I'm still waiting for the specific date when I start work there. Frustrating. Although, it is becoming more and more tangible, partly perhaps because I went for my first jabs this week. Typhoid in my left arm, as that's the one that will hurt most they breezily informed me while wielding the needle, and combined Hep A&B in the other. Not too painful at all at the time, it seemed to me. To be honest I was more concerned with how I looked as I left the surgery with the fluffy ball of cotton wool taped to each arm (ridiculous, is how I looked). However, woke next morning with shoulders and upper arms stiff as a board. Followed by very mild sniffles, probably because of the typhoid jab.

I've also been filling in a questionnaire in preparation for a coaching session next week. The support for the personal development aspect of the ILO scheme is really thorough. The questions included some highly sensible ones about objectives and commitments, as well as a couple I didn't entirely understand if I'm honest. But I know I'll get help and support, which is what matters really I suppose.

I'll be working with the Civic Forum for Housing, an umbrella organization that supports various charities working on housing and land rights issues. The Forum wants to build its profile in order to recruit more member-charities and improve its fundraising. So I'll be developing a brand with them and producing brand/profile policies and documentation - I absolutely can't wait to get stuck in.

I'll be based in Lusaka but will travel to visit the various charities, one of which is in Livingstone, which I hope (or should I say, presume) means I'll get to visit Victoria Falls. The African name for the Falls is Mosi-oa-Tunya, which means 'smoke that thunders' - name sort of says it all, really. According to my research transport across the country is neither quick nor comfortable. On my return to Wales, I think I'll be complaining a lot less about the A470.

I'm one of about 15 (lucky) people from all over Wales going to Africa as part of the Assembly's International Learning Opportunities (ILO) scheme. The scheme provides development opportunites for managers from the Welsh public sector and helps Wales fulfill the UN's Millennium Development Goals as part of the Wales for Africa initiative.

At a presentation last week for people who went to Africa last year Carwyn Jones, the First Minister, talked about Wales's contribution to development in Africa. For instance Wales makes up about a quarter of all the UK's links with hospitals in Africa - we really punch above our weight when it comes to international development. I've felt many things since I found out I had a place on the scheme (excited, mostly anxious...) but listening to that speech I felt really proud.

More details will follow very soon.

The art cart starts this saturday (31st July). Come and make a paper flower ring!

The exhibition has been created by the BioSyB Dept as a contribution to the International Year of Biodiversity. The exhibition looks at some of the ways in which we can help reduce the loss of biodiversity. Look out for this touring exhibition at other Amgueddfa Cymru venues during the rest of the year.

Annette Townsend

Michael Houlihan, the departing Director General of Amgueddfa Cymru – National Museum Wales, reflected on his time as head of the organization by delivering a lecture at National Museum Cardiff on Wednesday 14 July 2010.

After seven years in this key role, Mr Houlihan will be leaving in the coming weeks to take up his new post as Chief Executive of the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa. Amgueddfa Cymru – National Museum Wales announced earlier this week that David Anderson, Director of Learning and Interpretation at the Victoria and Albert Museum, has been appointed as his replacement.

To read the lecture in its entirety, please click here

The ‘Spring Bulbs for Schools’ project allows 1000s of schools scientists to work with Amgueddfa Cymru-National Museum Wales to investigate and understand climate change.

Since October 2005, school scientists across Wales have been keeping weather records and noting when their flowers open, as part of a long-term study looking at the effects of temperature on spring bulbs.

See Professor Plant's reports attached or download the spreadsheet to study the trends for yourself!

Many Thanks

Professor Plant

Thanks to everyone who came to our brand new art club. We were looking at nature and printmaking and made some beautiful pictures with potato prints, leaf prints and leaf rubbings.

Our next art club is on saturday 4th September from 2pm until 3.15pm, places must be booked in advance so please phone our education department on 029 2057 3424 as soon as possible.

Art Club allows families to spend more time exploring different art and craft techniques, the September art club will continue to look at nature, but i haven't decided exactly what we'll be doing yet!

