Kulturama: Museum des Menschen

I had fully planned on staying home today, since tomorrow we leave bright and early for nine days in Austria.  We'll start with a night in Salzburg, but most of our visit will be at a little resort in southern Austria. We don't know a thing about the area, truthfully; we chose the destination for the hotel.

And, since that's the case, I'm a little embarrassed to tell you the name: for our sophisticated winter ski vacation in the Alps, we'll be staying at the Smileyhotel, where "You simply convince yourself and you let themselves in the Smileyhotel spoiling. You stand in...and we experience together, how in the pleasure Fairytale gets true."  I'm not sure what that means, but I heard "Fairytale" in there.

Sold.

I've mentioned before how very hard it's been to find convenient lodging for our family with three small children. It seems we'll almost always have to separate into two rooms. So we decided to look for someplace really kid-friendly, and it appears that, in Europe, it doesn't get much more friendly than the Kinderhotel group. With a few outliers in Germany and a new hotel in Croatia that we have our eye on for the summer, the bulk of these hotels are in the Austrian Alps, and are generally smallish, family-run resorts that completely cater to the kids.  Many of them, including the one we'll be visiting, have extensive, price-included childcare.

So Dennis and I, for the first time in almost nine years, will have a chance to go skiing together.  And I won't really feel guilty about it: the kids will English-speaking instruction in ski school, swimming, theater, magic lessons, arts and crafts, and on and on. Lucky, lucky, lucky. The hotel is full-board (meaning all meals included) as well, with around-the-clock ice cream. It sounds a bit like a cruise ship, plopped on the side of a mountain.

If you're curious and feel like practicing your German, you can see more about the hotel here. Hopefully I'll still be able to get online from there, but if you don't hear from me for a while, you'll know why.

Anyway, I was talking about how I intended to let the kids watch television all day while I packed for the trip.  But my sanctimonious daughter rallied the boys, explaining to me that they really needed some fresh air and exercise. She was angling for was a repeat of yesterday's trip to the zoo, but it was a little too cold and I was a little too tired.

About that. Those alarm clocks that we bought yesterday worked perfectly: the kids stayed in bed well past 7:00.  If you don't count the time Ella woke up at 3:00 because her eye was hurting her and the two times Joey woke up.

The first time I don't even think he knew why he was crying.  When I came into his room and asked what it was, he looked around quickly, and then moaned "My ta-able." It was pushed away from his bed a little, so I nudged it back. At which point he murmured "Thank you, Mommy," and rolled back over to sleep.  Um....glad I could help?

The second time he woke up, he was struggling fiercely, trying to wriggle under his bed. I finally got out of him that he lost his water bottle and calmed him down. On my way back to my bed, I walked right into the edge of my bathroom door, hitting my forehead so hard that I fell on my bottom. (And with those words typed, I release the very last shreds of my dignity to the internets.) So I spent a good long time last night, cradling an ice pack. It stills hurts every time I raise my eyebrow.  Which, I today discovered, I do quite a lot when the kids are around.

Looking for something a little more subdued than the zoo, I picked one of the museums associated with the University of Zurich: Kulturama, the Museum of Mankind.

I'm afraid I wasn't allowed to take any pictures inside, although there are a few on the museum website. I wasn't quite prepared for how very many human skeletons would be on display. The kids seemed unaffected, though, although they stared for a good long time at an embalmed human heart ("That's not very appropriate for Valentine's Day, is it.") and lungs ("Are you sure that's what those are, mommy? Are you reading it right?") They had skeletons in ballet poses and skeletons in runner's starting blocks and even a skeleton slumped over a desk, which was supposed to be an object lesson in bad posture, but Ella informed me was a different sort of cautionary tale ("Yep. That's what happens if you give a kid too much homework. She dies of boredom.") They also had rows of animal skeletons, and the kids had a lot of fun guessing what each one was.  Thank goodness introductory German included basic farm animals.

Oddly enough, instead of all of the skeletons, what fascinated Ella the most was a picture, tucked in the corner of a display case, of the ages of man (which I don't believe has a copyright, so I included it.) She stared at it for the longest time, and then asked me, "Mom, what's the golden age of man? Because here, I think it's saying the best age is fifty. But I really think the golden age is four, or maybe five. Four-year-olds get to play all day long. It should really be a cliff, with a four-year-old on top, and everybody else standing below together." I'll have to try to convince her to draw that sometime. Maybe she can add in a cartoon bubble saying "Don't jump!"

That was all in the upper gallery; the lower gallery was supposed to be dedicated to evolution, although they threw in a mummy and an embalmed whale heart (awesome!) for good measure. They had models of several of the species of homonids, and I did my best to explain what they were seeing, remembering what I could from 9th grade social studies and making up the rest.

I could only bluff for so long, though, and we still had quite a bit of time before dinner when we left.  So Ella got her wish: fresh air and exercise.  We returned to the "boat park," and Joey revealed its grave flaw: there is absolutely no way for a toddler to get up on that pirate ship. So I spent my afternoon hoisting.



















When I got home, I had an absolutely fantastic surprise waiting for me.  I don't mean to brag, but I had,  without a doubt, the two best college roommates ever.  And one of them, my dear Kimmie, had sent a care package: presents for the kids and, for Dennis and me, the raw ingredients to make Chuy's Creamy Jalapeno Dip. I could squeal!

Alex was in heaven with his little bakugans, and Ella, although her birthday is over a month away, sweet-talked me into letting her open her gift early (Kimmie, I hope you don't mind!)  She bought for Ella a little scrapbook repository for "plans and ideas." Ella disappeared very soon after she opened it, and I found her, halfway under her bed, sketching out some of those big plans of hers.

Oh Kim, you know my daughter so well.