day 3 - british museum, library, tomb raiding

First, some funny short stories.

My first day here, a guy asked me where I was from. I said Utah and then asked him if he knew where that was. He replied, ya... I'm from Pennsylvania.
*Smack head* Idiot.

Our professor John has been giving us his version of British facts. Here are a couple.
The guards stomp their feet when move because hundreds of years ago the palace had problems with rodents so the guards had to subtly stomp the rats to death to keep the guests from noticing.
Big Ben was originally named Huge Hue but they changed it because it didn't roll off the tongue.

Clark found an umbrella in the trash. And of course he kept it.

I thought I could flip my laptop case in the air and catch it... I didn't. It landed on my little toe. And it hurt.

Now for day 3.

British Museum
Today we woke up and went straight to the British Museum.
Oh.
My.
Heart.
I was in heaven. We were given 3 hours of time to browse through the museum and it was definitely not enough time. The first section I went through was egyptian sculpture and honestly, I was getting emotional over how beautiful it all was (I was getting emotional over a lot in the museum actually). After so many semesters of art history classes, it was amazing being able to see the pieces that I had studied in person. It was incredible and overwhelming. Afterwards, I headed over to the greek and roman sculptures. One section that I had been looking forward to for so long was the Elgin Marbles from the Parthenon. I was literally giddy seeing them in person. They are incredible! Wow.
Wow.
Wow.
Wow.
Greek sculpture is probably one of my favorite parts of art history (Hellenistic period to be exact). I'm so excited to see more at the Louvre.
There was so much at the BM that I can't even begin to write about it all. It would take forever. But know that it was incredible. I didn't even get through the whole thing. Some of us ended up going back for about an hour and I still didn't finish. We're going to go back again :) ha!

British Library
After the BM, we went over to the British Library. There's a gallery section of old treasures from their collection. It was beautiful. It was full of first editions and rare, old books from history. Some of my favorites were the illuminated manuscripts from all sorts of cultures and the book of hours. When I had studied book of hours before, I always loved how intricately painted they were but I never realized how small they were until seeing them in person. The ones we saw were on average about 4x5 inches which made the detail even more impressive. Rick was saying that they would use paint brushes with a single hair to get the detail they were getting. Amazing. Some other great things were original copies of Handel's Messiah, Jane Austen writings, Charlotte Bronte writings, Beatles lyrics written on backs of envelopes and scrap papers, and lots of other treasures. And lastly, my very favorite pieces were some original papyrus documents and Mozart's marriage contract. It talked about how Mozart wrote to his father and told him that he and his bride both cried in their small and personal ceremony. I thought it was the sweetest thing. And the original papyrus documents were fragments from the Gospel of John scrolls and the Book of Psalms. Those were my overall favorite. I couldn't stop staring at them. They just fascinated me.

Other Adventures
After all of the stuff I just wrote about, some of us broke off and we just explored. We found an art show that was exhibiting in a crypt in the bottom of an old eerie church. It was super creepy (the art and the location). And to make things even creepier, Tia, Clark and I snuck through a locked door into the other end of the crypt that was dark and dusty and scary. We pulled out our cell phone flash lights and explored the tunnels and sections that we could get to. Not gonna lie, I was freaked out. But it was awesome all at the same time. I felt like a tomb raider. Without the raiding and without the monsters.

After, we walked around to the St. Pancras Renaissance London Hotel by Kings Cross. What a gorgeous building! We walked around inside and I felt super out of place. Everyone was business casual/semi formal and I was in dirty jeans and wet toms. But it was lovely. And Clark grabbed some candy from the front desk that was delicious. I want to go back just to get more. No joke.

Then we went home exhausted and tired. I fell asleep on the subway. And Clark took pictures. Bleh.

When we got home, we ate and Rick made truffles (gosh I love that kid). And then Clark and I decided to play hot lava in the hallway. I miss rock climbing so I climbed the walls haha! It actually was super fun climbing everything and trying to get down the hall using door frames and window sills. Felt satisfying :)

Now for bed. Tomorrow is the crowned jewels. Yes :)

Entrance to the British Museum. Huge, overwhelming and beautiful.



Egyptian sculpture.


Greek sculpture.


Elgin marbles from the Parthenon.