Yesterday I visited the Smithsonian Natural History Museum rather than hang around the National Book Festival. The 2006 National Book Festival was pretty boring. You could only buy books by the featured authors, stand in a long line to have your books autographed, or watch authors read in various tents. I bought Thank You For Not Smoking by Christopher Buckley and Stone Bow Prayer by Amy Uyematsu although I’m not very interested in reading either book.
There was a light drizzle so I decided to visit the nearby Smithsonian Natural History Museum instead. It was really amazing! On the first floor I saw lots of dinosaur skeletons; including a Tyrannosaurus Rex and a Triceratops. They also have mammal fossils. The most impressive mammal fossil was a giant sloth that was as huge as a dinosaur. I also saw a woolly mammoth skeleton fossil.
The first floor also has a mammals exhibit were I saw stuffed animals; tigers, lion, monkeys, gorilla, bear, bats, kangaroos, zebras, etc. There was also a special exhibit of the Sikhs from the Punjab region of India. I liked this exhibit because I’ve never heard of the Sikhs so their culture appeared quite exotic. There was a model of the Harimandir Sahib, a golden temple, and images of their ten gurus.
The second floor has the gems and minerals exhibits, the bones exhibit, insect zoo, and meteorites exhibit. I saw the Hope diamond which had a crowd around its glass case. The gems and minerals exhibit was a spectacular collection of crystals in many different shapes and colors. I saw some moon rocks and meteorites. The bones exhibit had skeletons of many animals including very large sea turtles. I saw a live tarantula in the insect zoo.
At the museum store I bought two books; Tyrannosaurus Sue by Steve Fiffer and Vanished Kingdoms: The Wulsin Photographs of Tibet, China and Mongolia 1921 – 1925 .
The Smithsonian Natural History Museum made me feel some existential angst because it presents you with the physical evidence for the vastness of time and space. The animal skeletons and dinosaur fossils seem a grim reminder of how short any lifeform’s existence is compared to the time required for crystals to form and grow or meteorites to travel through space.
From a distance, I saw the Capital Building, the White House, and the Washington Monument.
The bus trip was arranged by the James V Brown Library with a focus on the 2006 National Book Festival. The bus stopped at a Cracker Barrel restaurant for diner and I was forced to watch the Whoopi Goldberg movie Sister Act on the bus.
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