporting trip to Erbil, the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan. Erbil (often called Hawler by Kurdish people) is also Nashville’s newest sister city, a distinction born of our vibrant Kurdish community, which is the largest in the United States.

Feb 4, 2025 | wpln.org | Rose Gilbert

I met Rêdûr, a Kurdish farmer from Turkey, for tea and kebabs at an international market in South Nashville. As we ate, he told me that he and his family fled their village and came to Nashville as asylum seekers about two years ago. Now, they are among thousands facing an uncertain future after President Trump issued an executive order suspending the asylum process. On Monday, the American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit challenging that order.