Faremax: Travel Forums

With all the issues going on in the Middle East right now, how long before a person can safely take a trip to place like Baghdad? A place which, coincidently, has a lot of history, and looks interesting, aside from what all is happening there.

In my opinion, not in the foreseeable future unless you want your head sent home in a bag.  Sorry, but there's a pretty bad war going on there right now, so anyone who thinks it's safe is nuts.

As for other areas of the Middle East, I know people who still visit, but they aren't Americans and aren't travelling on American passports ...which makes a difference.

It was years before it was safe to travel to Saigon or Hanoi, and I suspect it will easily be that long for Baghdad.

As much as I would love to see Baghdad, I think it'll be years before I feel safe enough to travel there. I have a friend who spent some time last year in Afghanistan, and I worried about him the entire time he was gone. I know my family would be terrified if I announced a trip to the Middle East, justified or not.

I'd have to say that it will be a very long time before it's safe to get anywhere near Baghdad.  Certainly not for a number of years, but maybe not even then.  We don't know how all this is going to turn out, after all.

Believe it or not, I have worked in the Middle East, and been back for a holiday.

Things were quieter then, it was the eighties. I worked in the West Bank town of Nablus, teaching Palestinian teenagers, at the time the whole of the West Bank was under Israeli occupation. People were wonderfully friendly, and I had a great time with my students and their families.

At one point however the whole town was put under curfew for four days.

I went back to Nablus for a holiday a few years later, as I had made friends there.

I think things in that area have definitely got worse.

I'd love to visit Iran and Iraq, but would not do so within the foreseeable future.

I went to Turkey last year and had a great time, but a bus was blown up in another part of the country while I was there.

 

There really isn't any place that is entirely safe these days, inside or outside the Middle East. There are some places more safer than others. Dubai is supposed to be reasonably safe, but very expensive. It seems to depend a great deal on where you go in the Middle East, but more and more of it is becoming unfriendly to tourists. Seems the richer areas, areas that benefit from maintaining relations with the West, are a little bit more safe. Still, there are travel warnings for anyone going to the Middle East.

I know someone living in Dubai now and has been for a few years.  She says the same thing, that everything feels very safe.  I think she mentioned one time that she feels safer there than in America. I certainly wouldn't go *that* far, but it tells me that she really likes her new home.

Dubai is certainly on my list of places I'd like to visit ...along with Jordan and a couple of others, but it just doesn't seem like the time to travel on an American passport there.  My Brit friends still go to Jordan on holiday with no problems, but it's one time when that American passport isnt' so good.

Yes - I would like to visit Dubai too. I have passed through it when travelling between Japan and the UK, but never set foot outside the airport.

There was a documentary about life in Dubai on UK TV recently, and it looked like an interesting place to live and work for a while.

 

The fascination for me would be not only seeing the totally different lifestyle, but also noting all the similarities between the cultures.  And of course the food... isn't that one of the best parts of any trip to another part of the world? 

I love Middle Eastern food: hummous, tabbouleh, couscous, the salads, the aubergines, all the lovely fruit ...  The mint tea.

crassus:

With all the issues going on in the Middle East right now, how long before a person can safely take a trip to place like Baghdad? A place which, coincidently, has a lot of history, and looks interesting, aside from what all is happening there.

I think this is not some good time to visit baghdad now .
So you should delay some and plan later to go there as there is no certainity of life out there and war between militia and US troops is in critical stages and conditions are not stable!

Hello crassus,

I am new here but I am not suggest you for Baghdad, If you are serious to visit My advice is Turkey, Turkey is very good place as well as safe ...

Thank You ..



jacabandrew,