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Jun. 17th, 2009 07:12 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
labellementeuseYesterday, per ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
blythely's recommendation, I hit up the Museum of London (I also thought it might be a good idea because my favourite Wellington museum is the Museum of Wellington City and Sea and I thought it might be vaguely similar - it's not really, but still good.) Everyone, BTW, should have a friend like blythely willing to recommend bags of places from within a similar culture as your own (like, e.g., where to find quality coffee, which is indeed in short supply.)
Unfortunately everything after 1666 (Fire of London for those of you who passed out in History, ought to be ashamed, etc) was closed for renovations or something, sadface! But I got to see everything before that which is, um, a faiiirly long time. About the biggest exhibition there is London Before London, which is... um, prehistoric London, basically before the Romans decided a port city would be super useful. The exhibition has really vast numbers of flint knives/axes/cutting things/hammers, of which I have seen one or two before, but some of them were really nifty (arrowheads and spearheads are favourite.) OTOH, once you've seen 20 flint handaxes you've basically seen them all - I feel this exhibition could have used a few more reconstruction and interactive activities and fewer videos with no sound. Also, I am compulsive about reading text in museums which means it took me a REALLY LONG TIME to get through this one. (I am the only person in the world for whom museums take longer than art galleries - and art galleries do usually take me quite a long time, but I only usually read gallery text if I don't like the art but find it interesting. It can usually turn looking at that piece into a sociological curiosity.)
Then there's Roman, which was my favourite, probably partly because we used to do Roman Britain in high school so I got to feel clever when I already knew stuff. But I think it was probably also the best-designed exhibition of the lot; lots of models and reconstructed shop fronts and dwellings, which typically had replica furniture etc. and genuine Roman Stuff (like, I dunno, combs and pins and necklaces and bowls and pots and mosaic floors and statuettes and glassblowing equipment and carpenter's tools &c&c&c - you know, Stuff!) Plus the Romans always make for really good models because a) the British were so obsessed with them for awhile and b)their houses etc are so niftily designed and c) they were, I guess, relatively consistent and uniform - which, when you think about it, is kind of dumb, but. Anyway, my favourite model was one of the London Forum (where the Romans used to chill, do business, etc. Caecilius used to go to the forum ALL the time (when learning stuff about Romans I always try to imagine Caecilius living or visiting. WWCD?)) Anyway, my point is that you could learn a lot without necessarily reading vast quantities of text, which is good because it was like 4 by this time. There was a pretty nifty display of coins & a great activity where you had to get 4 weights to balance which I OBSESSED over until I got right (you had to play around with the counterweight in the end.) Yeah, Romans, I like them. I guess I'm kind of Victorian like that.
Then there was Mediaeval London, which IIRC was sort of 400/500 CE through Henry VIII. (Apparently the city was more or less ditched when the Romans left it, then someone started re-Londoning outside the Roman wall and that city got sacked by the Danes and the Vikings and then Alfred rebuilt it inside the wall. After he made peace with the Vikings, but I guess he was worried it would slip, which is fair enough (my mother's people are all Norse (from Norway: tall, bluff people, except my mother and grandmother who are both tiny little throwbacks to something) and I can really see how you'd be worried that it wouldn't stick.) This was a pretty decent exhibition, lots about the plague, guilds, model of St Paul's, some interactive stuff including a pretty fun game where you direct someone's life through London (usually you die of plague), some church stuff, dissolution. My issue is that I didn't really enjoy the way the exhibition was set up, which was sort of in clumps that were themed rather than chronological. I personally would rather look at chronological, especially in a thousand-year period across which I presume one oughtn't really make massive generalisations.
