Egyptian museum

Egyptian museum is an excellent introduction about the ancient land of Egypt. Last week after watching a show about Egypt it reminded me of the museum I visited and made me write some of those remembrances here. Almost a decade ago, I chaperoned my son’s class to the interesting Egyptian museum in California. The middle school children enjoyed all the hands on activities. Having read about Egypt in their class, they enjoyed the tour and answered a set of questions as part of their class work.  I think they all learned how the Egyptians life was after seeing and reading the description of all the artifacts. Of course, they did not have enough time to spend in each room, as we had to rush due to the time constraint.  Exhibits had real mummies and also had close to 4000 artifacts in display. The artifacts tells us that ancient Egyptians worshiped hundreds of Gods and Goddesses, about kings and pharaohs, their lifestyle, mummification, burial practices which tells about their belief of afterlife. The museum describes the mummification process in detail and also the daily life of ancient Egyptians. The highlight of all the exhibits was to go into a small dark doorway which led us down to a crypt where there was a display of recreation of a mummy, starring at that children were all in awe.  Myself, having studied history in college, thoroughly enjoyed the Egyptian museum.

Egyptians had more than 500 hieroglyphic signs in their written language, a complex form of communication. Hieroglyphics are pictogram that not only portray meaning but also have an aesthetic aspect. Below is the pictogram of some of hieroglyphic signs for English alphabets. 

Children had fun in making hieroglyphic signs of their name. The class teacher bought the two chaperons of the class an Egyptian bookmark which I treasured it to date. We all came home with memories of ancient Egypt and wondering how the country is today. Not sure how many of us could have a chance to visit Egypt to have a personal experience, but I would visualize sitting in my backyard.

Proverbs from ancient Egyptian Temples:

• The man who knows how to lead one of his brothers towards what he has known may one day be saved by that very brother.

• Each truth you learn will be, for you, as new as if it had never been written.