IRAQ: Michael Jansen visits one of the few places where ordinary Iraqis can find a little peace and quiet amid the post-war disruption.
The route to the zoo goes through two checkpoints. At the first a pink-faced young US soldier examined my press card and asked my driver to open the boot and bonnet of his recently imported, beautifully refurbished 1965 Chevrolet Caprice, sporting Texas truck plates.
"Are you from Texas, ma'am?" the soldier asked, a tinge of hope in his drawl. When asked for directions to the zoo, he told us to go down the road to the traffic light, which was not working, turn right and right again.
At the second checkpoint another soldier stopped us, peered at the press pass and told told me that the driver had to take down the curtains in car win- dows. "If he refuses we'll confiscate the car," the trooper warned.
When I argued that no one had said anything about curtains before, he retorted: "It's a new order. Came out last night." The driver produced a screwdriver and took down the curtains. He is very proud of his new car. The blue velvet curtains kept out the sun's sharp rays and the glances of ill-intentioned motorists.
The soldier directed us to a walk-in gate 300 metres down the road, but the guards insisted that we should drive in. Two got into the car and gave instructions. "Watch out for those two guys," the trooper at the checkpoint joked, "they're dangerous."
The journey took us round the spooky futuristic tomb of the unknown soldier, beneath two arches of curved swords held aloft by thick, strong hands and into the vast, dusty park surrounding the zoo.
We drove past a children's playground and up a high humped bridge over a neck of water between two sparkling green manmade lakes. We might have been in Delhi or Cairo, but not war-ravaged Baghdad. This place is normal, secure.
Gone were the blackened shells of the ministries and telephone exchanges, paper litter fluttering and swirling across the streets, pools of sewage and piles of dirt, the prickle of fear caused by the thought that "Ali Baba" might be plotting to rob or kidnap you or that a guerrilla may be preparing an attack on a checkpoint or passing military vehicle, catching your civilian vehicle in crossfire.
The zoo is a peaceful place where a few men and women, families and groups of youths now come to walk in safety. Foreign soldiers who cannot defend the people of Baghdad from criminals manage to protect the animals in the zoo.
I walked through the gate of the zoo and round the wet painted head of Mickey Mouse on the paving bricks and was promptly taken to to meet Ahmad Abdel Razzak, a caretaker doing the rounds with food for the vegetarian residents.
Ahmad and his assistant had a barrow of apples, pears, plums, bananas, grapes, greens and bread and were feeding a pair of dusky brown bears from the north of Iraq. They were lying flat on the floor of their cages, prostrated by the heat. We strolled past cages holding happily wagging stray dogs, some with cute puppies, taken in by the zoo.
There was a pointy-nosed coyote and a slim wolf which is losing its fur because it constantly rubs up against the bars of its cage. The cages were some of the cleanest I have ever seen in a zoo, and the animals had a fresh supply of water and appeared to be well fed and in good health.
After the city fell on April 9th, it became a target for looters. They took everything of value, water pumps, cages, animals and birds and smashed what they could not carry away. "We lost nearly all the animals and all the birds," Ahmad said with deep regret. Rockets broke open the lions' enclosure, freeing three of the big cats, later shot by US troops.
We crossed the grass to another set of cages housing three baboons, one an old lady who adored the spicey bunches of greens Ahmad pushed through the bars.
An elegant cheetah was coiled near the door leading to the run which she shares with her mate. "She was Uday's house pet," said Ahmad. "You can go into the cage and stroke her."
The African porcupines rattled their long white quills in greeting as Ahmad tossed fruit into their cage. Four lions were inside their cages in the lion house, two female teenagers, sleek and elegant, patting one another in play. They came from one of President Saddam Hussein's palaces.
A middle-aged lion couple were dozing. Outside lying in the shade in the moated enclosure were five more from the ousted president's collection. One lioness, Sugar, an elderly pensioner with huge tawny eyes brought into the zoo by car in 1995, has private quarters.
A Bengal tiger who clearly thinks highly of himself stalked back and forth along the bars of his cage to show off his fine coat. The meat-eaters dine off defrosted buffalo meat from Bombay bought in the local market.
Ahmad, who has worked as a keeper for 13 years, made a bee-line for the ostriches. He has a particular attachment to the towering grey female who looked down her beak at us, panting slightly in the heat. She and the two males were found in Uday's garden.
"I took off my belt, looped it around her neck and then ran five kilometers across Baghdad with her," Ahmad remarked. "When we came through the gate, everyone clapped."
He pointed to the enclosure built for elephants. "There has never been an elephant in the Baghdad zoo. I have never seen one. No one has. Only photos.
"But we can't afford an elephant. It eats hundreds of kilos of grass every day."
For him, the problem is between man and man. "The war destroyed everything in Iraq." If the zoo can be rebuilt and function normally, there is hope for the country.