Meanwhile, our regular drop-in summer art cart sessions will be running throughout August... more information to come.

]]>http://www.museumwales.ac.uk/en/blog?entry=297Wed, 07 Jul 2010 00:00:00 +0000Ben Rowson reports on a recent Bioblitz day:

On 22 May, "Bioblitz" species recording events were taking place nationwide. I led a snail and slug search as part of Swansea City Council’s Bioblitz at Bishop’s Wood Local Nature Reserve (Caswell Bay, Gower). We found several species, a few of which I’m now checking the identity of at the Museum, although there must be many others present in this old woodland. I suspect the dry weather is to blame for the slim pickings, showing the importance of timing and return visits. Always nice to see the "land winkle" Pomatias elegans though, and several people were surprised to discover just how tiny the adult "dwarf snail" Punctum pygmaeum is. At 1.5 millimetres, more than 10,000 would fit in a matchbox!

The service was 'iterated' (i.e. the sacred words and songs recited) three times, and was also filmed. Keep an eye on this 'ere blog for video updates in the very near future.

Yesterday was particularly special, as members of the public attended the service - some from the area where the church was originally built, near Pontarddulais. Others were practicing Catholics, who, while familiar with some of the rites, were surprised at how moving an experience it was, especially in the presence of the murals.

I was in my Tudor costume, not for show, but to see how comfortable it would be to participate in a Tudor service in an appropriate costume (i.e. one with a wooden corset). There was at least 20 minutes of prostrate kneeling - that's on your knees, with your nose as close to the floor as possible - in the ritual. I felt that I should enter into the spirit of things (no pun intended) to get the most out of the experience. It was, to my surprise, much more comfortable in Tudor costume than in my civvies. Margery Kempe, a woman whose devotional practices were recorded in the 15th Century, describes how you can roll up the front of your dress to create a kneeling cushion. It worked to a degree, but I'm still nursing bruises!

Shortly after the service finished, we were beseiged by a pensioners' trip from South East London. The solemn atmosphere created by the chanting and kneeling was replaced by an impromptu rendition of 'We'll keep a welcome in the hillside'. It was very, very surreal and I may have got a bit too excited - I caught it all on camera, so maybe I'll try making a mashup of both films!

In all seriousness though, The 'Reconciliation of Penitents' was a very moving service, which served in the past to welcome sinners who had been excluded from the community back into the Church. All the clergy, students, singers, academics and anthropologists involved made a huge effort, and I hope they learned as much as I did from the experience. After a short break from all things Tudor (aka a trip to Barry Island), we will be discussing how we can use the footage and audio of the service. What would you like to see?

]]>http://www.museumwales.ac.uk/en/blog?entry=295Fri, 25 Jun 2010 00:00:00 +0000

Sun prints! They are such fun to make and really beautiful too. We'll be making some on the 3rd July at our new art club]]>http://www.museumwales.ac.uk/en/blog?entry=294Mon, 21 Jun 2010 00:00:00 +0000Well, it's all been happening in the last few weeks!  

As you know from the last post, we lost one of the four original chicks around 23 May. On Saturday 29 May it was a rainy day and so we limited the event to the Museum. Then, at about 12.20 a lady rushed into the Museum to say that some people outside near City Hall had found a chick on the pavement and were "kicking" it to make it fly off. James and I rushed outside to see what was going on and there was a chick on the road, surrounded by people. It obviously had jumped the nest a bit too early, as it couldn't fly yet.  

So we contacted Adrian Williams, local falconer who we're consulting with, who came down to check it over. He said it was fine, just a bit underweight. James and Adrian took the chick back to City Hall roof where the chick was placed just under the clock tower. By the bank holiday Monday, the bird had made it back onto the tower, but not to the nest. 

In the week or two after we have only ever seen two juvenile birds at one time, so it looks as if the third one did not get enough food from its parents and was out-competed by its siblings. Sad news. 

However, the remaining two are now flying! They're coming up against their own challenges as the gulls try to mob them as they practice their flying skills, but it doesn't seem to be deterring them from making significant progress. They're beginning to look quite adept, so do come down and see us soon, as we'll be seeing some aerial acrobatics as the young birds get taught their hunting skills by the adults.  

