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Step 57000 Museums
Donna and I went to 3 or 4 museums a day. I started calling her "two-speed" because whenever we were going somewhere, I could barely keep up. Once we got to a museum she would slow way down, staring at each exhibit as if to memorize it. She REALLY LIKES MUSEUMS.
When I was a kid in Akita in the last century there were lots of people doing crafts and trades in a shop in front of their house and living in the back. I spent a lot of time biking around watching people at work.
The country is a lot different now. Those people are all retired and their kids are riding bullet trains to office jobs. Japan is a country that doesn't like to lose any traditions. To help remember how things used to be, the country now has 7000 museums.
One of the most amazing museum buildings I saw was the Osaka Maritime Museum. It's in an artificial island dome, and much of the building is underwater. You walk to the museum through an underwater tunnel looking up at fish through the skylights. Inside the museum is a reconstructed Edo era merchant ship. Their old shipbuilding techniques are unique in the world. Steaming and bending huge timbers and fastening them with gigantic staples. A typically Japanese example of taking on a hugely ambitious impractical project. Then forcing it to work with amazing teamwork and skill. Kind of like the building it's housed in.
At the other end of town is the huge Osaka Ethnological Museum. Probably my favorite museum in the world. Here's an African textiles exhibit there. Multiply by 100 countries studied, and that's the museum.
The Japanese government is just as far in debt as ours, mostly from building amazing projects like these, the other 7000 museums, and the nice parks I slept in.
My own government debt is mostly for, well... Look it up. A lot of bad things.
When I was a kid in Akita in the last century there were lots of people doing crafts and trades in a shop in front of their house and living in the back. I spent a lot of time biking around watching people at work.
The country is a lot different now. Those people are all retired and their kids are riding bullet trains to office jobs. Japan is a country that doesn't like to lose any traditions. To help remember how things used to be, the country now has 7000 museums.
One of the most amazing museum buildings I saw was the Osaka Maritime Museum. It's in an artificial island dome, and much of the building is underwater. You walk to the museum through an underwater tunnel looking up at fish through the skylights. Inside the museum is a reconstructed Edo era merchant ship. Their old shipbuilding techniques are unique in the world. Steaming and bending huge timbers and fastening them with gigantic staples. A typically Japanese example of taking on a hugely ambitious impractical project. Then forcing it to work with amazing teamwork and skill. Kind of like the building it's housed in.
At the other end of town is the huge Osaka Ethnological Museum. Probably my favorite museum in the world. Here's an African textiles exhibit there. Multiply by 100 countries studied, and that's the museum.
The Japanese government is just as far in debt as ours, mostly from building amazing projects like these, the other 7000 museums, and the nice parks I slept in.
My own government debt is mostly for, well... Look it up. A lot of bad things.
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Oct 10, 2009. 8:40 PM
yanggers
says:
yanggers
says:
" That is just a amazing piece of enginnering right there," said FaqMan while pointing to the entirety of Japan on the map.
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Jan 18, 2009. 10:04 AMFaqMan
says:
That is just a amzing piece of enginnering right there.
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