19. Museums

Here's a confession: some museums bore me. As someone studying Archaeology and arts in general, I often feel I should appreciate museums' collections more. The more collections I see, however, the more I learn to appreaciate lay-out and presentation - and size. Gigantic collections such as The National Archaeological Museum at Athens, not to mention the National Museum at Istanbul, which is in parts well laid-out but in others chaotic, just tend to depress me. There are so many exceptional pieces that you quickly become numb.

Too many hours walked around on sore feet and trying to bring myself to care have taught me two lessons: 1) Be selective and 2) Look out for small collections. I am slowly learning to fight my OCD tendencies and to only look at things that catch my attention. It's okay to walk past that tenth cabinet with flint knives or even part of "Agamemnon's treasure" at Athens. (Yes, I said it. I did it.)

I've also learned that even the most gorgeous object loses a lot of its interest value if it has no tag explaining what it is. Museums aren't merely deposits for artefacts; they are places where people can find information, explanations, and learn about history or culture with the support of the "physical" material. I have to take my hat off for the Brits here: while I think a lot of British sights are obnoxiously expensive and as such elitist, I also think they have done a marvellous job bringing history to life. They do a lot of museum tours with well-informed guides. Better yet, many museums have guides in period dress playing out parts - usually with a hearty dose of humour thrown in. If you don't feel like paying £15 for a cleric to show you around for an hour at Westminster Abbey, some smaller churches and museums have volunteers who will show you around for free. (If you're ever at St Giles in Edinburgh, ask for John. He literally knows every stone of the church and is a jolly old chap in addition.)

Here are some museums, sights, or random places that I've enjoyed. They're mostly limited to the British Isles and the Mediterranean as those are places I've had the chance to travel around in.

British Isles:

Stirling Castle. I personally enjoyed it much more than I did Edinburgh castle. It's less crowded, to begin with! I think there's a remarkable integrity to what archaeologists and historians have done at the castle: the dining hall has been completely reconstructed and has people in period-dress talking about the castle. Other buildings are mostly left as they were (with some restoration carried out to protect the structures as well as the tourists), but there are extremely helpful plaques explaining what the rooms would have looked like. The plaques give an insight into archaeological thinking: instead of holes in the wall, you learn to look for timber holes indicating an upper storey, etc. There is a reconstructed kitchen complete with the smell of meat cooking and medieval recipes. I think you can see medieval handicrafts at the castle as well.

The Prison Museum, Stirling. I went into this museum thinking, "Could they come up with a more boring museum" and came out gushing. The museum itself is far from spectacular, but there is an absolutely brilliant guided tour with an actor. The man played at least five different roles in under an hour, from a rabid prison guard to prisoners to a Victorian idealist.

Dunvegan Castle, Caisteal Dhùn Bheagan, Isle of Skye, An t-Eilean Sgitheanach. This castle is a curiosities cabinet of sorts, but a very charming one. It's filled with the treasures and heirlooms of the MacLeod clan. The premises are beautiful and there's a lovely garden with extravagant structures built for the ladies of the clan. It's a great place to go and feel a romantic longing for the Gaelic past, Bonnie Prince Charlie, and make the guardians' day by saying "Madainn mhath".

Museum of the Isles, Armadale, Isle Of Skye. It's ironic to go to Scotland to say God bless America, but it's nice that the offspring of people looking for a better life in the New World generously sponsor this nice Centre. As a result, the museum on Clan Donald and the Western Isles in general is extremely well laid out with informative plaques, modern design, and multimedia.

Kilmainham Jail, Dublin. More prisons! I don't recommend going here if mentioning IRA makes you see red. Once more, what makes the museum special are the tour guides who are sentimental, nationalistic, but also really, really good. Seeing the encouraging inscriptions prisoners with no hope of escaping the punishment of the British government as well as seeing where prisoners were shot to death felt unexpectedly bad - maybe it's the Ausschwitz syndrome. (I've had friends tell of unexpectedly bursting into tears at Ausschwitz because there's such an aura of sadness still hanging over the area.) Bonus points for the guide introducing himself bilingually.

The Tower, London. Such a cliché, not to mention ridiculously expensive, but the beefeaters are absolutely hilarious. Old sarcastic British soldiers talking about medieval gore, how could it be anything less than brilliant!

The British Museum. It's so big it's daunting, but they sure managed to hoard some nice stuff during those wild years of "colonialist archaeology". I mostly focused on the Greek and Roman collections, because three visits to the museum wasn't nearly enough to see everything, and there are some pretty unique objects. One of my favourites was this little thing next to the Portland Vase (and no, it's not just because there's buggery going on):

There was a shortage of staff and many of the rooms I was interested in were closed when I was in London. I went to the information desk to ask if the rooms would be open some other day, but instead I was told to wait for a staff member to come let me in. I was let in, the staff member chattered about the artefacts, the museum, and life, and let me take my time looking. Amazing customer service.

