quotes

Day Three: Bundles of Beavers

I hope I remember where I parked the car. Feeling a little unbalanced at the moment -- had two dollops of sleep last night, with a big gap in the middle of wakefulness. Very slow in getting up and getting out the door. Then drove around and around and AROUND before successfully parking. Got to the Maison Carree, a 1st century Roman temple smack dab in the center of town, only a few minutes before it closed for lunch. Whatever possessed them to paint the interior the sandy salmon color of a modern hotel?

The above paragraph was written at a brasserie where I consumed a blameless omelette aux cepes. I then trundled down the Avenue Courbet to the Archaeological and Natural History Museum. A world-weary woman took my twenty-two francs, and indicated a corridor where another woman sat slumped in disillusionment over a table of pamphlets that have been waiting to be sold since the beginning of time. Tiptoeing past her, I peered at all the Celto-Gallo-Roman inscriptions on the same sand-yellow stone that the buildings are composed of. Coolest thing there, I think, were the Celtic safety pins -- I forget what they're called in archaeologist talk -- as well as the lintel of galloping horses and severed heads. Otherwise not much there other than faded pottery and muck-encrusted amphorae.

Upstairs in the Natural History section, you open the door and step back fifty years in the "Ethnographique" section. The whole nine yards of colonial imperialism -- savage aprons, cooking pots, pictures of grim-faced "natives" and strange adornments, inexplicably mixed in with an exhibit of local quartz. The welcoming gazes of two enormous stuffed bulls lead you into the gallery of beasts.

Well, the Cadogans did not lie about this being an odd little collection. Explain to me why they have about eighteen stuffed lemurs, and only the skeleton of a llama... And beavers galore! The kangaroos are resigned and dignified in their moth-eaten splendor. I do wish the curators hadn't positioned the once cold, wet noses of so many of the deer on exhibit practically against the glass, as if the little chevriots and izards were about to pipe up, "Let us out! Mademoiselle, let us out! Take us home with you, it is so cold and smelly in here."

Between the two galleries is a little case of folk remedies. I think my favorite is "Coral is good against the evil eye -- even in Italy!"

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