Brucatos in the Northeast!: Beautiful Yale campus!

Thursday (although I keep thinking it’s Friday…) September 17, 2015

Hello!

Wow! We had a really lovely day at New Haven, and very much enjoyed exploring the Yale Campus. [Thank you so much Robbie (my iPhone) and Sheldon (R’s iPhone)…]

Yale campus

Possibly the law building

Up about 6 this morning, and turned on Mike & Mike in the Morning on ESPN – which is actually being produced and broadcast from just across the street, even as we watch! The wonders of television! Our first appointment today wasn’t until 11:15 a.m. so we figured we had time to dawdle, and we also wanted to miss traffic heading into New Haven. (Bristol is about 24 miles north of New Haven.) So, out about 8 a.m. with the first stop being the local Bristol Post Office to drop off the two “if it fits it ships” boxes that R had put together to send extraneous stuff back to Tucson (better than lugging it around in our suitcases).

Sterling Library

Me and the Sterling Library

He is certainly a master packer – he actually was able to somehow get my new Boothbay Harbor reversible jacket to fit! Boxes were heavy – the gal who took care of us said that one of the boxes alone would have cost more than the two if-it-fits-it-ships boxes! Hopefully they’ll be in Tucson soon and arrive in good condition.

From the post office we set Emmy (our GPS) to New Haven. To explain: over the past several years, I have kept a museum file and put in it the names and addresses of institutions that had near eastern material that we found interesting. Then, when we started putting this trip together, into the museum file I went, to see what we could work into the trip. One of the recommendations was the Babylonian Collection at Yale.

Entry hall, Sterling Library

Library

Well, when researching the collection, it turns out that it resides in the Sterling Library on the Yale campus, but it is not a museum per se – and is not open to the general public. I contacted the curator of the collection, to see if a visit might be possible, and he put us in touch with Agnete Lassen, who we met today.

Cloister of Sterling Library

Note elevator doors!

It was an interesting ride to New Haven – a bit of random freeways, and a bit of surface streets, but we really didn’t run into any heavy traffic – certainly not like Los Angeles, where it doesn’t matter what time of day you get on a freeway, it will be full! Emmy got us fairly close to the library, but it is set within an interior courtyard, so not exactly easy to get to the front door. We were able to find 4-hour parking on Broadway, across from the Yale Bookstore. As we still hadn’t eaten, we went into a Courtyard Hotel and had pastries and coffee and hot chocolate, which were good. We then found the Sterling Library, where we were to meet Agnete Lassen. (As we were a little early, we decided to make our way to the nearest Wells Fargo bank first, which gave us an opportunity to explore a little more of the campus.) We found Agnete a few minutes early on the front steps of the Sterling Library, and she is really lovely! She is currently a lecturer at Yale, and has just completed post-doctoral studies at Copenhagen University. Agnete actually spent last summer digging in Kultepe, where we spent several lovely days on our last trip to Turkey. Very small world!

The Sterling Library is really an amazing building. It is built along the lines of a cathedral, and when you stop to think about the importance of books – and learning – it really does seem to make sense! Agnete took us through the security process (which wasn’t a problem!) and into the stunning library! Wow; what a place! Hopefully some of the photographs R took will be able to give an idea of the scope of the building. As it turns out, the collection is stored in several rooms – one of which is really a classroom, with all sorts of wonderful things all around – as well as old-fashioned glass cases with wonderful examples of some of the pieces they have in the collection. It was so refreshing to read the labels on some of the pieces – real specific information in a language we could understand! We saw everything from beginning level geometric problems to a student scribe’s first attempts at learning cuneiform (which Robert got to try as well – and his “writing” was much better than the young student’s!) We were there for probably an hour and a half, and it was such fun talking about things that we’re excited about to a professional!

Lunch!

From the library, we decided to get some lunch, and found a little noodle place near the parking lot. Robert had udon noodles with beef, and I had General Tso’s sweet and sour chicken with broccoli and rice; we split an order of fried wontons.

Art museum ancient gallery

Love those lions!

We then headed to the Yale Art Gallery, which wasn’t too far away. This building – both free and open to the public! – has a small collection of ancient art that we wanted to see. There were some Assyrian bas relief panels from Nimrud, as well as yet another blue lion in tiled bricks…one of my favorites! There was also a very good collection of sculpture and pottery, as well as medals and coins. The museum was really nicely air conditioned (unlike the library…) so we had a good look around; very enjoyable. Then, back to the car for the journey back to Bristol.

Assyrian panel

We made the return trip in about half-an-hour (passing the ESPN facility on the way; what a collection of satellite dishes!), and are now back in our lovely DoubleTree Hotel. We went downstairs to their sports bar again tonight; nice glasses of Sauvignon Blanc and I had their blue cheese salad with a great hamburger (cooked rare even!); R had a repeat of their clam chowder, followed by chicken wings in teriyaki sauce. All good! So…heading to bed early tonight after a busy today!

Lovely mosaic

Temple from a Syrian site

One point of interest: Right next to our hotel is a tall building that turns out to be the testing facility for Otis Elevators. I guess they cut the cables to see if the safety devices really work, a comforting idea for some one who soon will be visiting the Empire State Building. Otis, by the way, did not invent the elevator; he invented the safety brakes (in 1851) to stop the elevator from falling to the basement if the cable breaks.

Tomorrow we head back to Boston and turn in the car; more museums to come!