Teacher builds cultural museum from door-to-door finds

KIFRI — Soran Othman, an instructor at the Kifri Institute of Fine Arts, has spent more than a decade building and running a private cultural museum in Kifri district, part of Sulaymaniyah’s Garmian autonomous administration, collecting most of its artifacts through door-to-door visits.

Othman said he has spent 12 years visiting homes in Kifri and other cities across the Kurdistan Region to find old materials that document the history and identity of the area.

“Collecting these items has taken 12 years. I went door to door in Kifri and cities across Kurdistan,” Othman said. “I don’t want these cultural items to disappear, so for 10 years I have been running this museum voluntarily.”

He said the museum is organized into several sections, each focusing on a different aspect of local heritage.

One section, known as the Ministers’ Room, is dedicated to ministers from Kifri, which is locally known as the “city of ministers.” Another section focuses on craftsmen and traditional professions once common in the district.

The museum also includes a room displaying traditional Kurdish clothing and a henna section dedicated to wedding customs and long-standing marriage traditions.

Othman said the museum has become a cultural symbol for Kifri district and that he continues to enrich it with historical pieces he rescues from being lost or forgotten.