Solo Trip - Taiwan (July 2023) - Taichung NSM 黄帝内经 Huangdi Neijing

Before we move on to the next exhibit, I thought I'll do one dedicated to the 黄帝内经. This is the Emperor's book that contains advice on how to live a long and healthy life. I though it was interesting and actually stood there and took every screenshot you see here :)  I mean, where else can I find such knowledge for a banana like me? Not gonna write much in this post. It's just a collection of screenshot for sharing, and for you to ponder over. 

Ref: 黄帝内经 

Solo Trip - Taiwan (July 2023) - Taichung NSM The Journey of Human Life

Next comes a hall all about ourself! Humans! The Journey of Human Life. Isn't it a nice touch that they placed a pregnant lady statue there? Just before you were born.... Again, I thought this hall would be boring, and AGAIN, pleasantly surprised. Everything here is so hands-on!

One of the exhibit was a station with three machines that helps uniquely identify you. This was the first time I've seen something so advance in a science museum. Am I that outdated? Or should I visit more museums? I had a lot of fun here learning more about my own trademark.

The first was Iris recognition. There is a camera that actually scans your iris and tells you more about it. This is not new since it's already being used by coms immigration system in the certain countries.

Next is voice recognition. You can actually speak into a mic and they will mark out the voice print. I wonder how reliable this was. 

Last was the fingerprint. Even our mobile phone uses this nowadays. Interestingly, my mobile can't recognised my fingerprint if I go to a cold country and all my skins dried up. It took nearly a month before the normal print is visible again for the mobile to detect it. 

There is also a heat image camera. I wonder, is this same as aura photo? Some places charged you money to get a photo like that. I took mine here for free. Don't mind the hand blocking my face, I was trying to take a selfie :P

Next, an eyeball motion detection. Wow, this was the first time I played with this. You could use your eyeballs to move the mouse around on the screen. It was so cool!

Next, a lot on aging of the human body, how we grow old and breakdown. Yes, a bit depressing. But better to know more about it so that we know what to expect, then be caught by surprise, right? At this age and time, science and technology has advanced so much that we are living longer and longer. But living longer should also come hand in hand with quality of life and health!

Some advice on how to keep your brain healthy to slow down aging. I guess once our brains are gone, it is as good as our whole existence is gone. Our memories, our abilities to remember, to reason, to understand etc. Gone. So do try to keep yourself active physically, as well as mentally. Play games if you have to. Do things that may looked childish if you have to, like painting, drawing, arts and craft. Learn. Keep on learning. Languages, knowledge, DIY, anything! There is more to life than just growing old and dying!

The exhibit closes with how human tries to achieve immortality, from long time back till today. They have the Egyptians Mummy, where all the organs and the whole body is preserved. With all the religious scripts surrounding it, hoping that the dead lives on in another life, or perhaps can be brought back to life again one day? Preserved, just in case they need anything when they are back?

The Chinese too have their own mummies. The Jade Burial, where the body is covered in a suit of jade to preserved it. 

And now? the coolest of it all, literally, nitrogen freezing via cryogenic tanks. I mean, I've seen these in documentaries and movies before, but to see it in real life right in front of you, kinda make the future seems closer than you imagine it to be. It was a surprisingly educational exhibit on human from start to finish!

Solo Trip - Taiwan (July 2023) - Taichung NSM Pre-historic Humans

 

Right at the end of the dinosaur exhibit, we come next to the homo sapiens, or the cave man era. No they did not exist on the same time as dinosaurs, they came after. Again, the exhibit, although small, was beautifully curated. Like the above, it shows network of caves and how homo sapiens find shelter in these caves to keep themselves safe from the natural elements and wild beast. 

And apparently, fire was already discovered by this time, so the caves are illuminated.

They also have displays of different homo sapiens from different period. Do we call them all sapiens? Think not. Neanderthals perhaps? You could also compare it with the ape family in terms of the skeleton structure.

The above does exactly that, showing you the similarity between humans, apes, monkeys etc. Same same, but different!

There were also a beautiful glass displayed of the ancient humans. Man, the aesthetic of this place, I just can't say enough of it!

I also took this picture of the origin of species which would probably be banned in my own country, lol.

It also kinda reminded me of the story Animal Farm. I leave you here with below photos which I can't even recall why I took it except that it looked so beautiful. I think it is a one-glance summary of the earth's evolution. 

Solo Trip - Taiwan (July 2023) - Taichung NSM Dinosaurs!

