Overheard

It's been about 2 and a half weeks since I started working in Venice. I don't know how much I'm allowed to tell you about what I actually do at the museum because of privacy agreements and whatnot. But I can tell you I work with the visitors every single day. Here are some of my favorite quotes from these visitors thus far:

• Is this museum only Modern Art?
• Where are the bathrooms? (This is the most frequent question I get in 4 different languages, and it always is asked the minute they step inside without having seen any of the museum yet.)
• Did Peggy paint all of these?
• Bagnnnnno. Where is the baaaaagnnno? (bagno = toilet. Unfortunately, I don't think I have to tell you he was American.)
• Frenchfrenchfrenchfrenchfrenchfrenchfrenchfrenchfrench. Merci.
• This is my favorite, I love Kandinsky! (In a room filled entirely with Pollock)

And my personal favorite:

• Did you paint this? (Asking me if I was Carla Accardi, who was born in 1924, and the label for the painting he was referring to clearly stated it was done in 1960.)

Istanbul was Constantinople!

We arrived in Turkey late Wednesday night and after purchasing Visas at the airport we just caught a cab to our hostel. There was only a slight hiccup getting there when the car in front of us ran into a pole. (No one was hurt). But eventually we got to this hippie looking place with cats wandering free, candles burning, posters, and peace signs everywhere. In the morning I didn't remember where I was when I was awoken at 5:30 in the morning by a call to prayer. I said some prayers of my own and it eventually stopped and I got to go back to sleep.

A couple hours later we hopped on a trolley and headed straight to the Hippodrome, which is the historic center of the city. Our first stop was the Hagia Sofia, a basilica/mosque/museum which has an extensive history. It was built by the Greeks in 360, thus the name "Heavenly Wisdom." Then it was re-built by the Emperor Justinian in the 5th Century. It served as Constantinople's church until the city was conquered by the Ottoman Turks who turned it into a mosque in 1453 and then in 1931 it was secularized and turned into a museum.

You can still see some of the mosaics put up by the Christians.

And the Sultan's loge, from when it belonged to the Muslims.

The image of the Madonna and Child over the nave area.

You can see the images of seraphs in the corners and the Arabic signs below.

And all the light fixtures hang incredibly low.

It's an incredible place and I think everyone should go here at least once in their life. Oh, and I almost forgot, there's a wishing knot on the bottom of one of the columns and you put your thumb in it. Supposedly if you turn your hand all the way around and make a wish it will come true. Here's hoping.

Redeeming a Visit

Wednesday was our last day in London and we had to pack in as much tourism as we could. We started out at the British Museum, which is easily one of the best museums in the world, ignoring the fact that they looted a lot of their treasures from their colonies, of course. I had a decidedly better visit than the last time I was there in 2005.(I was with the Girl Scouts who had just landed after a 7 hour flight without sleep. The six of us dredged through the galleries like a pack of zombies, and finally fell asleep out front around one of the huge columns while my Mom went to the gift store. We woke up to some Asian tourists taking our picture. Not in the top ten experiences of my life.) So anyway, this visit was fantastic compared to that.

There's a head from Easter island (Someday I'll get there)

What museum would be complete without statues from Antiquity?

And the obvious favorite, the Rosetta Stone! I don't remember it being so small.

Mummies!

Golden Goat.

And whatever the hell this is.

V&A (or my new favorite place)

Everyone knows the story of Victoria and Albert. True love. Nine Children. Ruling an empire. And most importantly, starting a museum. This place has it all: paintings, statues (such as the one above Madonna and Child, Veit Stoss, ca. 1505), decorative arts, clothes, a gazing pond, and costumes. And all for only a suggested donation of £3. I'd like to get lost in this museum (in fact it happened once or twice, but I eventually turned the map right side up and we were golden after that).





They even had a costume made for a character named Clara! (Clearly the treasure of the entire museum.)

Museo Vaticano, Finalmente!

Today I met up with Vivi and her family and we ventured on over to the Vatican Museum. This has been a long time coming because this place has been destination number one since I got here and it has taken me 3 months to finally accomplish a visit. So we waited in line for about 20 minutes and headed up the stairs to the beginning of the place. We saw Christian tombs, Egyptian mummies, saint relics, frescoes, maps, Raphael Rooms, Bernini's plaster models, and the Sistine Chapel. In essence I was in heaven. And since Vivi's son was in his stroller the whole time we got to take short cuts around the stairs and all the people. The only hiccup was convincing the guards that I was part of the family so they would let me in the short cuts as well. I tried to switch places with Damian so that I was the one in the stroller, but he didn't go for this plan.