Museumgoing

We took James to an exhibit of Afghan art last Sunday. A neat exhibit, in part because the objects were interesting -- the exhibit included materials from several graves of nomadic people that formed part of the Bactrian Hoard found at Tillya Tepe, and it's always interesting to see how cultures in which travel is common (the Vikings are another example) tend, despite variations in style and practice, to wear their wealth on their bodies -- and in part because of the objects' history. The curators of the National Museum of Kabul hid these things, first from the Soviets and later from the Taliban, and risked their own safety to preserve the objects for the public good.

Anyway, I digress. What James liked best about the exhibit was (a) the wall text (capital letters everywhere!); (b) the exit signs (always a hit in public places); and (c) the animals. There were several small sculptures of lions, tigers, and large oxen, as well as an antique glass vase painted with wonderfully lifelike tigers. James, as is his custom, greeted each animal in turn with a respectful growl. The other people at the exhibit thought this was hilarious (lucky for us). James also discovered an echoey area outside the exhibit and spent a few minutes singing scales there. (We've been discussing inside and outside voices lately. Scales (with certain time, place, and manner restrictions) are fine inside; shrieking is not. The practice in our house is to go outside to the patio and shriek there if we need to shriek. I demonstrated this for James the day we instituted this rule. He seemed impressed.)