The Hall of African Mammals

After my final, final turn-in last Wednesday (which involved a 30-mile drive there-and-back at 10 am plus 1.5 hours of waiting to get my portfolio printed & bound to narrowly meet the noon turn-in) I was exhausted. While driving back to my place the radio was playing 'A Day in the Life' by the Beatles, which was pretty amazing what with that crazy buildup that explodes cathartically at the end. It concluded five years of architecture school so perfectly.

My goal for the day was to go to the Natural History Museum because it is just across the street from campus, and I hadn't gone in thirteen years or so. I ended up sleeping for about four hours and then lazing around and watching Gangs of New York instead. I mentioned to two of my friends that I wanted to go, and they were eager to join up too. So on Thursday we went and were pleasantly surprised to discover that USC students get in for free!

The Hall of African Mammals always awed me as a child. The meticulously crafted dioramas looked like frozen frames of real life in the savannah, and being young I could only comprehend it as such, with the most powerful suspension of disbelief in action. And even then, stepping into the hall I got a flashback (think of Anton Ego's flashback in Ratatouille when he takes his first bite of Remy's cooking) and I walked past each frame with the same sense of wonder I'd had as a child. Almost. Now with a more discerning eye I was able to notice the curved wall behind each scene giving the view more depth - a simple yet masterful illusion that really tricks you into thinking you're viewing a vast stretch of landscape. I let myself get whisked away, I pretended I was eight years old again, forgetting about graduation, about looking for a job, wondering if I still have a job. I watched the animals and wondered if they were real, worried about the giraffes being hauled down by the lions on the other end, half-expecting the oryxes to leap away at a moment's notice. I pretended I was in Africa, and for a few minutes nothing else was real.