Bloggen

This blogging thing is tricksy. It takes over your mind a bit. You are constantly looking at the world through a blog shaped lense: how can I write that incident in aclever and interesting way? Little phrases pop into my head. I suppose this is what journalists do, except they then write that stuff down in a moleskine notebook.

Today I have wanted to write about: the Viennese underground train, my thoughts on the first part of Cory Doctorow's new book, interesting cultural misunderstandings I have encountered/ perpetrated (already!), the british language education system, my trip to the Vienna Natural history Museum (and consequently a discussion of German rock names). I'm sort of posting this as a reminder to myself . Plus, it's nice to let people know what they're missing, haha.

I am sticking to the tradition of reporting stuff that has actually happened to me, for now at least. So: Today I went to the Naturhistorisches Museum Wien. It is situated in the rather impressive Museumsquartier of Vienna, which coincidentally is a 15-20 minute journey from my halls, door to (somewhat more impressive) door. I managed to get in as a student by showing my UCL ID, so it cost me a fairly reasonable €3.50 to get in. The place was quiet, probably due to today being sunday, and there was a lot of space to stand in and stare.

Now, the London Natural History Museum is impressive architecturally, but what hit me about this museum was its sheer sense of grandeur. It is a lot more like a stately home, with huge ceiling paintings and imposing doors, and maybe it being older it was maybe more designed as a storehouse of treasures for more private viewing than our own NHM? I speculate, but what was very noticeable as I wandered around is that there is a lot less emphasis on big, themed experiences than the NHM London. The zoology section is basically a stuffed example of a reasonable proportion of large modern bird, fish, reptile mammal and other assorted species organised in accordance with traditional taxonomic order. There are a few little interactive exhibits but by and large you are left to explore the museum for yourself. You learn what you want from it, which I found very enjoyable.

So what did I discover on my first exploration? (for I will surely return). Lots of animals are way bigger than I thought. I think I am so used to seeing animals on TV that I think they are all TV sized. Albatrosses are HUGE, as are elephant seals, bears, whales etc. Kiwi birds look amazingly silly. Pangolins are cute. The german word for sloth is even more to the point than ours, they are called 'Faultiere' (lazy animals). Aardvark in german is 'Erdferkel'. Butterflies are pretty. etc etc.

I also spent a long time in the geology section, quite unsurprisingly. There was a meteorite ROOM with more meteorites than I have seen in the rest of my life combined stored in it. Incredible. The mineral collection was wierdly identically displayed to the London one, but slightly bigger, and accompanied by very detailed landscape paintings on all the walls that I didn't even notice till half way through. They had a lot of salt crystal lumps presented to them by various people in the past, all of them over 1000kg, including a 1680kg actual pillar of salt. Very biblical eh? It was all good revision, I learnt a few translations of rock names from english I hadn't known before. They aren't all as easy as I'd expected, and I'm considering taking a very low level class just for vocab purposes.

In the middle I stopped in the very posh cafe for a Struedel and a tea. It was expensive, but what the hell, i'm on holi... oh. Well, tasty Struedel and proper loose leaf darjeeling tea, so all was not lost. Mild confusion when I forgot to tip the waiter, but I got the hint in the end.

I now appaer to be off back to the Museumsquartier, but am reliably informed this is because there are bars there, not to go to a late night museum opening. Although they do stay open till 9 every thursday.