British Museum

I woke up, said goodbye to Sarah, packed my bags, and headed for the airport. It was a sad goodbye but we have already planned for another trip with Kaz and Coz back in Aus hopefully at the end of the year, so there is always that to look forward to. Travelling on my own, without a sim card was a bit of a challenge but it was kind of fun I'm a way. Back to my roots of when I was first beginning my travels. But, against the odds, I shook the rust and made it to the airport safe and sound. I caught a quick flight to London and after a couple of trains I arrived at the British museum. I dropped my bag off next door, where I was staying and headed across to begin the exploration. World famous for its ability to reflect the UKs dominance over much of the world during the colonial period, it holds (stolen) artefacts from every corner of the globe. And that is not an exaggeration, there isn't a single country that I could list that didn't have some culturally significant artefact advertised inside. The moment I entered, I was overwhelmed. You could spend days in here. I only had a few sections I was really interested in so I could kind of speed through. But, with that being said it still took me over 4 hours. The highlight for me was the Rosetta stone. But there was sections on ancient Europe, Egypt, the Middle East, Australia, language, Greece, Rome, The Aztecs (and other SA empires), North America, Japan, Korea, China, medicine, astronomy, currency, and literally hundreds more. It would take you weeks to avidly read and observe each section inside. Each site had hundreds if not thousands of artefacts. My summary of the above items does not even begin to describe how each Empire and civilisation is in some way portrayed here. Their British Empire was truly enormous. Interestingly, I saw many artefacts from many sites I had been to in Turkey, Tunisia, Italy, Peru, and so on. This was cool and depressing, knowing how complete these sites would be with the original artefacts. Ephesus being the big one. So many amazing statues stolen from their original locations that fragment and fracture the beauty and impression that the sites has on you. I already loved Ephesus but cant help but think about how much more amazing it would be with these artefacts still there. It took many many hours until I was finally done, and made desperate for a feed and a drink after all the standing and walking. I hadn't eaten and barely drank any water all day. So, I found an Asian restaurant and spent a pretty penny filling myself up there. I went back to the hostel and laid down until it was a reasonable time to sleep. It was a big day and I was eager to rest as much as I could.Read more