To the Metropolitan Museum!

Friday afternoon, September 25, 2015

NOTE:  I’m posting last night’s photos from the top of the Empire State Building first!

Well!  The streets all around our hotel are blocked off, and I’m hearing all sorts of sirens and helicopters in the area.  Supposedly, 80,000 people are expected to join the Pope in his procession; don’t know to where, but possibly Madison Square Garden where he will say a mass. 

We were up this morning around 6:30 am and joined Chris about 7:30 for a walk over to Morton Williams, the neat grocery store we visited yesterday.  As it turns out, they have a wonderful hot food bar, and we were able to get good scrambled eggs with potatoes and sausage/bacon (M/R) as well as coffee and O.J. for a total of $18 – as opposed to the same breakfast that would cost us $32 EACH if we did it at room service!  Sheesh!  I mean, I know New York prices are high, but that’s just plain ridiculous!

Beautiful Della Robbia!

Ancient bowl with cuneiform

Stunning drinking cup!

Gathered Chris and Brenda up about 9:20 am for our trip over to the Metropolitan Museum.  We walked over to Madison Avenue and were able to get a bus which took us right to the museum, albeit on a different side street. 

Metropolitan Museum

We had only a few minutes to wait in line until opening time, and we breezed through security.  (As opposed to the Empire State Building, where everyone had to remove their belts!  I mean, really??)  As R and I had paid full-price at The Cloisters yesterday, we were allowed in free to the Met Museum today, which was very nice.  And, as R & I had very specific things that we wanted to see, we and the Lowders each went our separate ways, arranging a meeting point at noon.

Ancient territorial boundary in cuneiform

Loved those drinking cups!

So, to the Ancient Near East Collection.  On the good side, the collection included a few Hittite artifacts, which I really loved to see!  On the negative side, I thought the collection was a little too randomly arranged, and needed some definite divisions and better labeling to be less confusing.  However, all in all, we spent a very enjoyable two hours going through the Near East Collection (about 6 rooms).  Met Brenda and Chris as planned, and we decided that since we had more to see at the Met, and they really didn’t, that we would again split up and meet back at the hotel for the manager’s reception at 5 pm. 

The next thing we wanted to see was Adam a beautiful Roman statue by Tulio Lombardo from 1490’s whose base had collapsed under his weight several years ago (2002, as a matter of fact).  Apparently the staff arrived in the morning to a curator’s worst nightmare – damage to an exhibit!  But in this case, Adam was in 28 large pieces, and hundreds of smaller pieces.  It took the Met 12 years to completely restore him – but he looks absolutely fabulous, and you would never be able to tell that anything had happened to him!  Many congratulations to the Met for their outstanding job! 

From there we headed to see the Minoan and Etruscan collections.  These were in a huge room with hundreds and hundreds of pieces, and absolutely NO explanation at all – you were supposed to use the computer program in several terminals to find out the who, what, when and where’s…utterly ridiculous – so you’re going to remember that you want to look specifically at something in case 37, and get the information that way? 

Love the pottery!

Another boundary stone

Assyrian weight stone

A very, very bad idea; we hope this isn’t the newest trend in museum presentation.  We even tried the Met’s on-line app but it was even worse.

An old friend from Persipolis

Assyrian painted jar

Then, while we hoped to be able to find a bus to bring us back to the hotel, we could see where the traffic was down Lexington – and NOTHING was moving due to a police blockade…Pope Francis heading for Central Park…so, we ended up walking back to the hotel, and got here about 3:30 pm. 

Unusual stamp seal

Now we need to get moving, as we’re meeting Brenda and Chris for our manager’s reception from 5 – 7 pm – then we have the play at 8, after which we’ll probably find some food somewhere!  So!  More later!

m

xxx

Adam, the broken statue!

Minoan pot

R's lentil salad

More chocolate cake!