Saturday, September 8, 2007

Seeing "Lucy" in Addis

A group of us travelling from Johannesburg missed our respective connecting flights in Addis Ababa.............. and so we had no choice but to stay the night in Ethiopia. We were put up at the Hilton. Thank God! At least the stay would be clean, comfortable & safe!

The next day we had ample time to take in the sights of the city as our respective connecting flights was only late in the evening. After breakfast, Anne, a Norwegian girl who was on the same flight and I decided to take a walk down to the Ethiopian National Museum which was not so far away. I'm glad we did. The weather was lovely and the conversations along the way was very enlightening.

The Museum houses numerous relics and archaeological artifacts from prehistoric times but of course the most famous is the 3.5 million year old skeleton of "Lucy" which is supposed to be the oldest hominid ever discovered. This is housed at the basement.........probably for better protection? It was an awesome sight coming face to face with someone who lived millions of years ago.


Only that........... what we saw was just the cast/replica/copy of the real one. The real "Lucy" is safe in a lab.........somewhere in Addis.

1 comment:

lauren bergold said...

ooooooooooh you had me at "ethiopian national museum"!!! :) wow--to see LUCY--(even a replica) now that is *something*!!! ...and to think i was excited about that comparative youngster...KING TUT!!!