Museum
of Cultures
In
the glare of the mid-day sun I stepped into a big modern building.
The building had been erected next to a park in the middle of a city
in California. The place was called the Museum of Cultures. The purpose
of the museum was to display the architecture and the atmosphere of
each country. Man-made objects, interiors and surroundings had been
collected there from all over the world.
The
museum was divided into sections on a geographical basis. I started
my tour from Europe, the Nordic section. I inspected a hall containing
the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian exhibitions. Superficially they
all looked the same: timber houses, wooden saunas, old country sceneries.
Very traditional, I thought. The countries had been put together,
even if with a closer look one could detect minor differences between
the cultures. There were deviations in the use of colours, for instance.
I only wondered how such differences could be spotted by those who
actually didn't live in the North.
I
walked in the next hall, which was the Mediterranean section. In the
Italy room, I was greatly surprised to find my parent's living room
there: the same wide-screen TV, Persian carpet, yellow sofa, mock-antique
table and chairs. "How on earth does mock-antique furniture reflect
Italian culture?" I asked. The guide replied, "Mock-antique
interiors are very typical in today's Italy. The museum could well
have displayed genuine antique, too, but this idea was abandoned because
most Italian homes do contain mere copies." There was a logic
to that, so I didn't ask any further questions. Still, it was strange
to see my parents' living room in the museum's Italy section. Then
again..."That's what I always thought!" I exclaimed. "My
family is almost like the Sicilians."
