Lessons from children at The Israel Museum

We were on a guided tour today of the Jewish Culture and Dress From Around the World display.  The woman guiding us was talking about a costumed Yemeni child bride when a boisterous group of 4 year olds, in self made costumes ran into the gallery. Today's photo captures their costumes and the big explanation labels around their necks. The lively children could explain themselves. The dressed up dummie of a child bride could not. I wants to whisper to the child bride on display that I could sneak her away so she could still play and grow from a little girl to an adult like the children in the Gallery

We went on into a very provocative display, inspired by Professor Yuval Harari's book A Brief History of Mankind. The display uses objects from The Israel Museum collections to illustrate the different stages of Homo Sapiens evolution. Because it is an overview, the 4 stages were named Hunter/gatherer, Agricultural, Industrial, and Digital. Each stage offered cogent explanations for human development at that time illustrated by found objects like flints and by work of contemporary artists reflecting on that time. One of the objects was the hyoid bone of a Neandrathal who coexisted in this area at the same time as Homo sapiens. The accompanying explanation indicated that the this neck bone is exactly the same as ours, suggesting that Neandrathals could speak just like us. I had thought that Neandrathals preceded the Homo sapiens stage. But no, we were the more cunning fighters and we extermined them all.   Our history is a violent and competitive from the start. It was an eye opening exhibit.

I try to look for kindness every day. While we were waiting for our bus, another bus on a different route pulled up and two tourists emerged complete with guidebooks and camera. The driver noticed that one woman left her hat on her seat. He stopped the bus and called out to her. She was so grateful and embarrassed. The bus driver just smiled and pulled away.