Wonder Wednesday – Natural History Museum
Hello everyone! As you can see I have gone to see the Natural History Museum in Manila, with our friend Dos is joining us as well, as you can see it is a very big museum with many floors exhibiting different topics. On the ground floor, there is a room where they showed real tiny bits of asteroids from outer space, and there is a huge skeleton of a sperm whale hanging above your head. We had no tour guide with us, but that is ok since a lot of visuals and text helped us understand better. When I first saw the museum I thought it would be like a normal small sized museum, I didn’t think it was super huge and was modern which exceeded my expectations.
The first floor exhibited the beaches in the Philippines, the mangrove trees and how they help with the environment, sea creatures that live on the beaches, and oceans. As you walk to the next area it is more about marine and sea life, They have preserved dead sea animals in clear jars which people can see and read about what are their specific traits and what they do. They also have a variety of seashells, crabs, and sea urchins too! I wanted to draw them for practicing my live drawings but the security doesn’t let you use pen or pencils because they are scared people might draw on stuff.
The next floor showcased the forest, animals, and how scientists would camp to observe the animals. The museum also showed an elephant tusk and the world’s largest alligator named Lolong whose body was preserved along with a female Philippine eagle who died too young and was preserved for science. You can see that most of the animals there have been preserved once they died so we can all learn more about them. We also experienced different animal sounds during different times of the day, we had to be in a dark room listening to the speakers, it was a nice interactive activity but it was a bit hot there. We also learned about plant life and different kinds of it, the purposes of them, and which are rare.
In another floor we got to see the land formation of the Philippines and the formation of the volcanos and mountains, there was a fun area where you can put your hand on a heat sensing pad which left hand prints which would slowly go away as it cools and then you can just put your hand there again! There was even some videos playing of earthquakes and volcanos erupting with loud sounds trying to simulate that you were in an actual one which didn’t to me, it was just annoying hearing it on loop.
Finally, at the end back on the ground floor, some of the homeschoolers had a photo including us! This museum has thought me new stuff and impressed me. I hope that when you have the chance, you can visit the museum soon!
