By Peter Graff

BAGHDAD, Aug 8 (Reuters) - The two brand new tiger cubs were frolicking in their pool under the date palm trees, playing with red and blue plastic balls and splashing each other.

Gleeful children toted balloons, popcorn and cones of candy floss almost as big as themselves. U.S. soldiers snapped photos while their bomb-sniffer dog peed over by the hyena cage. The lions were snoozing in the shade.

It's hard to imagine a nicer day than Friday, when Hope the tiger cub and her playmate Riley made their debut at the Baghdad zoo.

The two rare Bengal tiger cubs, donated by a conservation society in North Carolina, replace a tiger shot dead by an American soldier after it tried to maul another soldier who got too close to its cage in 2003.

Back then the zoo was a ruin. Hundreds of animals had been stolen or set free by looters during the U.S. invasion and four escaped lions had to be shot.

It remained a grim place for years when sectarian warfare made it impossible for Baghdadis to go out.

But over the past year, as violence in Baghdad has dramatically declined, the zoo has been reborn as a delightful oasis in a city still divided by concrete and razor wire.

Two years ago only 100 people might wander into the zoo in a day. Zoo director Dr Adel Salman Moussa said it now gets 10,000 visitors on a weekend.

Judging by the crowds on Friday morning, before the day started to get too hot, that looked like an understatement.

There's a carousel and a train, spritely antelopes and bored flamingoes, and except for the searches at the gate it could be a zoo anywhere else in the world. That itself is a blessing, said families.

"I like the lions!" shouted Fatima, 5, when asked what she thought of the tigers. When pressed, she said the new tigers were beautiful too.

Her father, Moussa Hamid Ibadi, said he brought Fatima and her four-year-old brother Yusuf twice a month.

"We used to have nothing to do. No fun. This is the only place where we can have fun," he said.

U.S. troops from the 2nd Brigade Combat Team of the 101st Airborne Division had come to attend a ceremony welcoming the tigers, which they had transported to the zoo earlier this week in an armoured convoy from Baghdad airport.

"When they came here they just ran out of their cage and went straight into the water," said Lieutenant Lindsey Travis, 24, from Indiana.

Riley, the male cub, was more enthusiastic at first, she said. "Hope was a bit more apprehensive."

(Editing by Samia Nakhoul)

("My neighbours were having a wedding ... Children from all around came to listen to the music and dance in the street". Read Reuters reporter Aseel Kami's blog about life in Iraq, and have your say at: http://blogs.reuters.com/global/2008/08/07/in-baghdad-life-returns-to-city-of-ghosts/ )

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