Reflections on Things at Hand: India

It occurred to me that I don't really have any pictures of India on this blog (mainly because I started it since my last trip there). That's really a shame and I'll make an effort to get caught up. Of all the places I've visited India is my favorite. Not only is it an absolute goldmine for a historian, but the people there are the kindest I've ever met. As a friend of mine said one time - travel to India ruins you for travelling to anyplace else in the world - what else can match it? I've been lucky enough to travel to India four times, including spending the entire summer of 2004 teaching at our Champlain College campus in Mumbai (which is still the greatest learning experience of my life). Here's a picture of me and a fine gentleman that I met on the streets of Mumbai on the last night before leaving to come back in August 2004. My good friend John Neelankiavil took the picture. We had just finished a going away dinner and we saw the elephant down the street. John and I ran like luatics across several lanes of traffic (never a good idea in India because they drive like lunatics) to catch up and grab a picture.

Uffizi Gallery

When I was thinking about the then upcoming trip to Florence I was very excited about visiting the Uffizi Gallery, one of the world's great art museums (and one of the oldest). My only concern was having to wait for hours and hours in line (my Lonely Planet guide had suggested that waits of four or five hours were not uncommon). Their suggestion was to call ahead and reserve a ticket, so I asked the good folks at the bed and breakfast where I stayed to do that, and beyond them having to kill time on the phone, it was pretty easy. You have an extra fee, but it's "only" 4 euros. As it turned out, the wait wasn't too long any way (it was that way on everything I visited in Florence - must have hit town at a good/bad time), but it was nice to know that the option was there to save hours in line. The Uffizi is massive, with a central courtyard separating the two main wings of the museum. Normally you would go to gate #2, but if you call ahead and reserve a ticket you pop over to gate #3 to pick up your ticket and then walk over to gate #1 to enter. Very painless. The museum has around fifty rooms and over 1500 paintings, so you could easily spend more than one day there. To be honest - and this is going to sound somewhere between insane and pretentious (thus, probably representative) - I didn't like it as much as the Prado in Madrid, although I suspect this is just a personal thing. The Spanish painters (most notably El Greco and Goya) were just a lot "darker" and it fits my generally meloncholy mood better. That said, I had an extraordinary time at the Uffizi. For some reason I got really emotional when looking at Botticelli's Adoration of the Magi (pictured above in a shot I swiped off the net - you can't take a picture of it). The painting is in a huge room with other Botticellis, including an entire wall, dominated by The Birth of Venus. You could literally almost pass by the Adoration of the Magi because it is right beside a much larger painting and it almost got lost in the crowd (which is maybe one of the things that got to me). That said, I think what made me emotional was the painting's role in reshaping how I teach. Several years ago, as an experiment, I put together this Powerpoint presentation on the Renaissance - so, instead of simpy telling the students about the Renaissance, I would show them paintings from the Middle Ages and the Renaissance and have the students "define" the two ages just from examining the paintings. The core of the presentation was a side by side slide showing two Adorations of the Magi, one from the Middle Ages and one from the Renaissance (Botticelli's). I've often made the point to students that you could define the entire Renaissance just from examining Botticelli's Adoration of the Magi - the secularism, the individualism and the fascination with Greece and Rome. Anyway, the experiment went much better than I could have ever imagined and it led me to change my entire approach to teaching - trying, as best I can, to provide the students with the evidence that will allow them to discover the key concepts. So, anyway, when I actually had the opportunity to see the painting it really hit me hard. Anyway, the Uffizi is located right off of a lovely square with several restaurants and it is only a block or so away from a market (as well as a lot of high-end shops) - all in all, an unforgettable way to spend the day.