Sulaymaniyah

Tea, poetry, and cold mountain air

Kurdistan Region · BEST SEASON: March - June & September - November

Natural rock arch framing turquoise water cascading through a mossy canyon with bare trees on slopes. — SULAYMANIYAH · JAN 2026 · 18 TRAVELERS

Sulaymaniyah — Slemani to everyone who lives there — has been Kurdistan's argumentative, book-reading city since the Baban princes founded it in 1784. It sits in a bowl of mountains, Goizha and Azmar rising straight from the last streets, and the evenings cool fast even in summer; pack a layer. Mornings belong to Mawlawi Street: porters with handcarts, honey sellers down from Hawraman, the clack of backgammon from Chaykhana Shaab, where photographs of Kurdish poets have watched over the tables since 1950. Amna Suraka, Saddam's former security headquarters, is kept bullet-scarred as a museum; it is a hard hour, and it explains why this city feels the way it does. Evenings are easy — espresso and live music around Salim Street, men and women sharing tables, nobody checking what you wear. From here we day-trip east to the waterfall at Ahmed Awa and north to the blue sweep of Dukan Lake, and come back for one more glass of tea.

FROM OUR TRIP JOURNAL

On our April trip we stopped at Chaykhana Shaab for one quick tea, and a retired schoolteacher at the next table beat three of our group at backgammon, then recited a poem by Nali while our guide Rebin translated it line by line. We left for Dukan Lake an hour behind schedule, and nobody in the van minded at all.

WHAT WE SHOW YOU

Amna Suraka (The Red Museum)

heritage

Saddam's security headquarters, kept bullet-scarred. Inside, a corridor of 182,000 mirror shards — one per Anfal victim — lit by 4,500 bulbs for the destroyed villages.

Chaykhana Shaab

culture

The People's Teahouse, pouring since 1950. Portraits of Kurdish poets and politicians line the walls; there is backgammon, sweet dark tea, and deliberately no wifi.

Mawlawi Street & the Grand Bazaar

food

Suly-style kebab at noon with charred tomatoes and raw onion, Hawraman honey sold by the kilo, mountain cheese, porters threading handcarts through the crowd.

Ahmed Awa Waterfall

nature

A cold cascade in the Hawraman mountains near the Iranian border. Go on a weekday morning; on Fridays it belongs to picnicking Kurdish families.

Dukan Lake

nature

Kurdistan's largest lake, dammed on the Lesser Zab in the 1950s — turquoise water against bare hills, grilled-fish restaurants on the shore, swimming in summer.

Salim Street cafe scene

modern

Slemani after dark: espresso bars, bookshop-cafes, galleries and live music, students arguing over politics late into the night — the city's university-town side.

PROOF, NOT PROMISES