And then there were three walls on Elizabeth I and some of the Stuarts, 1558-1666. I have to assume this exhibition was heavily truncated by the works, because as I said it was about three walls and those three walls did not mention Elizabeth I once and she ruled for more time in this period than any of her successors - almost more than any 2 put together (about 45 years. James I, IIRC, managed 20, Charles I 25, Oliver Cromwell and everyone else pre-Restoration another 10-ish years, and then Charles II another 25 but only 6 years before 1666.) So, yeah, this kind of annoyed me, especially because I love Elizabeth I.
And then there was Fire of London, which is always kind of fun. Lots of Samuel Pepys but I can't pretend I really learned anything.
So after that I basically went for a wander, sort of vaguely trying to find some food or something else fun to do. I bumped into a couple of really cute gardens and several placards for something called the London Wall Walk, which apparently runs from the Museum of London to the Tower. I thought about doing it but unfortunately I could only find a few of the placards so I had to abandon that plan - a real shame, since the weather was absolutely beautiful. However. Then I just sort of wandered for a bit, which would have annoyed my mother (she gave me strict instructions to always look like I knew where I was going so's not to be vulnerable to thieves, which is probably great advice, but meh.) I ran into a chocolate shop and spent ten pounds, which is kind of naughty but realistically it's on a par with NZ prices and I'm really *bad* at walking away from chocolate. I have now eaten one of the bars and, hmm, not sure what to think really. I'll have to try some of the others and give a verdict.
Then I came home, went to bed pretty early and woke up at 6 - I seem to be able to catch right on 8 hours sleep a night, which is a fairly good number but is leaving me pretty exhausted at the end of the day.
Today... well, today I'm wide awake and more or less up at 8 am, so I think today is probably a good day to do the BM. I also might try to organise to go out tonight - I think I'm going to try to get to both Wicked and Avenue Q while I'm here, which requires finding places to get cheap tickets.
blythely's recommendation, I hit up the Museum of London (I also thought it might be a good idea because my favourite Wellington museum is the Museum of Wellington City and Sea and I thought it might be vaguely similar - it's not really, but still good.) Everyone, BTW, should have a friend like blythely willing to recommend bags of places from within a similar culture as your own (like, e.g., where to find quality coffee, which is indeed in short supply.)Unfortunately everything after 1666 (Fire of London for those of you who passed out in History, ought to be ashamed, etc) was closed for renovations or something, sadface! But I got to see everything before that which is, um, a faiiirly long time. About the biggest exhibition there is London Before London, which is... um, prehistoric London, basically before the Romans decided a port city would be super useful. The exhibition has really vast numbers of flint knives/axes/cutting things/hammers, of which I have seen one or two before, but some of them were really nifty (arrowheads and spearheads are favourite.) OTOH, once you've seen 20 flint handaxes you've basically seen them all - I feel this exhibition could have used a few more reconstruction and interactive activities and fewer videos with no sound. Also, I am compulsive about reading text in museums which means it took me a REALLY LONG TIME to get through this one. (I am the only person in the world for whom museums take longer than art galleries - and art galleries do usually take me quite a long time, but I only usually read gallery text if I don't like the art but find it interesting. It can usually turn looking at that piece into a sociological curiosity.)
Then there's Roman, which was my favourite, probably partly because we used to do Roman Britain in high school so I got to feel clever when I already knew stuff. But I think it was probably also the best-designed exhibition of the lot; lots of models and reconstructed shop fronts and dwellings, which typically had replica furniture etc. and genuine Roman Stuff (like, I dunno, combs and pins and necklaces and bowls and pots and mosaic floors and statuettes and glassblowing equipment and carpenter's tools &c&c&c - you know, Stuff!) Plus the Romans always make for really good models because a) the British were so obsessed with them for awhile and b)their houses etc are so niftily designed and c) they were, I guess, relatively consistent and uniform - which, when you think about it, is kind of dumb, but. Anyway, my favourite model was one of the London Forum (where the Romans used to chill, do business, etc. Caecilius used to go to the forum ALL the time (when learning stuff about Romans I always try to imagine Caecilius living or visiting. WWCD?)) Anyway, my point is that you could learn a lot without necessarily reading vast quantities of text, which is good because it was like 4 by this time. There was a pretty nifty display of coins & a great activity where you had to get 4 weights to balance which I OBSESSED over until I got right (you had to play around with the counterweight in the end.) Yeah, Romans, I like them. I guess I'm kind of Victorian like that.
