Royal Ontario Museum

My time is Toronto is just about over, and I thought I should use my last post to talk about what I think is probably the coolest place in Toronto. The Royal Ontario Museum, or ROM for short, is one of the premier museums of  Canada, and probably the best in Ontario. To give an idea of how expansive it is, I’ve been there twice, each time for three hours, and I’ve probably seen only 80% so far.

In any event, it’s a wonderful way to discover the history of the world’s cultures. My personal favorite exhibit was of the First Nations, who inhabited North America before European explorers made their way over.

The exhibit pays respect to  the people of First Nations by highlighting their historical tools and artifacts. I was particularly struck by the simple beauty of this summer dress from the Tr’ondek Hwech’in society that lived in the Yukon.

Not to mention this canoe, which was created in response to conduct trades due to its immense carrying capacity, illustrating how Canada’s indigenous people had prospering economies, even if they weren’t as technologically sophisticated as Europe came to develop.

The First Nations exhibit did a great job tracing the history of First Nations identity by incorporating centuries-old art with the work of contemporary artists. A favorite of mine was this undoubtedly wonderful piece by Jane Ash Poitras. Her powerful triptych Potato Peeling 101  to Ethnobotany 101 depicts the mistreatment First Nations children experienced when they were forced to assimilate into residential schools throughout the 20^th century. As a consequence, many First Nations traditions, such as medicinal treatments language were forced to be given up for the most “sophisticated” mores of white Canada. As you can see, the work juxtaposes historical narrative (the long pages of text) with children’s paintings of First Nations stories and motifs, symbolizing the surrender of their culture.

Also on the first floor is the not-to-be missed section devoted to Asian cultures. In sum, the exhibit explores Chinese, Japanese and Korean history through its art and artifacts. 

Particularly striking was the Korean pottery, not to mention statues of  Chinese royalty.

The exhibits on the third floor are just as exciting as the ones on the first, and is solely devoted to ancient civilizations (did you know there was once such a people called the Etruscans? I didn’t). As an econ major, I was very fascinated by the section of Byzantine coins. Specifically, it made me think of how in this day and age we tend to take pride in our government (bear with me) and think of each new idea as innovative and will “carry us forward.” The fact is, as this museum detailed, that many of the debates we have today, about government’s role in determining social and economic freedoms have been held throughout the history of politics. I was quite surprised then, to read all about how bureaucratic the Byzantine government was. In fact it was so powerful that it was able to regulate factories, set wages and prices, as well as maintain an active monetary policy.  That said, although they’re different in countless ways, the ancient world and our modern one are more similar and faced similar issues than people initially think.  To me, this really brings the ancient world to life. Usually we think of these civilizations as a bunch of people in white robes, but being able to see how they actually lived day to day is quite humanizing.

That’s why I was just as intrigued by these 2000 year old artifacts. The first of which shows two men assisting a cow giving birth and the second shows people providing a  (dead) beloved one with gifts for the afterlife before the final burial. They’re quite attention grabbing simply due to how they encapsulate what it was like to live in Egypt’s agricultural society. 

The fact that they’re in color, which is so well preserved, brings another layer of realism to the experience, and is also rather humbling. When we see the artwork of ancient civilizations, we’re a bit underwhelmed by how simple they are or the fact that they’re just drawings—two dimensional and barely lifelike by modern standards. However, looking at these figurines, we realized that they’re not very different from a typical child’s toy from as late as the 1920s. That is, two generations ago, certain aspects of our technological, “capitalist” economy weren’t much improved beyond what the ancient Egyptians could do thousands of years ago. That’s another way I noticed in which the present isn’t really that distinct from the past as we usually like to think we are.

In addition to the cultures of the First Nations, Eastern Asia and Egypt, much of the museum was devoted to European history. Particularly striking was the Roman exhibit’s sculpture displays.

What I especially liked about the Roman exhibit was how it captured the essence of everyday Romans in addition to great art. Yes, the most prominent bust on display is that of an emperor, but several of the portraits came from the remains of ancient Roman household.

A curious feature is how there’s a touch of realism the faces of this boy and young woman are, which is in contrast to how the Greeks depicted themselves. Instead, the Greeks valued pure, transcendent beauty above all. In this frieze over the ancient Greek exhibit, the simple forms illustrate the Greeks’ preference for beauty and idealism, in direct contrast to the Roman aesthetic.

