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When Wilson<br />
and I first spoke,<br />
we both had a<br />
passion to get<br />
such a project<br />
started so we can<br />
share the rich<br />
Chaldean history<br />
with others.”<br />
– Klint Kesto<br />
Erbil is the capital and most populated city in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. Its population is estimated to be around 1,200,000. Human settlement at Erbil may be<br />
dated back to the 5th millennium BC. At the heart of the city is the ancient Citadel of Erbil. The 7,000-year-old Assyrian citadel played a major role in history, and<br />
it was the target of every empire that subsequently ruled Mesopotamia. It is under a 5-year renovation project to rebuild unsecure walls and to create housing to<br />
simulate life before. The unfortunate thing is that the reconstructions have wiped out any mention or trace of its older history, and ties most of what it is seen to the<br />
Kurdish people. In July 2014, the Citadel of Erbil was inscribed as a World Heritage Site.<br />
Many of the Chaldean Catholics in the Detroit metropolitan area trace their origins to Tel Keppe. According to the estimates of a priest of Tel Keppe’s Sacred<br />
Heart Chaldean Rite Catholic Church, there were 10,000 worshippers in the late 1950s and this decreased to 2,000 around 2004. He said that “Many people<br />
don’t want to go from here; they cry that they have to go… But you almost have to leave these days because your family is probably already in Detroit.”
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