Well, in fact when my son asked me, if I go with him to the Egypt Museum I was somehow surprised about his idea. He told me, that he likes to do something special with during his summer holidays. What?! But why than to visit a Museum were you can discover potsherds… To be honest I told him, maybe better to go to an other attraction in Munich, while I thought it makes no sense for him, as he is to young… Happy that he won !!! (Not to say I was wrong ?
The Egyt Museum (https://goo.gl/maps/CgkuXVjKtEe4ecV7A) is underground, but the man you see on the next picture can check how it looks like inside. When you do scan a code with your mobile around the statue, you can have a look into the Museum and as you will discover, this is a good teaser for a high-tech Museum I never have seen before…
So, before you enter the Museum you will already have an idea how it looks like inside and how many people are there.
Travel tip: On Sunday you pay ONLY 1 € entrance into the Museum + 1 € Audioguide (English or German/ Children or Adult edition). You can also rent for 1 € a children discovery backpack…
Anyway, as you can see on the camera on my phone, I received from the man with the red stick (above), the Museum is not empty, but there are only a view people. The reason can be as well the start of the school holidays in Munich last week.
The Museum is 100% wheelchair accessible and as well prepared for people who are deaf or blind.
But lets start from the beginning. The whole Museum is somehow a link between the distant past and the future, as it is a high tech Museum in his own way.
As you can see on the following picture, there is a lot of support during discovering the history of Egypt, Africa and due to this as well the the European history. If you think, that you see exhibits longer BEFORE Jesus Christ than we life now AFTER Jesus Christ, it is hard to believe. In fact here you discover via a electronic pad, that you still use sometimes articles in daily life, that humans already used 4000 years and more ago.
If you like to learn more about a exhibits you press on this and you can read a description in English or German. It is really interactive and you learn without you know, what makes learning much easier.
The pad you carry with you knows via WiFi every time where you are. So it offers you information related to the part of the museum where you are. I was so lucky to have visited once Egypt and as well the Egypt Museum in Cairo, but in fact due to some “gimmicks” here I found my personal and own discovery journey entrance into the history of Egypt and so of Europe and other parts of the world.
When using the pad, you can for example display the picture of a whole reconstruction of the statue the head belongs to. It is not only for the head to the body, but sometimes as well the group of statues related to this… The place where they have been found and how the could be grouped… Or a picture from inside the burial place.
There is as well a audio function, so you can hear a text, sometimes as well music, have the possibility to jump to articles who are related to the exhibit or get the hint to look on an other statue, as there he/she is shown in an other context.
As well you find a lot of fixed big pads who give you the chance to see a lot of thinks in relation (picture below). On the following table, you can find Shape (Gestalt), Place (Ort), Name (Name) and Function (Funktion) of different Egypt Gods. Example: God A (Name) you can see as a Bird (Shape), he gave Health to the people (Function) and he has been found in Part A, D and G along the Nile. You can look on this from all 4 dimensions and this is in fact a real learning journey.
But one room was really special. It is a room for blind people and children, but in fact a haptic perception (like: learning by touching) for all people. There are a lot of copies of the exhibits, so you can touch them. You can feel what people did without machines. You have different stones, so, you feel how they look and feel like in nature and how they feel after humans did work on them.
In addition you have of course the audio, but as well there are braille (blind can touch and read) descriptions.
So, I believe that EVERY person can do his own journey via this museum. History is so interesting!
What I learned:
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Sometimes is good to listen what the children propose you ?
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Egypt history has a big impact on the history of the whole world.
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History presented in the right way, is accessible for ALL minds.
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My Learning Journey will least up to my last breath and I will never understand more than maybe 0,1% of the fantastic world…
