London - The British Museum

The faint rumbling of an underground train can be heard every half hour in our flat, and it caused my eyes to open early on Monday morning.  The sun had just come up, and I immediately thought about our main destination for the day, the British Museum.  This behemoth of a building houses an embarrassment of historical riches collected over the centuries by an empire that took pretty much whatever it wanted from all parts of the globe.  A visit there can be intimidating just because there is so much to see, and to miss a one-of-a-kind artifact would be a tragedy.  We devised and employed a strategy that will hopefully benefit the childrens’ education and ease any pangs of regret over surely missing important items.

We went for another cheap, delicious Subway breakfast and ordered sandwiches for lunch at the museum; we’re hoping to avoid paying high prices at attraction cafes by packing our own meals for the day.  Since there is no tube stop within 600 meters of the museum,  we picked a route that would get us fairly close and figured out the transfers involved with the journey.  After forty-five minutes, we were standing on the steps of the British Museum.  Part of our strategy for taking on the museum was allowing for at least two visits with the possibility of a third, and multiple visits are an option for us because they are FREE.  Hourlong eye-opener tours are scheduled throughout the day, and we selected one for the morning and one for the afternoon, and they are FREE.  Another part of our strategy was to scan several top ten museum highlights lists and choose which exhibits interested us the most.  While there are two or three items that make every list like this, the rest of the choices vary widely.  The museum has the collection divided into a logical, easy to understand system based on civilizations.  The sections we chose to visit were the ones that involve the childrens' curriculum, our travel destinations, and the coolness factor.

The British Museum

The crowd was not large as I expected, and as we walked into the first chamber right off the main corridor, there sat in all its important historical splendor, the Rosetta Stone.  I was glad to see that the children were duly impressed without prompting from mom and dad—I still think it’s exciting when an item is lifted from the pages of textbooks and placed in the path of life, and it was fun to see this same reaction from our kids.  Our first eye-opener tour took us around the ancient Greek civilization through the exhibits focused on sculpture and ceramic vases painted with intricate scenes depicting the gods in action.  The subject of most Greek art is the gods, so we got a good dose of mythology as well as the development of artistic technique over the centuries.  

After munching on some cookies, we decided to visit another top-ten exhibit before finding a place for the children to work on school stuff.  The Assyrian empire was our choice, specifically the lion-hunt reliefs dating from 700 BC and taken from a palace in Nineveh.  This huge display, to use an educational term, blew my mind.  In ancient Assyria, lion hunting was the sport of kings, and it was depicted graphically on these reliefs.  The composition is almost child-like—think of a six year old’s drawing of a soccer match, but the technique is masterful and captures what must have been an awe-inspiring event in the lives of the Assyrians.

Assyrian Lion Hunt Reliefs

While trying to locate a place for the children to do some schoolwork, we stumbled upon the family area, a labyrinth of rooms which resembled a repurposed factory or mill with exposed brick and ductwork.  The attendant told us to pick any area we desired, and we chose a room with a long metal table and comfortable benches.  Turns out these spaces are used for school groups and families as a headquarters while they tackle the museum, and there are lockers and other amenities nearby.  We felt like we were getting away with something as we logged on to the free wifi, did some research and schoolwork, and ate our lunch…in a private room….in the British Museum…we’re not worthy!!!

After lunch we took another eye-opener tour focused this time on the origins of ancient Egypt and the period of rule by Nubian kings.  This tour was interesting as well, but I noticed the 1000-meter stare starting to take hold of the children.  This stare is one of the early symptoms of museumitis, and it not treated early, the disease will cause eye rolls, disinterest, and general whiny behavior every time a museum is mentioned in the future—not a good thing this early in our journey.  We did a run-through of the mummy areas and called it a day.  A cold coke at the outdoor cafe was refreshing and gave us the energy to take a quick tube ride down to Buckingham palace where we stood in a throng of people peering into the gates at a big limestone building with two dudes in fuzzy hats walking back and forth…meh.  

We did enjoy walking along the sycamore-lined mall back to the Westminster Abbey area and our tube station for the ride back to our flat.  Because it was 5:30 PM, and everyone in London was going home from work, we had to cram ourselves into the train and just barely fit.  Since I get freaky in confined spaces, I had to close my eyes and go to my happy place until the crowd thinned out a bit.  We stopped by the local grocery store on the walk from the tube stop and purchased some groceries for the next few meals.  Over pizza at the kitchen table, we discussed our day and talked about how we should plan our days a little better so we don’t get burned out too early.  I think we’re still in vacation mode somewhat and feel like we need to rush around and see everything.  Even so, London has us under its spell.