The National Museum

Last Saturday, DH decided to go to his office to get some work done. I didn't want to stay idle at home, so I decided to take DD to the National Museum. Actually the idea of visiting the Museum had been brewing for a long time, but museums are not exactly DH's cup of tea and I didn't know how to get there by myself. Anyway, since the Museum is quite near to DH's office, he dropped DD and I there first before going to his office.

Prior to this visit, the only time that I'd been to the Museum was in 1984, when I was still an impressionable 12 year-old. My memory of the Museum is mainly of long, dark corridors with mannequins wearing traditional costumes. It seemed like a large place then.

Anyway, back to the present. I thought the entrance fee was ridiculously cheap: RM2 for me and free for DD. Upon entering the Museum, the first view welcoming us was the Hall, where there was an exhibition on AFF Suzuki Cup 2010. In case anyone missed the big news, Malaysia won the Cup. There in the Hall, you can have a view of the Championship Cup and another Cup won by one the Malaysian players (I think he won for scoring the most goals). There were photos of the players and officials, and there was even a telecast of the final match! So if anyone wants to relive the glory of Malaysian football, you may pay a visit to the Museum.

The Museum has 4 galleries, 2 each on the ground floor and on the first floor. The galleries are: the Neolithic Age, The Colonial Age, Malaysia Today and the Malay Kingdom.

We saw lots of bones and tembikar in the Neolithic Age gallery, mainly excavated from sites such as Lembah Bujang, Gua Cha (Kelantan), Perak, and the Borneo. I felt quite proud to discover that Gua Cha is the most important excavation site because a lot of bones were discovered there (haha).

The Colonial Age brought us through the usual fare: Portuguese occupation, Dutch colony, English rule and finally, Japanese occupation. An electronic display of the trading routes showed ships and camels plying the sea and land trails. I almost shuddered when I saw the uniforms worn by the Japanese soldiers and the bicycles that they used to travel along the peninsula. There's a section on the country's main products then: tin, rubber, coconuts and paddy.

Malaysia Today was the least interesting for me. I mean, even the name of the gallery can induce a yawn or two for the average Malaysian. There were sections on communism, early Malay writers, early newspapers, the country's prime ministers, and finally our very own Angkasawan program. But the one section that touched my heart was called 'Pahlawan Negara'. I shed a few drops of tears when I looked at photos of Tok Kenali, Mat Kilau and others. There were lumps in my throat, making it difficult for me to explain the significance of these individuals to DD.

The final gallery that we visited, the Malay Kingdom was the most interesting for us. There you'll see the Perak throne, old coins (we were so proud to see Kelantan gold coins), the head gears of all the sultanates in Malaysia, and really old maps of the old kingdoms. We laughed when we saw that the Kelantan Sultan's head gear is called 'Dastar Budu'. It certainly beats the more melancholic name of Perlis' 'Tanjak Dendam Tak Sudah'. We also saw old wedding gears, keris, jewelleries and tepak sirih and such.

What surprised me the most about the Museum was it's small size. It even seems smaller than the Selangor State Museum. I would have thought that the National Museum should have a bigger collection, befitting its 'National' status. It saddens me to note that our country's history is reduced to such a small collection. We completed our tour of the Museum in just one and a half ours. And we really took our time going through the entire place.

Within the same compound, there's another museum called Muzium Ethnologi Melayu, but we didn't visit it. There was also an on-going exhibition dedicated to Pahang Heritage in another building. Free guided tours of the National Museums are held at 10am on certain days of the week.

Overall, we had a good time there and DD wants to go again. She's such a good girl, paying attention to items that many other kids would find boring. Since it doesn't take long to tour the Museum, we're hoping that we can drag DH along next time. In the mean time, the next place we plan to visit is the Islamic Art Museum.