Then there was Mediaeval London, which IIRC was sort of 400/500 CE through Henry VIII. (Apparently the city was more or less ditched when the Romans left it, then someone started re-Londoning outside the Roman wall and that city got sacked by the Danes and the Vikings and then Alfred rebuilt it inside the wall. After he made peace with the Vikings, but I guess he was worried it would slip, which is fair enough (my mother's people are all Norse (from Norway: tall, bluff people, except my mother and grandmother who are both tiny little throwbacks to something) and I can really see how you'd be worried that it wouldn't stick.) This was a pretty decent exhibition, lots about the plague, guilds, model of St Paul's, some interactive stuff including a pretty fun game where you direct someone's life through London (usually you die of plague), some church stuff, dissolution. My issue is that I didn't really enjoy the way the exhibition was set up, which was sort of in clumps that were themed rather than chronological. I personally would rather look at chronological, especially in a thousand-year period across which I presume one oughtn't really make massive generalisations.
And then there were three walls on Elizabeth I and some of the Stuarts, 1558-1666. I have to assume this exhibition was heavily truncated by the works, because as I said it was about three walls and those three walls did not mention Elizabeth I once and she ruled for more time in this period than any of her successors - almost more than any 2 put together (about 45 years. James I, IIRC, managed 20, Charles I 25, Oliver Cromwell and everyone else pre-Restoration another 10-ish years, and then Charles II another 25 but only 6 years before 1666.) So, yeah, this kind of annoyed me, especially because I love Elizabeth I.
And then there was Fire of London, which is always kind of fun. Lots of Samuel Pepys but I can't pretend I really learned anything.
So after that I basically went for a wander, sort of vaguely trying to find some food or something else fun to do. I bumped into a couple of really cute gardens and several placards for something called the London Wall Walk, which apparently runs from the Museum of London to the Tower. I thought about doing it but unfortunately I could only find a few of the placards so I had to abandon that plan - a real shame, since the weather was absolutely beautiful. However. Then I just sort of wandered for a bit, which would have annoyed my mother (she gave me strict instructions to always look like I knew where I was going so's not to be vulnerable to thieves, which is probably great advice, but meh.) I ran into a chocolate shop and spent ten pounds, which is kind of naughty but realistically it's on a par with NZ prices and I'm really *bad* at walking away from chocolate. I have now eaten one of the bars and, hmm, not sure what to think really. I'll have to try some of the others and give a verdict.
Then I came home, went to bed pretty early and woke up at 6 - I seem to be able to catch right on 8 hours sleep a night, which is a fairly good number but is leaving me pretty exhausted at the end of the day.
Today... well, today I'm wide awake and more or less up at 8 am, so I think today is probably a good day to do the BM. I also might try to organise to go out tonight - I think I'm going to try to get to both Wicked and Avenue Q while I'm here, which requires finding places to get cheap tickets.
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no subject
Date: 2009-06-17 08:50 am (UTC)Also, as someone who will be in London in about 4 weeks (eep), any hints about the coffee thing would be awesome, as I am caffeine addicted and live in Wellington, and people keep telling me horror stories about coffee in the UK.
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Date: 2009-06-17 06:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-06-22 12:49 pm (UTC)Other than that, any near the main geeky tourist places (British Museum, Tate Modern, Tower of London). There's a good bet I'll be in those places as soon as I can. ;)
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Date: 2009-06-17 06:48 pm (UTC)Sounds like you went to either Thorntons (meh) or Hotel Chocolat (OMNOMNOM). Have a good time at the BM tomorrow - don't forget the LRB cafe!