 In another section of the third floor, the museum traces the history of Western Civilization in a very creative way. Spanning from Renaissance Italy to 1960s Toronto, the exhibit traces the history of the room. 

One thing that you couldn’t help notice is that with each step into the future, the rooms got more and more filled with stuff. Just looking at the renaissance bedroom to the 1960s room, you could see a room filled with a TV, radio, tables, couch, record collection, etc.  vs. just a bed and a harp, which just goes to show the radical extent to which scientific and economic ingenuity can benefit our lives.

There’s a lot more to see at the ROM, but one of the coolest things about it is that it lets you explore the evolution of cultures from disparate parts of the world. As globalization gets stronger and cultures blend with one another, cultural differences still persist, and institutions like the ROM allow us to see understand how those cultures came to be.

High Park

If I had more time to spend in Toronto, the thing I would most like to do is explore the park scene. Toronto is very environmentally conscious, so while they recognize urbanization is important for growth and staying economically healthy, they also conserve much land for parks and green spaces.

My favorite park is undoubtedly High Park, which is essentially Toronto’s Central Park (or if any Münchners are reading this, Englischer Garten).  There’s so much to explore that you really do need to return a few times before you’ve seen it all.

Just a 15 minute train ride from the St. George Station, High Park is where lots of Torontonians go for exercise and R&R, especially after work when the park hosts free (pay what you can) Shakespeare performances. 

As popular as it is though, in High Park it's always easy to escape the commotion and find a spot to oneself. That is, if you don't mind the company of a few dragonflies or a family of Geese waddling by. 

One of the landmarks of High Park is the flower garden, intricately designed to resemble classical landscaping of the 1700s. Personally, my favorite spot is along the banks of Grenadier Pond, where you can sit back and people-watch to your heart’s content. Afterwards, it’s fun to get lost in the park’s many windy escapes. Here’s a path that’s especially nice:

A Tale of Two Festivals

On July 9^th I had he pleasure of going to the Latin Festival, in which cultures from all over Latin America are celebrated. It’s only a few blocks, but there’s so much to see that you really need to walk from one end to the other a few times.

This was my first Toronto festival, and I was surprised to see the food options they had. While they certainly had typical “Latin food” I was more curious about the non-Latin stuff. For example, one of the most popular snacks was roasted corn. Outside of these stalls, customers were free to put whatever condiments they wanted on the corn. While they had obvious choices like salt and butter, there was actually a large variety of spices and herbs people could put on their corn. Also popular were coconuts and hollowed out pineapples you could drink out of, in addition to sugar cane juice. As for “Latin food,” vendors mainly sold what you’d find at a local taco stand: tacos, burritos, etc. The most interesting food stand was probably this:

Far and away the most popular attraction were all the dance studios giving free dance lessons to the crowd.

Unfortunately, as soon as I became entranced by the spicy rhythms and started shakin’ my bad self, the weather pulled a Cincinnati and started pouring out of nowhere.

Thus ended my Latin festival.

The other festival I went to was the South Asian festival, which mainly focused on Torontonians of Indian descent. As always, it was interesting to see what food was being served there. Just like at the Latin festival, vendors were selling mainly “typical” Indian food, such as goat curry, butter chicken, sides of rice, etc.

Curiously, this place also made use of the “non Latin” foods I mentioned above. Corn, coconuts and sugarcane were all there.  In all it was a pleasant afternoon, but I just wish they featured a stage performer to teach the crowd some Indian dances.

What was really curious though is that both festivals had very diverse attendance. While you could count on seeing people of Hispanic and Indian origin, I noticed that even those festivals they were a minority of the attendees. Neither were white people. As a matter of fact, it didn’t seem as if there was one predominant background in attendance, which is indicative of an interesting characteristic Toronto’s culture. When people talk about Toronto, the word “diverse” isn’t just some buzzword thrown around to make the city sound good. The city is really, truly diverse, that when the city holds festivals celebrating one of its many communities, the whole city comes out to celebrate and explore a culture that helps make Toronto the city everybody knows and loves.