 

The highlight of my visit to the Natural Science Museum was to see the dinosaurs! Finally I reached this magnificent hall! And I was so not disappointed. I guess in many ways, I wasn't expecting much of a museum in the middle of Taiwan. Thank goodness I was pleasantly surprised. The above photo is the entrance to the dinosaur hall, and it was only the ground level.  At one glance, you could already see all the highlights! And what is beautiful about the hall, unlike the other halls that I went through, this one has huge glass windows that lets the natural light in, shining directly on the skeletons of the giant lizards. 

It was nice they put the skeleton near the windows, while still having the t-rex in the middle of the hall. 

Above the two baby dinosaurs reminded me of those found in the movie Jurassic Park. 

The silhouette of the giant lizard is just too beautiful.

Here's from a scale perspective, the guardian of the dinosaur hall sitting in front of it.

Besides the ground level, you could also go up to the more detailed exhibit about the dinosaur. Here you will find smaller lizards, but still dinosaurs no doubt. 

There were smaller dinosaurs everywhere, and also some pictures of dinosaur fossils. 

Here we have the transition from lizard to bird via the flying dinosaur species. 

Lots of student were understandably excited to see the dinosaurs. They teacher or guide were also passionate about explaining it to them. I'm wondering, is there even a science museum in Malaysia? 

Besides the usual educational display, there were also other funner display to be found. Like this one on how the dinosaur disappeared. 

Lastly, here is another great display of the death of the dinosaur. I'll leave it to you for interpretation :P

Solo Trip - Taiwan (July 2023) - Taichung NSM The Evolution Of Life

The next exhibit I entered was on The Evolution of Life! Biology was my favourite subject in school, and I've even considered minor in it in university, so I was actually thinking of skipping this whole section, thinking that it would be rather boring. But as an act of duty, I still have to walked through the exhibit to get my money's worth! How truly asian!

Well, the displays more or less captured my attention. I mean, look at the above photos. I can't tell what they are and I'm already hooked. It looked so anime-like! I really really like the colour scheme of the whole place! And to think every hall has a special scheme based on it's subject.

I was also captivated by this alien looking thing. It immediately caught my attention and draw me to it. But I realised after reading that it was just a magnified primitive life form.  I think it was a jelly fish.

There was a section on the importance of water to life. I really love how they bring the point across with this display that 70% of our body is made out of water! It's a very multi-dimensional way of getting things across, and I really love it. You don't even need to read or imagine what it was like, they show it to you in 3d!

Slowly, deeper in, plant forms become animal forms. It was easy to explain it, but to have this poster with a few words and stunning illustration of life is just thoughtful. You can see that so much thoughts and passion has gone into the display!

One of the memorable display was this weird komodo looking lizard crawling up what looks like mud slope. But if you zoom into it, you can see it shows life, from water medium slowly evolving into legged lizards crawling up into land. 

Ok, maybe it was a dinosaur instead of a komodo dragon. But you know what is amazing about it? The creature is moving forward in the evolution stages, and it is looking up to looked like a dragon! How awesome! That must be the pinnacle of evolution! To become a heavenly dragon! My personal favourite since I'm born in the year of the dragon :)  It's the little things in the exhibit that kinda highlight a small private joke here and there that makes this place so entertaining. 

Family tree of dinosaurs?

Human civilisation. I'm almost embarrassed. Lol.

Remember those school excursion kids? I found more of them here with a very passionate teacher or staff giving them a talk about evolution and dinosaur. That was more than what my Baptist Biology Teacher ever did in class. Due to religious belief, she skipped the whole of evolution chapter during my A-levels! It was a sad realisation for me, that often my favourite teacher lets me down due to their religious belief..... Leaving you here with the disappearance of the great lizards! We will see them soon in the next exhibit hall! (I think).

Solo Trip - Taiwan (July 2023) - Taichung NSM Sketches

Besides the dedicated exhibit halls, there were also small popups exhibit in the common area connecting the halls together. While I was there, there was a display on natural science sketches, and they were so beautiful that they deserve a posting by themselves! The beauty of a scientific sketch is to get every minute details that differentiate each plants or a creature apart. Above is a collection of crabs, each different. Isn't it amazing?

Simple plant sketches highlighting the leaves and vein is in its' self beautiful. Everything natural is beautiful. The colour scheme just naturally calms the nerves.

Flowers add colours to the natural world and many famous paintings are of flowers. But natural sketches is more to capture the actual look of a species of flowers instead of an artistic interpretation of it. I think sketching is a great hobby to develop. It helps you see things in details, documents it, and you have a beautiful art piece as an end results. Ah..... It's one of my retirement hobby to take up, but there are still so many things to do that I've not gotten around it yet even though all the materials are there ready!

A more impressionistic sketching of nature.... love the black background coloured paper. It really brings out the sketches in colour.

Lastly, some beautiful animal sketches.