A View Of The Palace

  Here are a few shots of the palace that I promised. The most prominent feature is the giant chandelier in the rotunda. BTW, if you saw any pictures from the largest re-enlistment ceremony ever that took place on Independence Day, this is where it happened. You can actually fit more than 1200 people in there, if you aren't too worried about personal space.

 

The chandelier from the third floor balcony.

 

The chandelier and rotunda from the third floor.

 

The rotunda from the ground floor.

 

Looking up at the chandelier.

 

The blue stuff that looks out of place is. The Al Faw Palace is the headquarters of the Multi-National Force. Most of the space has been partitioned of into offices. Only the rotunda is still open. All of the stone your see is marble, but it isn’t really high grade stuff. You can get better for your counter tops, but if you are going to use this much, you would probably go for the cheaper stuff too.

 

Saddam liked to put gold plated odes to himself on the walls like this. I think this says something commemorating the recapture of the city of Al Faw from the Iranians, which was also why this palace was built, although he really didn’t ever need much of a reason to build one.

 

This last picture is the front door.