University Life 5

Royal Ontario Museum

Hi, everyone, I’m Jing. Today I would like to share my experience of visiting the Royal Ontario Museum with you. On Sunday, May 8th, 2008, I went to the Royal Ontario Museum with my friends Johnson and Jason. Actually, we went there at 5:00 pm on May 6th; however, the manager of the museum said that the museum had to close before 5:40 pm that day because they had a very important activity. Therefore, we went back home and went to the museum again on May 8th, 2008. The Royal Ontario Museum is one of the world’s great museums and the fifth largest museum in North America, and it contains more than six million items. The Royal Ontario Museum totally has five floors that include two major kinds of galleries, which are Natural History galleries and World Culture galleries.

The Natural History gallery includes three galleries, which are the Gallery of Birds, the Gallery of Insects, and the Gallery of Mammals, and all of these galleries are on the second floor of the museum. I think the most interesting gallery of the Natural History galleries is the mammal’s gallery, which has many models of mammals, such as tiger, wolf, lion, etc. (but I didn’t take any pictures there because my camera didn’t have enough electricity). However, Johnson and Jason liked the bird’s gallery because there are many fossils and models of different kinds of dinosaurs that Johnson and Jason are really interested in. The gallery of birds displays many specimens of different kinds of birds, as you can see from the picture. The gallery of insects contains both live and dead insects, such as toads and cockroaches.

The World Culture galleries include the Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Canadian, Indian, and Egyptian galleries. The Chinese, Japanese, and Korean galleries are located on the first floor. I think the Chinese gallery is the most interesting one because it has many ancient Chinese sculptures, models of Chinese famous buildings, and some other Chinese cultural relics that I have never seen before. The Canadian, Indian, and Egyptian galleries are on the third floor of the museum. The Canadian gallery contains many examples of early 19th and 20th century artifacts, which are from the indigenous cultures of the Plains, Eastern Woodlands, Northwest Coast, and Arctic regions. This gallery also has some famous artworks and paintings (as you can see from the picture). The Egyptian gallery contains a wide range of artifacts, which are agricultural implements, jewelry, cosmetics, and more. There are also a number of mummy cases, including the gilded and painted coffin of Djedmaatesankh, who was a famous female musician in Egypt, and the mummy of Antjau, who was a wealthy landowner.

We spent almost three and half hours visiting the museum because it is so big and knowledgeable. I think visiting the Royal Ontario Museum was an unforgettable and pleasant experience for me because I could see and learn about many histories and cultures of different countries from the museum.