📕 Part 1: Museums

When was the last time you visited a museum?

A long time ago now. It must have been in the summer when we went to this place that focused on social history. It was surprisingly large, actually. Now I think about it.

Do you often visit museums?

Not really, no. The admission fees are usually really high and I'm not sure what there is to do apart from just stare at the exhibits and displays.

Are there many museums in your hometown?

Loads. We even have one with a preserved ship of historical importance. The RMS Discovery. It must be about a hundred years old now, but it's very well curated.

Do you think museums are important?

For me personally, no. I don't see the point in them after you visit just the once, even if they do change the collections regularly. Maybe they're good for storing things for future generations, but apart from that, I'm not a big fan.

Will you visit more museums in the future?

I don't think that's likely, but if I find myself without anything better to do, then I'm sure I could swing by one of the many in towns around my country.

Right, dear listener. So we go to a museum, or we visit a museum. Rory, can I say I usually go to museums without any articles, or go to the museum?

If we're talking about a specific museum, go to the museum, and then go to museums in general.

And if I name a specific museum, do I need an article?

Then you need an article. You probably do need it, like the museum, the Natural History Museum, the museum of music. I don't know. There is a rock museum actually.

The British Museum. The Louvre, right?

The Louvre.

So usually museums are with articles, but dear listener, art galleries could be used without any article, like Tate Modern, for example, in London.

Well, or the Tate Modern. Which apparently is one of the worst art museums in the world.

Or the National Gallery. Actually, yeah. An article. But, dear listener, just remember that museums are used with the, like the London Science Museum, the Louvre. Okay? What else do we have? The, my favorite, the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam.

Maria is a lady of culture. I don't know that many museums.

Well, I enjoy a good museum.

I'm glad somebody does, because I don't.

Oh, really?

Yeah, it could just be the time of year that we're recording, but I've really gone off museums.

Because one of the most interesting museums I visited was in Kamchatka, the mountain region, and mountain and volcanoes. There are volcanoes there. So it was the volcano museum, and they have information about volcanoes and how they work. It was amazing. It was a small museum, a local museum, it was just amazing, about volcanoes. Wow. And all the lava and stuff. Wow. Amazing.

I think the coolest museum I've ever been to is actually a museum of Kurdish history, which is located in the center of Erbil, which is the oldest continuously inhabited human settlement ever. It's about 5,000 years old. And inside they have a collection of carpets through the centuries. It's quite funny. But that's not because of what is in there, it's because of where it is and what is around it, which is a building that's 5,000 years old.

So, dear listener, when the examiner asks you, when did you go to a museum? Or when did you do that or this? You just give a direct answer. A long time ago, a week ago, a year ago, or I don't remember when. So just give a short answer. Don't go, "Oh, I've been going to museums." No, like when, a long time ago. Or last week or I don't remember. And then you say, maybe I went there in summer. It must have been in summer. So perhaps it was in summer. And, I went to the volcano museum, to the Natural History Museum, just lie, just name a museum, or to the art gallery. Just say something, right?

Extra points for grammar. Models of deduction, it must have been, might have been, it could have been.

You could also talk about the type of history.

Social history, local history, military history. That's one of my favorites.

Not for museums, just for reading.

Yeah.

And you can say, well, I visited the Air and Space museum last week. There was nothing to see there. And it's a joke, dear listener. Air and space museum, nothing to see, they're just air and space. And you didn't see anything. Yes, you can crack jokes. All right, that's fine.

Just make sure they're funny.

Yeah, or just stupid. Even if you are not a museum person, like I'm not into museums, I don't like it, just say something, okay? Maybe once in your life you visited a museum, so just imagine that it was last week. I don't often visit museums or I regularly visit museums. In Rory's country, the admission fees are usually very high. It is what you pay.

To get in to the museum.

The admission fees. And I don't like staring at the exhibits. Exhibits is what you see at a museum. Different artifacts, exhibits, objects. So what is on display there?

You stare at them, you look at them. Maybe you interact with them.

Exhibit. Actually, C1.

Exhibit is a C1 level word.

C1, yeah.

Nice.

See?

Not quite band nine vocabulary, but it'll do.

So an object that is shown to the public in a museum, okay? So this museum has a fascinating collection, a lovely collection of exhibits from Iron Age to, I don't know, modern times. For example, I went to see the new dinosaur exhibit. So there was a dinosaur in a museum. Loads of museums, lots of museums. So you can say, yeah, I have a lot of museums where I live, or I don't have many museums. Just like art galleries. And then you should name maybe one or two museums which are most popular in your city, town, village, where you live. Or maybe closer to where you live. In your country, perhaps. So just Google most popular museums in your country. I think, Rory, in Great Britain, the most popular one is the British Museum, but also the Beatles museum in Liverpool is pretty popular.

That wouldn't surprise me. I'm not going to either of them, but that would not surprise me.

You've never been to the Beatles Museum in Liverpool?

I have, I think I was in the British Museum about 10 years ago when I first started being a teacher and I took some students on a tour.

Yeah, but what about the Beatles Museum?

I've seen Beatles Museum. I haven't been inside it.

Ooh, la, la. How crazy.

There's just no need for me to be there.

Ah, okay.

I'm not very musical.

Museums are curated, dear listener.

That just means they are looked after and maintained.

And usually we use this verb about exhibitions, museums, so curate an exhibition. So to be in charge of selecting different objects, different exhibits, to care for the exhibits in a museum, in an art gallery. This exhibition is well curated. I don't see the point of museums, okay? Or you can say, yeah, museums are important because they have important collections of different exhibits, of history, right? They store things for future generations. Like store, they keep things, they preserve things, exhibits, items, paintings for future generations. But I'm not a big fan. So you can say, I'm not a big fan of museums.

No, not a big fan at all.

I don't think I'll visit more museums in the future, or you can say, yeah, I'm into museums. I'm a big fan of museums. I enjoy museums. I'm a museum person.

A museumist.

A museumist? No, no, we don't have such a word.

No.

I'm a museum person. Or I'm just into museums. I'm a big fan of museums. And I don't think that's very likely. Likely, like probable. I'm unlikely to visit more museums in the future. Probably, I won't visit more museums in the future. And I could swing by one of many in town. I could swing by, I could pop into. So I could visit one of them. I could swing by.

So swing by is a very natural way of saying...

Yeah, I could pop in a museum when I feel like it.

Only if I feel like it.

Yeah, just to go briefly somewhere. So I could swing by your house, I could swing by the store on my way home, I could swing by your place. So we had two jokes about museums, dear listener. Another joke.

Oh, good. Another joke. I just love another science joke. Another museum joke even, I should say.

Okay, okay. It's about an art museum. As I was leaving the art museum, I got arrested for stealing a painting. Okay? So I was leaving a museum. I got arrested for stealing a painting. I found it very strange because earlier, the guide told me that I could take a picture.

Oh, god.

Rory, explain the joke.

So if you take a picture, then you obviously photograph something, but if you take a picture really, then you take it for yourself, you steal it.

Ha ha ha ha ha.

Maybe the people that stole all the paintings from the Louvre were thinking that. They didn't steal paintings though, they stole jewelry, I suppose.

Louvre. The Louvre. Yeah. Jewelry, yeah. Thank you very much for listening. Bye.

Bye.