Sarah Lewis

It will be the first Latin service to take place in St Teilo's Church since it was moved 50 miles down the M4, from near Pontarddulais, to the Museum. Part of a wider conference exploring worship in the Middle Ages, the service will be open to the public, but booking is absolutely essential. The conference is a meeting of experts from around the world, who study the nitty-gritty of everyday life, Latin texts, architecture, archaeology and visual history, to build a fuller picture of what life was like over 500 years ago. We will be testing their theories out, and you are welcome to come and help us!

In a way, the performance will help us at the museum to see whether our reconstruction of the Church - a lengthy process of research, archaeology and good ol' Vitamin Compromise - is right. We'll also be able to help researchers to see whether current theories about the performance of liturgy actually work when you try them out. We've yet to find a real Tudor priest we can phone to check these things out: so the only way to learn, really, is by trial and error. That's until I find a flux capacitor in the collection somewhere, obviously.]]>http://www.museumwales.ac.uk/en/blog?entry=292Thu, 17 Jun 2010 00:00:00 +0000Over the last fortnight we've been working on the roof and it's almost finished. We've used seven bails of reed to thatch the roof, each bail contains between 80-100 bundles of reed. As you can see we've gone through quite a lot!

Take a look at photographs. You can see the bundles being placed in between the hazel rod purlins before Dafydd uses a wooden paddle to beat the roof into shape.

I hope you can spot your drawings in these photos - i'll be adding some more soon!

We are on to our second collage already! Come and help us make some more wonderful works of art!

Staff, and our peregrine-cam visitors, noticed yesterday that there were only two chicks in the nest. So our first thought was that we had lost two!  

Luckily the third chick returned to the nest in the evening after having been on a journey around the clock tower ledge.  

Today the RSPB project officer has spent the day looking for the fourth chick, but to no avail. It seems unlikely that the chick is still alive.  

One possible explanation is that the chick was the weakest of the four, and that the hot weather over the last few days has been too much for it to cope.  

The three remaining chicks look very healthy and have a very good chance of surviving, particularly as the weather seems to be getting cooler.

Here are some images of the 4 chicks and the parents feeding the chicks.

My personal favourite moths on the night were the Lunar Marbled Brown and the Nut-Tree Tussock. Here's a list of all the species we found - thanks to Dave at SEWBReC for this!

Micropterix thunbergella

Eriocrania subpurpurella

Agonopterx cf heracliana

Capua vulgana

Dark-barred Twinspot Carpet

Small Phoenix

Golden-rod Pug

Mottled Pug

Brimstone

Coxcomb Prominent

Lunar Marbled Brown

Flame Shoulder

Common Quaker

Hebrew Character

Nut-tree Tussock

Pictures and loads more info on moths can be found at UK Moths

Eight eggs were laid on the 27th of April and finally hatched yesterday. The chicks are so small you can only really see them when they open their mouths. Mr & Mrs Great Tit are now very busy feeding their family in the woodlands at St.Fagans.

Dafydd's had plenty to think about though. The first six rafters went up easily but then he had to decide where to place the ring-beam - inside or outside the rafters? As you can see from the pictures he place them outside the rafters. You can find out why in Dafydd's diary.

Once the ring beam was placed the next set of rafters went up quickly. They were notched, allowing them to hook onto the ring-beam and then lashed with tarred string. A second ring-beam was then placed lower down. Before long we will be thatching.

Link to Dafydd's diary http://www.theroundhouse.org/dafsdiary.htm

 After last year's disappointment having 4 chicks this year is fantastic and they all look very healthy.

 They are growing rapidly so keep watching to see how they are doing.

I hope you enjoy the pictures below, apologies for the poor quality of my photography but the lighting is quite subdued in the gallery!

Thank you to everyone who came to the art cart over the bank holiday weekend to make passports. There was some fantastic work and i'll be putting up some more pictures as soon as possible!

Thanks to everyone who called in over the bank holiday weekend - it was great fun!