Photo By Sgt. Spencer Case | Coalition servicembers at Tallil tour the reconstructed house of Terah, the father of...... read more read more
LOGISTICAL SUPPORT AREA ADDER, Iraq - "I feel like Indiana Jones."
Spc. Daniel Medina, a mechanic for the 148th Forward Support Battalion, described the mood perfectly with a Hollywood reference as he and about 25 other multinational servicemembers descended a staircase that led to the gaping brick entrance of a 4,000-year-old royal tomb.
The tomb is one of the attractions that bring Coalition members to the ancient Sumerian city of Ur, located on Logistical Support Area Adder.
Staff Sgt. Arthur Washington, who helps the religious activities center and the 48th Brigade Combat Team organize transportation to the site, said that the tours serve the dual purpose of educating troops about the country they are in and providing them with a form of recreation to ease the monotony of the deployment.
"We're in a spot that's historical, it's biblical and it's a good time to see things you normally wouldn't see," said Washington, who is the installation chaplain NCOIC for LSA Adder.
Though the exact dates of the tours tend to fluctuate, there are several guided tours each week, Washington said. The size of the group also varies, but Washington says he has seen as many as 50 arrive at once to see the city.
On Jan. 28, a group of about 25 troops arrived for the tour at 3 p.m. The troops spent about 15 minutes at Ur's largest attraction, a lofty pyramidal stucture known as the Ziggurat of Ur, climbing its grand staircase to the top level and snapping pictures of the sprawling military base beneath them.
After they explored the ziggurat, the group gathered around Dhaif Muhsen, a tawny-skinned, middle-aged Iraqi, who conducts tours through the rest of the site.
Over the course of the next two hours, the troops walked into the tombs of ancient Sumerian kings, observed cuneiform writing on the walls of ruins, and navigated the maze-like pathways on the roof of the house of Terah, the father of the biblical figure Abraham. All the while, Muhsen spoke enthusiastically about each structure in accented but discernible English, giving precise dates and metric measurements in rapid succession.
As Muhsen explained, Ur was originally built in the year 2113 B.C., and was a very important city of the Sumerian empire, an empire credited for the invention of writing, the wheel, and law. Followers of all three monotheistic religions, Christianity, Islam and Judaism, also believe Ur to be the birthplace of the prophet Abraham.
It was finally abandoned around 500 B.C. as the Euphrates River gradually receded to its present position in the middle of modern-day Namaniyah.
"This is a great experience to witness," said Medina, who visited the site for the first time on Jan. 28. "It took ages of hard work to build something like this. It's truly amazing."
Muhsen, whose grandfather helped with the original British excavation of the site in the 1920s, said he has been giving tours of the site since 1995, but that interest has increased exponentially since the beginning of Operation Iraqi Freedom.
Muhsen said he is encouraged by the fact that Coalition members have taken such an interest in the site without pillaging it. He added that he hopes that the tours he gives will encourage large- scale tourism in the future.
"This is in Iraq, but this is for all the world," said Muhsen.
| Date Taken: | 01.28.2006 |
| Date Posted: | 02.10.2006 08:13 |
| Story ID: | 5361 |
| Location: | TALLIL, IQ |
| Web Views: | 99 |
| Downloads: | 16 |
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