Intravenous Jolt of History
I have been awake for thirty nine hours. Ten of those hours were spent tromping around Philly, and a grand total of FOURTEEN were wasted on a bus. I may have managed to snatch three or four hours of sleep on the ride down, but cramming my 5'9" self into a bus seat does not count as restful.
But! The exhibit was worth the sleep deprivation. Granted, Tut's mummy and his famous burial mask Never Ever Leave Egypt, and none of the really huge treasures were there, but what you do get to see is exceptionally stunning. It's mostly jewelry, statues and some artifacts that they believe may actually have been used in day-to-day life (as opposed to replicas created for the afterlife), but the small size just makes the detail that much more impressive. Nobody beats the Egyptians when it comes to working with inlay. Absolutely nobody. I was floored time and again by how well preserved the furniture and wooden artifacts were. They look better than most American antiques you see, and those are less than two hundred years old!
I'm so glad I got to see it with this class. Travelling as a pack of nerds was so much fun. At one point four or five of us were clustered around Tut's crook and flail, gawking. I'm sure we were all thinking Holy Shit, that's his fucking CROOK AND FLAIL. And then we all looked up, grinned at each other like idiots, simultaneously realized how ridiculously overwhelmed we were, and burst out laughing. I loved the shared sense of awe and wonder that I get with these courses, something that I've always found distinctly lacking in my Major. I don't know, it's food for thought, anyway. I still don't know what I'd like to do about a Master's degree, and I can apply English pretty much any way I'd like...
I just wish I could have taken pictures! Every room had at least two attendants making sure we didn't do just that. I may not have anything of Tut's, but we went to U Penn's museum earlier and I snapped plenty of shots of other cool stuff. Perhaps to be uploaded later.
It feels like I've been gone all weekend rather than just one night. I'm totally wiped and mostly incoherent, but I'm staring down the gullet of a nearly-finished paper, wondering how it would turn out if I wrapped it up on so little sleep.
But! The exhibit was worth the sleep deprivation. Granted, Tut's mummy and his famous burial mask Never Ever Leave Egypt, and none of the really huge treasures were there, but what you do get to see is exceptionally stunning. It's mostly jewelry, statues and some artifacts that they believe may actually have been used in day-to-day life (as opposed to replicas created for the afterlife), but the small size just makes the detail that much more impressive. Nobody beats the Egyptians when it comes to working with inlay. Absolutely nobody. I was floored time and again by how well preserved the furniture and wooden artifacts were. They look better than most American antiques you see, and those are less than two hundred years old!
I'm so glad I got to see it with this class. Travelling as a pack of nerds was so much fun. At one point four or five of us were clustered around Tut's crook and flail, gawking. I'm sure we were all thinking Holy Shit, that's his fucking CROOK AND FLAIL. And then we all looked up, grinned at each other like idiots, simultaneously realized how ridiculously overwhelmed we were, and burst out laughing. I loved the shared sense of awe and wonder that I get with these courses, something that I've always found distinctly lacking in my Major. I don't know, it's food for thought, anyway. I still don't know what I'd like to do about a Master's degree, and I can apply English pretty much any way I'd like...
I just wish I could have taken pictures! Every room had at least two attendants making sure we didn't do just that. I may not have anything of Tut's, but we went to U Penn's museum earlier and I snapped plenty of shots of other cool stuff. Perhaps to be uploaded later.
It feels like I've been gone all weekend rather than just one night. I'm totally wiped and mostly incoherent, but I'm staring down the gullet of a nearly-finished paper, wondering how it would turn out if I wrapped it up on so little sleep.