England: Day IV (London)

Thursday, July 14^th:

The British Museum:

            Today was another really cool day in London, and I really enjoyed finally getting to the British Museum. We woke up late, as we have had issues trying to get up in time for breakfast all week. We grabbed a pastry, again at Starbucks as it was just about the only place that didn’t serve Middle-Eastern food (little did we know, we were staying in what Londoners call “Little Arabia”) before heading over to the British Museum. The Museum is the most daunting place I have ever been to, as it is spread out into wings based on location and time period covering over five-thousand years of human history. Without a guide there is no clear direction on where to go or what to see, as exhibits line the walls, floors, ceilings, and just about everywhere. We decided to go to the Egyptian area first and see the world-famous Rosetta Stone. This stone is a slab of rock covered in ancient Egyptian writings. What is so important about it, however, is that it contains the same text written in three different languages, so historians and archeologists were able to use it to translate other writings on different ancient Egyptians items found throughout the Middle East.

The Rosetta Stone:

            Shortly following, after walking around the Egyptian section for a mere twenty minutes, Max and I noticed a massive gathering of people heading for the exits. We did not realize what was going on, thinking maybe it was a massive tour group heading out, until a woman told us that we had to evacuate, calmly of course, because of a bomb scare. Kind of freaky, but on our way out we asked a curator if the museum would be open again today and he replied, “Of course,” which gave us the impression that this happens often. We went across the street for a Guinness at a place called the Museum Pub before walking back over and going back inside when the gates reopened (after only about forty-five minutes). Back inside, I got to explore the Egyptian and Assyrian areas much more in depth. The ancient art absolutely blew me away, and it was just two of the dozen-or-more massive wings the museum has! One could spend a whole day in the museum (for free!) and still not see half of it.

The Assyrian White and Black Obelisks:

            Next I walked over to the Ancient Greece area. The crown jewel of this wing of the museum is the Greek friezes that were rescued from the Parthenon. There is one massive room that represents the shape of the Parthenon in Athens, Greece, and shows the positions in which the friezes used to lay. Most of them are much worn and they are not quite as impressive as the Pergammon Altar friezes in Berlin, however these are much older and still awesome to look at. Some of the Assyrian artworks that I really enjoyed were scenes depicting royal lion hunts, which made me think that these ancient events led to the small number of lions that remain in Africa and the Middle East. It still made for very spectacular and historical art, however. After admiring the Parthenon exhibition I made my way upstairs where I found another Egyptian section, this time filled with hundreds of mummies. It was really cool to see each layer of the mummification process laid out in front of my eyes; it is a strange custom, but a very interesting one at that.

The Parthenon Gallery:

            The next wing of the museum for me was the North American wing. I kind of skipped through a large section of Asia to get here, but I was really curious to see some of the Aztec, Inca, and Mayan artifacts that the British Museum had collected. They had a collection of Aztec carvings, Mayan statues, and various death masks made out of sapphires, topaz, and turquoise stones. I also walked through a short Inuit exhibit before heading back up to the Asian areas. Here I was confronted with literally thousands of idols and statues of Buddha and other gods in the different major Asian religions such as Hinduism, Taoism, Daoism, and more. It was a massive hallway filled with tons of really cool artifacts that really showed me how little I knew about that part of the world. Finally in this wing I walked through a tiny hallway filled with a massive collection of Chinese Jade jewelry—very pretty!

An Aztec Turquoise Mosaic of a Snake:

            The next wing I went to was the Europe wing, filled with a lot of Christian items from the Roman and Byzantine times, as well as artifacts from the medieval era. Lots of items in here were made from ivory elephant tusks, and I particularly liked a hand-crafted ivory chess set from medieval Britain. I then walked through a very short but interesting exhibit on clocks through time on my way down to the African wing. I also passed one of the famous Moai statues from Easter Island on my way. The African wing was very cool because it mixed items from Tribal and ancient Africa with very ultra-modern works of art, such as chairs and trees made from scraps of gun metals from the recent civil wars on the Continent. There was also a really interesting display of tribal swords and celebration masks. The museum was closing pretty soon, so we decided to leave and explore more of the city. I felt like I had merely scratched the surface, but I am sure I will be back again someday to dive into more of what the museum has to offer.

A Metal Tree Created from Gun Scraps in Africa:

            Max had wanted to check out the Tate Modern museum for its last thirty minutes of operation that day, so we walked to that part of the city. From here I noticed that St. Paul’s Cathedral was just across the bridge, so I left him to go check it out. Normally the cathedral is a tourist attraction and visitors must pay an entrance fee, however a service was going on when I went inside, so I got to sit and watch (and admire the church) for free. I was only inside for about twenty minutes before the service ended, but I could see just how beautiful it was and why, along with Westminster Abbey, it has been used in the past for Royal weddings of Britain (notably the wedding between Prince Charles and Princess Diana. I walked back across the ultra-modern Millennium Bridge to meet up with Max, and we walked by Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre on the way to the tube station. We also found a nice little bar called the Sea Horse, where we both ate burgers and enjoyed some beers before going home. We wanted to take it easy tonight because tomorrow we will wake up and catch a train to Stansted airport and fly with our friend Chris Burt to Dubrovnik, Croatia!

St. Paul's Cathedral: