The girls get their Norwegian over and done with super real fast this morning, I think they’re getting better at it! French and Duolingo as well, of course, but there’s only a teacher with a stopwatch and a deadline on the other side of Norwegian homework, so that’s always the main focus on Fridays.
We have decided we are in need of an adventure today, and one of the places we like to visit in big cities, is the science museum. So that’s where we’re headed today! I’m blogging furiously to make this evening’s posting time of 8pm, and I just want to finish before we leave, so Joe makes the girls some noodles for lunch, planning for him and I to grab lunch when we get there.
When we get off the bus, we walk the intricate stairs up, bridge across, stairs up on the other end of the bus pocket, then across some more and back down another set of stairs. I’m starting to realize exactly where we are: this is the neighbourhood where Joe and I stayed the first two nights of our 2013 visit! We used to stay two nights in a hotel to get over the worst of the jet lag before moving in to the cramped space of grandma’s apartment. Her space is fine for the four of us, but when she lived at home, we didn’t want to disturb her early and late while struggling to get over jet lag.
I see a familiar tea restaurant on a corner, even though it has switched names at least twice since then. This was where Joe and I came for my very first Hong Kong traditional breakfast! I mean, I was here in 2006, but with a Norwegian friend, so I don’t remember exploring traditional macaroni soup breakfasts at that time.
The girls are ready for a snack, so share a pineapple bun. They also like the looks and smells of our soups, so of course we share some with them. There’s also the plate of bun, egg and ham that came with Joe’s soup, which we all end up sharing, somehow.
After having sat there and staring at a building with a sign reading “science museum” over a door the entire lunch, we walk towards the door now. We’re stuck with a choice, do we turn left or right to find the entrance? Of course this door is a fire exit, why they have a sign above it from the outside, I do not know. And of course we turn right, when we should have turned left.
This Science Museum is fantastic! We walk in and are immediately in the AI section. Téa creates art by using the simple three category prompts, as well as the more creative “write about your image” then decide the style of the finished product. She could just stand here creating art the whole day, but we force her to move on…
Next we move on to the “rock, paper, scissors” station. We help their AI model understand how different people may show the three different hand movements. All it does is register how we hold our hands for the rock, the paper and the scissors movements. Then, we move to the next station, where we move the red and blue vehicles by using the rock, paper and scissors movements to direct the car left, right and forward.
Not quite done the AI art section, we move by these large screens and I notice it matches our images with famous paintings! There were so many fun styles, I think I liked the stained glass one the best, but I was all alone doing that one. When Téa joined me, it changed, first into “Starry Night” and then into…
We walked about as many sections of all the floors as we could, and had so much fun all day. Joe guesstimated we would spend two hours at the museum, but the first two hours came and went so fast!
The optical illusion section was awesome, and brought back fun memories from when we visited the Museum of Illusions in Montreal.
The “Futures” section was really cool! The section called Robot Helpers was mostly “out of order” unfortunately, one of the robot dogs was on charge, and the other one looked quite broken down in the middle of their pen. We learned so much about what research is doing in lab grown foods, how some flies grow and thrive by breaking down food scraps in an environmental composting system, how new technology can use mushrooms to simulate both fish and meat.
But my personal favourite section, maybe the least interactive of them all, is the geology section. Did you know? If I happened to be born on Iceland instead of in Norway, I would totally be a geologist today. And if you ever get the chance to visit Iceland (if you fly through there, book a longer layover!), you’ll understand why.
The basement held various puzzles, like the twisty, impossible to get the ring off, kind of metal games, numbers, letters, sticks and magnet puzzles. We spent more than proportionately appropriate time here, but then we noticed that the dinosaur section started in the next area, and excitedly hopped over in that direction.
After we go through all the skeletons and dig sites and dinosaur information, there’s also a section on other animals, this one in particular called “the savanna”.
At this point, we realize that it’s 6.15pm, and we’ve spent over 4 hours here! It’s getting dark outside, and we still need to get home. The museum closes at 7pm, and we feel like we’ve seen and done most of the things we came here for.
We decide to take the subway home, and when we step on, my phone tells me Maylin’s tracker is no longer with us. Hers and Téa’s trackers hang on their lanyards with their subway passes, which is right around her neck where she stands in front of her, but the actual tracker is no longer attached. I quickly check my phone, and breathe a sigh of relief. The tracker is still at the museum, thank goodness, we can swing by again tomorrow to pick it up from lost and found.
Maylin is distraught. She “misses her tracker”, even though it doesn’t actually do anything, it’s a black round blob that hangs around her neck. I keep checking throughout the evening, and reassure her that it’s still at the museum. Until suddenly, it’s not. When I go to put her to bed and want to show her it’s still at the museum, her tracker is now on the move.
I’m shocked and angry at the fact that her tracker sat at the museum from 7pm until 10.30pm and now is on the move out towards the New Territories. The museum closed at 7pm, does this mean a staff member has it? I keep checking back in on her tracker all night long, way past my bedtime, until it settles down and does not move way after 1.30am. I have their address, I know where they stop on their way home late at night, I know the bus stop they waited at to go home.
I don’t know what tomorrow holds, but I know I’m headed back to the Science Museum first!
Using mushrooms to simulate fish and meat sounds very interesting.
By the way, I’m sure becoming a geologist in Norway is quite possible. My niece is a geologist and she studied at University of Windsor. Her work now takes her all over the word.