{"id":851,"date":"2012-01-24T17:42:30","date_gmt":"2012-01-24T22:42:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dragocolosus.dyndns.org\/?p=851"},"modified":"2012-01-24T17:42:30","modified_gmt":"2012-01-24T22:42:30","slug":"a-night-at-the-museum-of-science","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dragocolosus.dyndns.org\/?p=851","title":{"rendered":"A Night at the Museum of Science"},"content":{"rendered":"

The boyscouts once a year run, probably since a long time, the night at the Museum of Science in Boston. The museum offers people to stay the night and enjoy the exhibitions more thoroughly and including a sleepover the simple, sometimes boring museum visit turns into a much talked about adventure. The first year Ivan and I opted out, I thought it was rather expensive. This year though the price was much reduced and we (the three oldest males of the family) decided to go. Ana picked me up from work on Friday (Jan 20). We went to ‘Au bon pain’ at Kendall square to make sure we had eaten well. We got some good sandwiches and off we went to the museum. Ana had packed the bags with everything we really needed: air matresses (two queen size), three sleeping bags (new), PJs, some pillow pets for the kids and some small snacks including a big bottle of apple juice.<\/p>\n

We arrived and quickly found the entry, that is right at the entry of the parking garage (left side when you enter), with good signs…. it seems there are many people doing this regularly. We dropped our bags at the entry at the prescribed spot and got our information sheet including the floor plan<\/a>. All was very neatly organized and we found our spot quickly. We had the reception in the Cahner’s Theater were we learned oabout the Science of Sound. some nice fun demaonstrations, one highlight being the ‘Bernoulli Principle’. The rules of the house were sung together in the end and the main thing I remember was that we should never take off our shoes, which made me worry as I only had my big boots on, but later I learned that the rules about the boots seem not to be strictly enforced, I asked myself what the whole point was anyways, ‘…and never take off your shoes.’
\nAfter the reception we moved downwards to the lower level were the kids had a wonderful workshop in the Triceratops Cliff. The parents standing around and chatting were all surprised how easily the museum helpers could convince the kids to puzzle a Dino skeleton together and later design their own Dinos. They really did very well. After the workshop we slowely moved up to receive a snack (coffee, tea, juice, cookies). From there we went to pick up our sleeping gear and constructed out camp ground in the ‘Investigate I’ section on the 2nd level. Our matresses took longest to inflate, because they were the biggest but our batteries came through and we had excellent sleeping spots for everybody. After some wild plays Science in the Museum we were invited to the lightning show in the ‘Theater of Electricity’. It was all about lightings produced with Tesla coils and the famous Van de Graff generator which actually the man himself (an MIT professor) had build and left to the museum when it was not needed anymore. They put it up on the parking lot at the time and the museum build a building around it. The show was electrifying with one highlight being the theme song from ‘Mission Impossible’ being played with lighting humming, very cool. Of course the large lightnings were cool too, Markus got a little scared: He does not really like load noises. Then we wnet to bad, and the kids fell relatively quickly asleep, shortly after midnioght when the lights were put out. We did evantually take off our shoes and even put on the PJs, very civilized including theeth brushing etc.<\/p>\n

In the morning we were woken by the museum folks, after a good night’s sleep. The morning program was packing uip the camp, breakfast, a wonderful show in the planetarium and a 180 degree cinema show on life on a journey. Wandering birds, wales, zebras and monarch butterflies. How do they decide to be the forth generation? …. an how in the world does the 4th generation know were to go in Mexico? what a mystery! We went home in good spirits with Damien (Markus and I) and Jim (Ivan) and met a equally relaxed crowd. I am sure this was not the last time we did this. Pictures are attached.<\/p>\n