Travel Journal - London
Trying to find things in my journal that I didn't mention on Facebook, special for you girls. Not too much in London that I didn't mention there - other than, you know.
Started by just wandering around - Drury Lane, Tottenham Court Road, Covent Garden.
Day Two was the British Museum which was hugely insane. I barely saw any of it at all. You need at least a full day there, probably longer, but on the plus side, it's free so I could head back again. From there I went to the British Library. It was a little disappointing because they only have one full-time exhibit room and the temporary exhibit was on propaganda (currently it's on children's book illustrations - how rude). However, at the same time it wasn't at all disappointing because of what's in that room. I saw the original 'Beowulf' and got choked up. It made me think of why I was on this trip, all the Tolkienness and the history and all that. Then there was a Gutenberg Bible and the Tyndale Bible, both of which stop you in your tracks, knowing what they mean. And then there was the Codex Sinaiticus. There I had to fight to hold the tears back. Seeing the oldest (4th century), most complete Bible in existence...I don't even know how to describe it. I just stared at it in wonder at the way it's survived, at the way GOD never changes, at GOD's faithfulness, at GOD's continuous desire to have us know him....so many things.
Day Three - Sutton Hoo. No lecture lunch, but I enjoyed it anyway. I'm thinking either I'm turning into some sappy woman, suffering from an overactive imagination, or turning into some supersensory sixth sense person, because it was yet another place where I could feel history. Sounds so dorky to say. But I felt it.
Day Four - British Museum again because I didn't find the Sutton Hoo stuff the first time. I found it and ended up spending an hour just in the one room where those things were. Then it was time for the WB Studio Tour. It was great except that we didn't have enough time and the gift shop was not that wonderful. I'm feeling the need to go back.
Day Five - You girls already know all about that one. :)
And that was London.
Started by just wandering around - Drury Lane, Tottenham Court Road, Covent Garden.
Day Two was the British Museum which was hugely insane. I barely saw any of it at all. You need at least a full day there, probably longer, but on the plus side, it's free so I could head back again. From there I went to the British Library. It was a little disappointing because they only have one full-time exhibit room and the temporary exhibit was on propaganda (currently it's on children's book illustrations - how rude). However, at the same time it wasn't at all disappointing because of what's in that room. I saw the original 'Beowulf' and got choked up. It made me think of why I was on this trip, all the Tolkienness and the history and all that. Then there was a Gutenberg Bible and the Tyndale Bible, both of which stop you in your tracks, knowing what they mean. And then there was the Codex Sinaiticus. There I had to fight to hold the tears back. Seeing the oldest (4th century), most complete Bible in existence...I don't even know how to describe it. I just stared at it in wonder at the way it's survived, at the way GOD never changes, at GOD's faithfulness, at GOD's continuous desire to have us know him....so many things.
Day Three - Sutton Hoo. No lecture lunch, but I enjoyed it anyway. I'm thinking either I'm turning into some sappy woman, suffering from an overactive imagination, or turning into some supersensory sixth sense person, because it was yet another place where I could feel history. Sounds so dorky to say. But I felt it.
Day Four - British Museum again because I didn't find the Sutton Hoo stuff the first time. I found it and ended up spending an hour just in the one room where those things were. Then it was time for the WB Studio Tour. It was great except that we didn't have enough time and the gift shop was not that wonderful. I'm feeling the need to go back.
Day Five - You girls already know all about that one. :)
And that was London.
posted by melilotnfosco | 6:19 PM
11 Comments:
I don't know anything about the Gutenberg or Tyndale Bible... :/
Gutenberg was the first Bible done on the printing press, Tyndale was the first English translation.
Chelley: "Let me google that for you"… Hehe sorry, that's just my gut reaction to seeing comments (not just from you, of course!) where someone says "I don't know about..." or "i wonder why…". Maybe that's why I married my husband, who has the same instinct to check Google or Wiki.
ANYWAY, that's fantastic! What a great way to start the trip. The Pergammon museum in Germany was also too big. Or most national museums tend to be. But then again, I get tired after a while anyway, so it's good just to get the highlights and feel like it's worth re-visiting.
What if my point in saying that wasn't to ask but to just say that I didn't know that like Mel does? :P
i understand, chelley
auto - while it's nice that google has all the info i could ever want at my finger tips, i prefer to ask people first, then google if nobody knows. how else do we get to share what we know and our feelings, experiences, and perspectives?
mel - i totally get what you're saying about the old Bibles. that's how i feel about the Dead Sea Scrolls. so much history! and to think that God has so carefully preserved His Word for us, and that so many were willing to die so that we could read it - awesome!
chelley - mel gave you the short answer. the true significance of guttenberg and tyndale is that they made the Bible available to the masses. in printing the Bible, it became affordable for people to have a copy in their own homes, to read on their own. and tyndale (as with martin luther in germany) gave people a Bible in their own language, rather than strictly the latin translations used by the catholic church. both were highly valuable contributions at a time when much of the church was corrupt and misrepresenting what the Word actually says.
highly significant, highly relevant, and taken far too much for granted today.
what she said
You didn't mention the smell of exhaust that permeates the city. I almost couldn't stand it. It completely spoiled London for me when I was there, bu that was over ten years ago so maybe they fixed that.
Did you take pictures of the Bibles?
I didn't majorly notice an exhaust smell, nothing more than any other city. And we're not allowed to take pictures of the Bibles. I guess that's a good thing, though. Unlike Westminster Abbey, where I think it's just dumb that you can't take at least flashless pictures. The stuff is stone for pete's sake.
@Hobsis - Re: looking up answers online. The difference is a matter of efficiency vs depth of information vs "the point", as Chelleybutton noted. Most of the time, I think I want to know a lot about the right answer right away, preferably with pictures and/or video. Sometimes I seek knowledge, sometimes conversation, sometimes knowledge through conversation.
I was able to take flashless pics in Westminster Abby. I wonder if they changed the rules or if I just broke them...
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