Manchester
On my rush south I did take some time to do something other than look at big stone buildings and actually visited some urban areas. In Manchester I wandered my way the the National War Museum North, which is housed in a building shaped as a sphere shattered into three shards to represent the three theatres of battle: land, sea, and air. The temporary exhibit was of a war photographer's life's work, which was impressive and depressing, as one would expect a war museum to be. The main area was dedicated to the last 100 years of warfare and held detailed fascinating exhibits about everything from weaponry to propaganda to the effects of those back home. Every hour or so the whole area was turned into the projection screen for films about a particular war or aspect of a war. Three different films would play on three different walls, with an overarching narrative voiced over the images.
The rest of my first day in Manchester I did other exciting things like hang out in the astoundingly large library (housing twenty miles of shelves), doing my taxes, eating Chinese food, and doing laundry at the hostel.
In the morning I ate breakfast in reconstructed Roman ruins near the hostel that give a glimpse of the walled fort that once stood there. I spend the morning at the Manchester art gallery. I loved the French impressionist paintings that captured Manchester's fog and industry. My favorite part, though, was a group of hyper-realistic replicas of people, but with the scale off. Sculptor Ron Muech created surreal and powerful impressions with a nude wild man 18 feet tall, looking nervous and uncomfortable, or the 18 inch tall couple spooning. If not for the scale I would have thought these were casts of real people, or even, momentarily, that they were real people since they were accurate down to the hair follicles, cellulite dimpled thighs, postures, and expressions.
I had a late lunch at an Indian buffet, where I learned that now that I am older I do in fact have limits to how much I can eat. That limit is four heaping platefuls of rich delicious Indian food. From there I waddled over to spend more time in the magnificent library before taking some bloody expensive trains to Bristol and Salisbury. I considered trying to make my way to Stonehenge since the druidic ceremony among the stones would be early the next morning for the Spring Equinox. However, buses sure weren't running there at night, and it was pouring rain. Instead I managed to check into the youth hostel right before it closed for the night.
The rest of my first day in Manchester I did other exciting things like hang out in the astoundingly large library (housing twenty miles of shelves), doing my taxes, eating Chinese food, and doing laundry at the hostel.
In the morning I ate breakfast in reconstructed Roman ruins near the hostel that give a glimpse of the walled fort that once stood there. I spend the morning at the Manchester art gallery. I loved the French impressionist paintings that captured Manchester's fog and industry. My favorite part, though, was a group of hyper-realistic replicas of people, but with the scale off. Sculptor Ron Muech created surreal and powerful impressions with a nude wild man 18 feet tall, looking nervous and uncomfortable, or the 18 inch tall couple spooning. If not for the scale I would have thought these were casts of real people, or even, momentarily, that they were real people since they were accurate down to the hair follicles, cellulite dimpled thighs, postures, and expressions.
I had a late lunch at an Indian buffet, where I learned that now that I am older I do in fact have limits to how much I can eat. That limit is four heaping platefuls of rich delicious Indian food. From there I waddled over to spend more time in the magnificent library before taking some bloody expensive trains to Bristol and Salisbury. I considered trying to make my way to Stonehenge since the druidic ceremony among the stones would be early the next morning for the Spring Equinox. However, buses sure weren't running there at night, and it was pouring rain. Instead I managed to check into the youth hostel right before it closed for the night.
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