It was a very enjoyable day out with SK after class yesterday. I'd wanted to go to the Greek Sculpture Exhibition at National Museum of Art before it ends on Sunday and he was free to go and he had the car so we made plans. We reached the museum at 4.30pm and God's favour was upon us because it was free entry 6-8pm yesterday :) We hung around and snooped around the other exhibits till then to enter.
This was one of the first photos i snapped at the museum as we hung around, waiting for 6pm. i love the Victorian rustic stairs and sunny window.
A cool quote that i do not quite understand. weird greeks.
SK made me stand under this quote to snap a photo. It was a mini exercise in embarrassment since there were many guys trying to snap the quote and we were plotting how i could appear under the quote without being too conspicuous. it was hilarious as we scurried away after the crime. I've got to get him to send me the photo.
Having been there for the 3rd time, SK was my free guide. See the apple in Aphrodite's hand? It was the trophy for her unsurpassed beauty in the competition for the most beautiful goddess.
This is Ares, Aphrodite's lover. One of my favourite sculptures because he looked like he breathed. seriously. i stood there breathe abated for 5 minutes as i saw his chest heave with breathing and his flesh come to life. That's why i love Greek sculptures. I spent most of my time at the Greek gallery at the Met last summer. It was so glorious. I'll never forget.Of course, i was bemused yet again how Greek mythology has such scandalous "lives" having affairs and immoral relations left right center and yet the Greek people held the gods in such high regard. I think the Greek people must be a bunch of bored people who had to live vicariously through the lives of fictitious men and women burning with passion.
i was a little disappointed that there were so few sculptures and exhibits that we could finish seeing everything under an hour. And there was no Hercules. No complete Hercules at least. they could had small replicas of him that weren't intact. Perhaps i'd imagined it to be at least half as grand as the Greek Hall at Metropolitan Museum of Art. I remember the huge Constantine bust i saw last summer. I just stood there in awe. What was i thinking, to compare museums here with New York. But I'm still thankful that i got to see some sculptures on a sunny Friday evening.
I should have snapped more photos.
I saved $4 on my entrance fee for my $14 ramen dinner later. Ramen enthusiasts (read: Grace and Tobias) pls go and try Ken at Orchard Plaza if you haven't. very authentic japanese (according to SK) very delicious (yummy!). The shop front is very japanese too. I think it's one of the best ramen places i ever went to.
We popped by kinokuniya to get some books for his sunday school kids. it was the first time i hang around Kino till they closed. i didn't know they off the lights partially in a polite attempt to chase customers out 5 minutes before. interesting. The queue at the counter got longer the closer it got to the minute.
I was thumbing through The Notebook as i was waiting for SK to pay for his books. Reading through the novel once more made me a little sad. I never watched the movie, perhaps coz i love the book. It's hard explaining why; perhaps the love story was powerful to me because of how much it stands for what i desire. I would want to fall in love with a poet who lived vicariously. But more importantly, the story and writing had a kind of depth that affects me. A kind of emotion and tenacity that stands up under doubt, uncertainty, sickness, death and even.. memories. Love is made all the more harder the lovelier the memories and the reality of it slipping away from one's faculty forever, slowly but surely. And yet Noah hung on. and Allie did too, as long as she could.
would i hang on too? or will i allow myself to drift, to compromise?
I'm always stumped when people ask me how i view relationships and my status. I can only say my only fear is that i'm incapable of love and be loved. There is always the temptation to just be with someone to feed the loneliness. but my heart says no, it cannot do so. It must remain true to itself. But so much so i'm starting to wonder if it's not so much of the right person but an inability to love. I discovered a mind barrier to the heart not long ago and i'm still stupefied as to when i had allowed it to be erected. Was it the time i told myself "Never Again"? Or was God keeping me for the best at the best time? I'm not too sure, as always, but the answer will come some day, in a time of retrospection.