Greece:

Delphi. I always tell people to skip Athens and go see Delphi. The site itself is very poorly laid out, but the location and surroundings are breath-taking. The sanctuary looks down into a deep valley which is green even when the rest of Greece is sun-burnt desert land (this might have something to do with the fountain of the Muses running in the area). Go early in the morning or in the evening to avoid tourist masses and heatstroke. The museum is a flagship museum (along with the up-coming new Acropolis Museum in Athens). Viva la France for sponsoring it! It's shiny, modern, and airy with plenty of room. Best of all, there's a limited amount of artefacts on display which allows you to really look at the exhibitions. I would say it's the best museum I've seen in Greece (if not anywhere), and I've seen quite a few.

Aegina. I'm still uncertain whether it's due to chance or pedantic German archaeologist who restored the site, but the temple of Aphaia forms a perfect section of a Doric temple. It's a great place to study temple architecture and building technique in general. There are plaques explaining eg how the massive stones were heaved up, and you can see the corresponding holes or grooves still in the stones:

I hope the picture's big enough to see the U-shaped grooves on the stones high up - ropes ran along the grooves and a pulley system was used. Similarly the museum has building fragments and scuplture which were buried (I think) and as a result have remarkably well-preserved remains of paint. All in all, the place is like a crash course in ancient architecture.

Kerameikos, Athens. Kerameikos was the area for potterers near the gates of Athens in the ancient times, and there was also a cemetery lining the road leading into the city. Nowadays the cemetery is a lovely haven amidst the dust, honking cars and sweat that is Athens. There is a museum with a smallish exhibition and a lot of information on changes in burials. The cemetery itself has some signs as well, but I mostly found myself enjoying just strolling around.

Piraeus Museum (near Athens). It's tucked away a bit, but I'm glad I took the time to hunt the museum down. The finds from shipwrecks around the area are taken here, and some of the finest Classical bronzes we have are in the Piraeus Museum. Once more, the collection is small enough to actually appreciate, but there are many important pieces of ancient art. There's also a stone with measurements based on the human body chiselled into it that I thought was sweet.

Syntagma metro station, Athens. Yes, it's a metro station, but the coolest one around. When the metro was built and extended, there was much worry in the international community of archaeologist over the preservation of the archaeology of the area. Much was destroyed, no doubt, but the Greeks did pull of a miracle in excavating and documenting huge areas. Some of the finds are now displayed at various metro stations. One entire wall at Syntagma is a section of the stratigraphy of the area.

Italy:

Herculaneum. I'm recommending Herculaneum because it's less hassle and on a more controllable scale than Pompeii but with many of the same benefits. I know there are many wonders to be seen at Pompeii, but personally all I remember is nearly passing out of dehydration. My recollections of Herculaneum are quite similar, but at least my feet didn't hurt quite as much.

Villa Borghese, Rome. The villa is located in a big lush park, which in itself makes it worth a visit. I know very little of Renaissance sculpture and find it difficult to analyse it apart from "That's pretty", but the pieces by Bernini at Villa Borghese somehow stuck in my head and made me think. Daphne and Apollo is so vivid and intricate in real life that I detest looking at photos of it because they never do it justice. Truth made me feel vaguely disgusted, but it's interesting he would choose to present Truth as a sprawling, cackling woman.

Finland:

Vapriikki, Tampere. This is me promoting my home town. As well as fairly boring modern history exhibitions, the museum has temporary exhibitions with themes ranging from Imperial Russian art to Indonesian tribes. The museum is housed in old factory buildings, which are worth a visit in themselves.

The National Museum, Helsinki. This is the real reason I made this post - to share pictures of my friend and I being total dorks. The regular displays at the museum are informative, but I particularly enjoyed the thematic exhibition for this year on the Swedish-Russian war of 1808-1809. Upstairs there's a playroom for children with all sorts of activities that proved too difficult for us, such as harnessing a horse, figuring out past leaders of the country, and setting up a table with cutlery from different periods. Better yet, there's a room called "information centre" where adults are allowed to play around. For this exhibition, there were uniforms modelled after those of the Russian and Swedish soldiers circe 1808 that you could try on.

Suggestions for great museums are more than welcome. (I'm going to Florence in March, so any gems in Tuscany are especially wanted. I've already seen the most clichéd places in Florence, Accademia, Uffizi, etc.)