Kak Bwar

Having an established office and a work colleague has been a great change for me. I get to say 'bayanit bash' (good morning) to the same people every  day, the guards on the gate know me and now people drop in.

I couldn't have chosen a better work mate than Bwar Nuradin Saber and I am so glad that I pushed to have him employed on the Encyclopedia project.

Bwar hails from the small mountain town of Qaladze and came to Slemani in 1981 to train as a car mechanic at the Sulaymaniyah Technical Institute for Boys, which as it happens is right next door. Schooling was cut short in 1984 when he joined the Peshmerga rebels in the mountains fighting Saddam Hussein. After the Rapareen/Uprising in 1991/1992 he was then caught up in the ugly civil war between KDP and PUK.
Once the truce was signed he then turned to books and over the past 15 years has become the most experienced Kurdish editor in the city. In addition he has established three different libraries for the Kurdish Heritage Institute, the Zheen archive and Sardam Publishing. In his spare time he has written seven books on music, folklore and biographies.

But Bwar's great love is his pioneering work, the first Kurdish bibliography and this month the  the first volume was published taking in Kurdish books and manuscripts in all dialects up to 1914. The second volume, 1914 to 1940 is 95% finished.

This might make him sound a bit booky, but he is funny, clever and everything interests him, not to mention a passion for football/soccer.

Even better he gives me a ride to work every morning!