Chi Chi The Giant Panda

My grandparents in Wembley often took us to museums when we were children.

My most vivid memories of these trips are the Natural History Museum, the RAF museum in Hendon, travelling on Underground trains with wooden floors,

and the long walk back to their house at the end of an exhausting day

along the 'longest road in the world', Carlton Avenue East.

And what I remember most clearly about the Natural History Museum

was seeing Chi Chi the giant panda.

Going to see Chi Chi was an 'event'.
The diorama intrigued me.
Is that what China really looked like?

And why is she sitting eating? Is that what pandas do all day?

And why that yellow! That yellow has stayed with me.

I went back to the Natural History Museum recently with my kids and there was Chi Chi.
The same diorama, the same yellow.

I was excited, I could say to my kids,

"I saw that when I was a girl, that same Panda, that same yellow.

It looked just like that when I was your age."

Looking at the lettering used for 'Chi Chi', very seventies looking, I feel I am probably right.
Nothing has changed.

 Chi Chi was caught in China in 1957. After being kept in a number of different Zoos, she came to London Zoo in 1958 where she lived until 1972 when she died of old age.

They tried, unsuccessfully, to get her to mate and have babies.

So her legacy is not one of children, grandchildren
and helping to increase the panda population.

It is as a natural history specimen, to be wondered and marvelled at

by generations of visitors to the Natural History Museum.

But this visit was with a knowledgeable uncle

who used to work at the Natural History Museum.

None of that talk of yellow walls and seventies lettering.

We got animal facts.

"Pandas are unusual, not like other bears, because they have an opposable thumb, like us, for stripping the bamboo so they can eat it. Other bears haven't got opposable thumbs.

They're weird because they eat vegetation all the time, not what other bears eat,

they're omnivores. They have a very restricted diet.

I think you're asking for trouble if you're a panda with a restricted diet of fresh bamboo

and not much else!"

Don't hold me responsible for the factual accuracy of the above statement,

we were just having a chat.

If I did see Chi Chi alive in London Zoo, I was too young to remember it.

I will ask my parents.

Opening times and details here http://www.nhm.ac.uk/index.html

The Lost Tomb of Sir George Gellatly

Museums tell stories and display things.

Some stories and things are real, they can be authenticated, and others, well...

Introducing the Lost Tomb of Sir George Gellatly, found in the garden of the Nunhead and District Municipal Museum and Art Gallery.

A brilliant pop-up museum created for the Telegraph Hill Festival 2014

Sir George Gellatly's mausoleum was discovered at the end of this garden in Nunhead, SE London.

This way...

In we go...

His tomb.

Before you enter, those of a nervous disposition please take note...

His final resting place.

Here is Sir George in better health.

Like all good mausoleums,

there should be...

 ...live music.

and "marble carving in the Italianate style, depicting George's wild and extravagant life."

Objects from round the world, collected by Sir George fill display cabinets.

 I even got to see behind the scenes, where curators had been hard at work.

 Like all good museums,

an engaging series of lectures had been planned,

a museum cafe opened,

and a shopping opportunity provided,

selling unique branded products.

We bought a DIY "Commemorative Display Bone Kit".

The Nunhead and District Museum and Art Gallery began in 2009,

open for two days every year during the Telegraph Hill Festival.

From previous years,

here are the Catacombs discovered under the floorboards in 2009,

opened to the public in 2010.

"They are 100 feet deep,

the site hasn't been fully excavated yet,

as we haven't had permission from the local authority."

I believe that last year the bodies weren't in such an advanced state of deterioration and looked remarkably like Barbies.

The inspiration behind this unique museum I am told, was a visit, years ago, to a municipal museum in Keswick, Cumbria, where, "objects from different collections were all mixed up, everything displayed together, wooden display cabinets, difficult to read handwritten signs, but all about to be revamped, modernised to meet with health and safety requirements and be brought up to date".

So this is a homage to museums in times gone by, yet it is incredibly innovative, energetic and forward thinking.

Such a fabulous municipal museum and art gallery.

I'll leave the last word to the curators...

"Would you like a tomb in your garden?

Let the museum know and you can have this one."

Open 5th and 6th April 2014. part of Telegraph Hill Festival open studios.

You have probably missed it for this year, but put it in your diary for next year, what will the future bring?

Or even better, start collecting and create your own  museum. I'll visit.

If you know of any other pop-up museums, please leave a comment.

On top of cabinet five...

I'd never noticed them before...
...not until a man asked if he could possibly take a look at the boomerangs on top of cabinet five.

There were two. Very unassuming.

Carved strips of wood.

But you would be amazed at how heavy they are. I didn't expect the weight, nor the chat...

"Must be hard-wood?" 

He began, "...the craftsmanship, all hand-carved, no machines, look at the uneven surface.

"Perfect aerodynamics, the curve of the top surface, greater than the one underneath, this is what produces the lift so it rises into the air when thrown." 

 "An aerofoil, designed so when you throw it, it rises into the air,
spins around and comes back to you."

"All that technology, and remember this was before the age of aeroplanes!"

Tools created with such a sophisticated knowledge of aerodynamics, designed to be thrown, to rise in the air, spin about their axis, follow a curved path and to return to their owner.

Inspiring!

I really must spend more time talking to retired carpenters.

I'll never look at these boomerangs in the same way again.

You can hold (perhaps not throw) them for yourself in the Discovery for All session in the Hands-on Base on Sundays and during school holidays in the Horniman Museum. More details here. 

Weird creatures

The Armadillo in my last blog post,

you can read it here,

has surely captured my imagination.

The more I think about it:

...the nose, like a rat?

...the ears, cute?

...the shell, comfortable?

...having hard shell down the front of your face, odd?

...the claws, huge?

...the tummy, hairy?

...rolling into a ball, very clever?

Well I found another...

...at the Grant Museum.

Here's what the Armadillo looks like underneath the shell, the skeleton.

This one has a much longer tail.

The colour of the shell could have faded with the light over time.

Sorry not a great quality photo.

Just to keep the weird creature theme going...

...I present the Elephant Shrew,

related to both the elephant and the mole.

This photo, with its reflection, of a table full of books alongside the labels,

makes me think he looks like he works in a bank.

Do you know of any weird creatures?

Please leave a comment and where to find them.

These two are to be found at the Grant Museum, an amazing zoological museum,

open afternoons, not Sundays.

The Armadillo

In museums some things just grab your attention.

Like the Three-Banded Armadillo

Like the hedgehog, in a previous post here, they too roll themselves into a ball when scared.

Into an armoured ball. Look how amazingly the pieces of shell fit together.

"Like a puzzle."

It impressed us.

"That's so cool! It's all fits together so perfectly."

"Awesome!"

"Mad!"

"Looks like my Bakugan Battle Brawler."

I think you need to be ten years old to get this connection.

They're creatures from a Japanese TV series, characters called Baku-Gan,

which when translated means 'exploding-ball'.

Could the Armadillo have been the inspiration behind this?

See these armadillos from Brasil (not Japan) at the Natural history Museum.

Opening times on their website here.

Visitor Responses

When looking at objects with visitors you get such varied responses... 

'I don't want to wee on it!' What did that five year old make of our discussion about foxes wee-ing on hedgehogs to make them uncurl from a ball when trying to attack them?

'Has that hedgehog ever been wee'd on by a fox?' asked his big sister after she'd touched it.

I know a little about the animals in the Hands-On Base at the Horniman Museum, however not the answer to that question.

 'Cute but full of fleas', said his mother.

'It doesn't move anymore!', said a perplexed two and a half year old about this squirrel. Understanding the difference between dead and alive in taxidermy is a difficult concept when you're two and a half.

One kid asked me about a stuffed fox...

'Is it dead?'

'yes', I replied

'but is it dead alive?'

I reassured him that it really was 'dead alive'.

Stuffed foxes can make little children very nervous.

A stuffed fox can be a deal breaker. I've seen little children refuse to come into a gallery because of a curled up taxidermy fox. Or, as is more usual, rush over to it, stroke it and occasionally try and sit on it.  

Perhaps I stressed the importance of safe object handling too much...

'I heard the sea... and I didn't break it', said a really keen visitor age three.

These objects are in the Hands-On Base in the Horniman Museum in Forest Hill, London. Visit the Discovery For All session on Sunday afternoons. You can touch them and see what you make of them, over 3,000 of them.

You can read more about the handling session here.

Elizabethan Bling?

The Cheapside Hoard, nearly 500 pieces of Elizabethan and early Stuart jewellery.

Expensive? yes. Elaborate? yes. Ostentatious? yes (particularly when you sew pieces on your clothes). Bling???

Jewellery from the 16th and 17th centuries made to be seen in. Worn as symbols of money, power and sometimes of who you knew.
If Queen Elizabeth 1 gave you a cameo with her portrait, surely you'd make sure you were seen wearing it.
To up the ante, you could also wear jewellery on your clothes. Rings and other jewellery were sewn onto sleeves, hats, bodices, girdles and ruffs. There are paintings to prove this, portraits of the rich and influential, including Queen Elizabeth 1 herself with bejeweled necklaces hanging from her ruff.

If you weren't into bling, you may have worn jewellery for the believed properties and benefits that gemstones brought you.

My birthstone, amethyst, was believed to have a sobering effect on violent passions and drunkeness, plus the power to sharpen intelligence and business accumen. I'll go with the intelligence sharpening!

Most pertinent to Londoners in the 17th century, emeralds worn on the skin were believed to protect the wearer from the plague.

Whether it was the emeralds or the Great Fire of London, the bubonic plague of 1665-66 was the the last major plague epidemic in England. It was around this time that the Cheapside Hoard was believed to have been stashed under a cellar floor in Cheapside, the City of London, never to have been reclaimed.

300 years later it was found by builders in 1912, who did what most people with any 'business accumen' would do. They took it to 'Stony Jack' the pawnbroker in Wandsworth.

Today this priceless collection of  Elizabethan and early Stuart jewellery is on show at the Museum of London, nearly 500 pieces of exquisite necklaces, earrings, brooches, hairpins, rings, buttons, time-pieces and scent bottles.
With such intricate details that you need a magnifying glass to see them properly (they are provided).

  

Outside the museum a 10 metre long model of a salamander brooch adorns the wall. This beautiful gold brooch, set with emeralds and diamonds in reality is only about 4 cm long.

Bling or not, there are more burning questions to be answered. Who buried it? Why was it hidden? Whose was it?

All these questions are up for debate.

See the Cheapside Hoard with its many unsolved mysteries at the Museum of London until 27th April 2014 to draw your own conclusions.

http://www.museumoflondon.org.uk/london-wall/